real power of Madame de Maintenon over the king's mind peeped out more
and more into broad daylight. She promoted it dexterously by her extreme
anxiety to please him, as well as by her natural and sincere attachment
to the children whom she had brought up, and who had a place near the
heart of Louis XIV. Already the young Duke of Maine had been sent to the
army at the dauphin's side; the king was about to have him married
[August 29, 1692] to Mdlle. de Charolais; carefully seeking for his
natural children alliances amongst the princes of his blood, he had
recently given Mdlle. de Nantes, daughter of Madame de Montespan, to the
duke, grandson of the great Conde. "For a long time past," says St.
Simon, "Madame de Maintenon, even more than the king, had been thinking
of marrying Mdlle. de Blois, Madame de Montespan's second daughter, to
the Duke of Chartres; he was the king's own and only nephew, and the
first moves towards this marriage were the more difficult in that
Monsieur was immensely attached to all that appertained to his greatness,
and Madame was of a nation which abhorred misalliances, and of a
character which gave no promise of ever making this marriage agreeable to
her." The king considered himself sure of his brother; he had set his
favorites to work, and employed underhand intrigues. "He sent for the
young Duke of Chartres, paid him attention, told him he wanted to have
him settled in life, that the war which was kindled on all sides put out
of his reach the princesses who might have suited him, that there were no
princesses of the blood of his own age, that he could not better testify
his affection towards him than by offering him his daughter whose two
sisters had married princes of the blood; but that, however eager he
might be for this marriage, he did not want to put any constraint upon
him, and would leave him full liberty in the matter. This language,
addressed with the awful majesty so natural to the king to a prince who
was timid, and had not a word to say for himself, put him at his wits'
end." He fell back upon the wishes of his father and mother. "That is