princes had been better instructed, he would neither have been trusted
nor employed, and this it was his object to prevent, hoping that he
should live much longer than he did. The Queen-mother found all that the
Cardinal did perfectly right; and, besides, it suited her purpose that he
should be indispensable. It is almost a miracle that the King should
have become what he afterwards was.

I never saw the King beat but two men, and they both well deserved it.
The first was a valet, who would not let him enter the garden during one
of his own fetes. The other was a pickpocket, whom the King saw emptying
the pocket of M. de Villars. Louis XIV., who was on horseback, rode
towards the thief and struck him with his cane; the rascal cried out,
"Murder! I shall be killed!" which made us all laugh, and the King
laughed, also. He had the thief taken, and made him give up the purse,
but he did not have him hanged.

The Duchesse de Schomberg was a good deal laughed at because she asked
the King a hundred questions, which is not the fashion here. The King
was not well pleased to be talked to; but he never laughed in any one's
face.

When Louvois proposed to the King for the first time that he should
appoint Madame Dufresnoy, his mistress, a lady of the Queen's bedchamber,
His Majesty replied, "Would you, then, have them laugh at both of us?"
Louvois, however, persisted so earnestly in his request that the King at
length granted it.

The Court of France was extremely agreeable until the King had the
misfortune to marry that old Maintenon; she withdrew him from company,
filled him with ridiculous scruples respecting plays, and told him that