MEMOIRS OF LOUIS XIV AND HIS COURT AND OF THE REGENCY

BY THE DUKE OF SAINT-SIMON



VOLUME 13.




CHAPTER XCVII

To go back, now, to the remaining events of the year 1719.

The Marquise de Charlus, sister of Mezieres, and mother of the Marquis de
Levi, who has since become a duke and a peer, died rich and old. She was
the exact picture of an "old clothes" woman and was thus subject to many
insults from those who did not know her, which she by no means relished.
To relieve a little the seriousness of these memoirs, I will here relate
an amusing adventure of which she was heroine.

She was very avaricious, and a great gambler. She would have passed the
night up to her knees in water in order to play. Heavy gambling at
lansquenet was carried on at Paris in the evening, at Madame la Princesse
de Conti's. Madame de Charlus supped there one Friday, between the
games, much company being present. She was no better clad than at other
times, and wore a head-dress, in vogue at that day, called commode, not
fastened, but put on or taken off like a wig or a night-cap. It was
fashionable, then, to wear these headdresses very high.