The
chancellor said to me,
"You have produced a great effect, but especially have you
triumphed over the cabal by the nobility of your manners and the
dignity of your mien; and thus you have deprived it of one of its
greatest engines of mischief, that of calumniating your person."
"They imagined then," said I to him, "that I could neither speak
nor be silent, neither walk nor sit still."
"As they wished to find you ignorant and awkward they have set
you down as such. This is human nature: when we hate any one, we
say they are capable of any thing; then, that they have become
guilty of every thing; and, to wind up all, they adopt for truth
to-day what they invented last night."
"Were you not fearful?" inquired the king.
"Forgive me, sire," I answered, "when I say that I feared lest I
should not please your majesty; and I was excessively desirous of
convincing mesdames of my respectful attachment."
This reply was pronounced to be fitting and elegant, altho' I had
not in any way prepared it. The fact is, that I was in great
apprehension lest I should displease the king's daughters; and I
dreaded lest they should manifest too openly the little friendship
which they had towards me. Fortunately all passed off to a miracle,
and my good star did not burn dimly in this decisive circumstance.
Amongst those who rejoiced at my triumph I cannot forget the duc
d'Aiguillon.
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