The marquise de 1' Hopital came to solicit my interest for the
prince de Soubise, her lover. I replied, that his majesty would
rather have the marechal for his friend than his minister; that,
in fact, the different appointments had taken place; and that, if
the names of the parties were not immediately divulged, it was
to spare the feelings of certain aspirants to the ministry: madame
de 1' Hopital withdrew, evidently much disconcerted at my reply.
Certainly M. de Soubise must have lost his reason, when he supposed
that the successor of M. de Choiseul would be himself, the most
insignificant prince of France; he only could suppose that he was
equal to such an elevation. However this may be, he took upon
himself to behave very much like an offended person for some days;
but, finding such a line of conduct produced no good, he came
round again, and presented himself as usual at my parties, whilst
I received him as though nothing had occurred.
I had more difficulty in freeing myself from the importunities
of Messieurs de Broglie and de Maillebois. I had given to each
of them a sort of promise; I had allowed them to hope, and yet,
when the time came to realize these hopes, I told them, that I
possessed much less influence than was generally imagined; to
which they replied, that they knew my power to serve them was
much greater than I appeared to believe. After a while, I
succeeded in deadening the expectations of M.
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