When the comtesse de Bourbon Busset came to return me her
acknowledgments for what I had done, she accompanied it with a
request for a fresh interference on my part: this was to obtain
for her husband the title of duke and peer. Accordingly I
mentioned her wishes to the king, observing at the same time how
very surprising it was that one so nearly related to the house of
Bourbon should not have reached the honors of the ducal peerage:
to which Louis XV replied, that he had no desire to increase the
number of princes of the blood, of whom there were quite sufficient
of legitimate birth without placing the illegitimate upon the same
footing; that Louis XIV had been a sufficient warning of the folly
of acting too indulgently towards these latter, who were only so
many additional enemies to the royal authority. To all this I
answered, that it was not fitting to treat the family of Bourbon
Busset, however illegitimate might be its origin, as though it
merely belonged to the
, etc.; but my arguments
were in vain, and, as the proverb says, "I talked to the wind."
My friends recommended me not to press the subject, and the matter
ended there. However, in order to smooth the refusal as much as
possible, I procured M. de Bourbon Busset the appointment of first
gentleman usher to the young prince.
The establishment of the comtesse d'Artois was now formed. M.
de Cheglus, bishop of Cahors, had the post of first almoner; and
strange to say, although a prelate, was a man of irreproachable
virtue; he had little wit but strong sense, and was better known
by his many charitable deeds than by the brilliancy of his
sayings.
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