Lamothe-Langon, Etienne Leon, baron de, 1786-1864
"Memoirs of the Comtesse Du Barry, with minute details of her entire career as favorite of Louis XV. Written by herself"
The
of the furnished me
likewise with a long account of the many visits paid by his
majesty to her establishment. The fact was, the king could not
be satisfied without a continual variety, and his passion, which
ultimately destroyed him, appeared to have come on only as he
advanced in years.
All these things created in my mind an extreme agitation and an
alarm, and, improbable as the thing appeared even to myself, there
were moments when I trembled lest I should be supplanted either
by the baroness or some -fresh object of the king's caprice; and
again a cold dread stole over me as I anticipated the probability
of the health of Louis XV falling a sacrifice to the irregularity
of his life. It was well known throughout the chateau, that La
Martiniere, the king's surgeon, had strongly recommended a very
temperate course of life, as essentially necessary to recruit his
constitution, wasted by so many excesses, and had even gone so
far as to recommend his no longer having a mistress; this the
courtiers construed into a prohibition against his possessing a
friend of any other sex than his own; for my own part, I
experienced very slight apprehensions of being dismissed, for I
well knew that Louis XV reckoned too much on my society to
permit my leaving the court, and if one, the more tender, part
of our union were dissolved, etiquette could no longer object to
my presence.
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