es felt relieved at no
longer being obliged to dine together.

Thus never was change greater or more marked than that brought about by
the death of Monseigneur. That prince had become the centre of all hope
and of all fear, a formidable cabal had seized upon him, yet without
awakening the jealousy of the King, before whom all trembled, but whose
anxieties did not extend beyond his own lifetime, during which, and very
reasonably, he feared nothing.

Before I go any further, let me note a circumstance characteristic of the
King. Madame la Dauphine went every day to Marly to see him. On the day
after the death of Monseigneur she received, not without surprise, easily
understood, a hint from Madame de Maintenon. It was to the effect that
she should dress herself with some little care, inasmuch as the
negligence of her attire displeased the King! The Princess did not think
that dress ought to occupy her then; and even if she had thought so, she
would have believed, and with good reason, that she was committing a
grave fault against decorum, a fault which would have been less readily
pardoned, since in every way she had gained too much by what had just
occurred not to be very guarded in her behaviour. On the next day she
took more pains with her toilette; but what she did not being found
sufficient, the day following she carried with her some things and
dressed herself secretly in Madame de Maintenon's rooms; and resumed
there her ordinary apparel before returning to Versailles. Thus she
avoided offence both to the King and to society. The latter certainly
would with difficulty have been persuaded that in this ill-timed
adornment of her person, her own tastes went for nothing. The Comtesse
de Mailly, who invented the scheme, and Madame de Nogaret, who both liked
Monseigneur, related this to me and were piqued by it. From this fact
and from the circumstance that all the ordinary pleasures and occupations
were resumed immediately after the death of Monseigneur, the King passing
his days without any constraint,--it may be assumed that if the royal
grief was bitter its evidences were of a kind to promise that it would
not be of long duration.

M. le Dauphin, for, as I have said, it is by that title I shall now name
Monseigneur le Duc de Bourgogne--M. le Dauphin, I say, soon gained all
hearts. In the first days of solitude following upon the death of
Monseigneur, the King intimated to M. de Beauvilliers that he should