ais. Her marriage to an
officer in the Prince de Conde's army was an unhappy
one; and she was left, deserted by her husband, in
straitened circumstances. After the assassination of
the Duc de Berry, M. de la Rochefoucauld, one of the
leaders of the ultra-Royalist party, contrived to throw
her in the way of Louis XVIII., in the hope of
counteracting the more Liberal influence which M. de
Cazes had acquired over the King. Madame du Cayla
became the hope and the mainstay of the altar and the
throne. The scheme succeeded. The King was touched by
her grace and beauty, and she became indispensable to
his happiness. His happiness was said to consist in
inhaling a pinch of snuff from her shoulders, which
were remarkably broad and fair. M. de Lamartine has
related the romance of her life in the thirty-eighth
book of his 'Histoire de la Restauration,' and Beranger
satirised her in the bitterest of his songs--that which
bears the name of 'Octavie':--

Sur les coussins ou la douleur l'enchaine
Quel mal, dis-tu, vous fait ce roi des rois?
Vois-le d'un masque enjoliver sa haine
Pour etouffer notre gloire et nos lois.

Vois ce coeur faux, que cherchent tes caresses,
De tous les siens n'aimer que ses aieux;
Charger de fer les muses vengeresses,
Et par ses moeurs nous reveler ses dieux.

Peins-nous ces feux, qu'en secret tu redoutes,
_Quand sur ton sein il cuve son nectar,_
Ces feux dont s'indignaient les voutes
Ou plane encor l'aigle du grand Cesar.

It is curious that in 1829 the last mistress of a King
of France should have visited London under the reign of
the last mistress of a King of England.]

[Page Head: WELLINGTON'S ANECDOTES OF GEORGE IV.]

After dinner the Duke talked to me for a long time about the King
and the Duke of Cumberland, and his quarrel with the latter. He
began about the King's making Lord Aberdeen stay at the Cottage
the other day when he had engaged all the foreign Ambassadors to
dine with him in London. Aberdeen represented this to him, but
his Majesty said 'it did not matter, he should stay, and the
Ambas