found, to their astonishment, that he had none. They begged
of him to desist, telling him that, if they did their duty, they
should arrest him; but they must, at all events, instantly acquaint
me with the circumstance, as Ranger of the Park of Versailles.
They added, that the King must have heard the firing, and that
they begged of him to retire. The Abbe apologized, on the score of
ignorance, and assured them that he had my permission. 'The Comte
de Noailles,' said they, 'could only grant permission to shoot in
the more remote parts, and in the great park.'" The Count made
a great merit of his eagerness to give the earliest information
to Madame. She told him to leave the task of communicating it
to the King to her, and begged of him to say nothing about the
matter. M. de Marigny, who did not like the Abbe, came to see
me in the evening; and I affected to know nothing of the story,
and to hear it for the first time from him. "He must have been out
of his senses," said he, "to shoot under the King's windows,"--and
enlarged much on the airs he gave himself. Madame de Pompadour
gave this affair the best colouring she could: the King was,
nevertheless, greatly disgusted at it, and twenty times, since
the Abbe's disgrace, when he passed over that part of the park,
he said, "This is where the Abbe took his pleasure." The King
never liked him; and Madame de Pompadour told me one night, after
his disgrace, when I was sitting up with her in her illness,
that she saw, before he had been Minister a week, that he was
not fit for his office. "If that hypocritical Bishop," said she,
speaking of the Bishop of Mirepoix, "had not prevented the King
from granting him a pension of four hundred louis a year, which he
had promised me, he would never have been appointed Ambassador.
I should, afterwards, have been able to give him an income of
eight hundred louis a year, perhaps the place of master of the
chapel. Thus he would have been happier, and I should have had
nothing to regret." I took the liberty of saying that I did not
agree with her. That he had yet remaining advantages, of which
he could not be deprived; that his exile would terminate; and that
he would then be a Cardinal, with an income of eight thousand
louis a year. "That is true," she replied; "but I think of the
mortifications he has undergone, and of the ambition which devours
him; and, lastly, I think of myself. I should have still enjoyed
his society, and should have ha