mediate
supply."

"Bless me!" ejaculated the king, "why all, the girls in my kingdom would
go to prison for such a dowry: however, she shall have the pension; but,
in truth, my treasury is exhausted."

"Then, sire," returned I, "borrow of your friends."

"Come, come, let us finish this business; I will give your _protegee_
4000 louis."

"No, I cannot agree," answered I, "to less than 5000."

The king promised me I should have them; and, on the following day, his
valet Turpigny brought me the order for the pension, and a bag, in which
I found only 4000 louis. This piece of meanness did not surprise me, but
it made me shrug up my shoulders, and sent me to my cabinet to take the
sum deficient from my own funds. With this dowry my poor _protegee_ soon
found a suitable husband in the person of one of her cousins, for whom
I procured a lucrative post under government. These worthy people have
since well repaid me by their grateful and devoted attachment for the
service I was enabled to render them. One individual of their family
was, however, far from resembling them either in goodness of heart or
generosity of sentiment--I allude to the brother of the lady; that same
brother who formerly supplied his sister with his clothes, that she
might visit the king unsuspected. Upon the incarceration of the father
the son succeeded him in his office of _valet de chambre_, and acquired
considerable credit at court; yet, although in the daily habit of seeing
the king, he neither by word nor deed sought to obtain the deliverance
of either his parent or sister. On the contrary, he suffered the former
to perish in a dungeon, and allowed the latter to languish in one during
more than seventeen years, and in all probability she would have ended
her days without receiving the slightest mark of his recollection of
his unfortunate relative. I know no trait of base selfishness more truly
revolting than the one I have just related.

But this story has led me far from the subject I was previously
commencing: this narrative, which I never call to mind without a feeling
of pleasure, has led me away in spite of myself. Still I trust that my
narrative has been sufficiently interesting to induce you to pardon the
digression it has occasioned, and now I will resume the thread of my
discourse.

CHAPTER XXXVII

A conspiracy--A scheme for poisoning madame du Barry--The
four bottles--Letter to the duc d'Aiguillon--Advice of the