with him, and reproached M. de
Vendome and M. de la Rochefoucauld because they never went to hear his
sermons. M. de Vendome replied off-hand, that he did not care to go to
hear a man who said whatever he pleased without allowing anybody to reply
to him, and made the King smile by this sally. But M. de la
Rochefoucauld treated the matter in another manner he said that he could
not induce himself to go like the merest hanger-on about the Court, and
beg a seat of the officer who distributed them, and then betake himself
early to church in order to have a good one, and wait about in order to
put himself where it might please that officer to place him. Whereupon
the King immediately gave him a fourth seat behind him, by the side of
the Grand Chamberlain, so that everywhere he is thus placed.
M. d'Orleans had been in the habit of seating himself there (although his
right place was on the prie-Dieu), and little by little had accustomed
himself to consider it as his proper place. When he found himself driven
away, he made a great ado, and, not daring to complain to the King,
quarrelled with M. de la Rochefoucauld, who, until then, had been one of
his particular friends. The affair soon made a great stir; the friends
of both parties mixed themselves up in it. The King tried in vain to
make M. d'Orleans listen to reason; the prelate was inflexible, and when
he found he could gain nothing by clamour and complaint, he retired in
high dudgeon into his diocese: he remained there some time, and upon his
return resumed his complaints with more determination than ever; he fell
at the feet of the King, protesting that he would rather die than see his
office degraded. M. de la Rochefoucauld entreated the King to be allowed
to surrender the seat in favour of M. d'Orleans. But the King would not
change his decision; he said that if the matter were to be decided
between M. d'Orleans and a lackey, he would give the seat to the lackey
rather than to M. d'Orleans. Upon this the prelate returned to his
diocese, which he would have been wiser never to have quitted in order to
obtain a place which did not belong to him.

As the King really esteemed M. d'Orleans, he determined to appease his
anger; and to put an end to this dispute he gave therefore the bishopric
of Metz to the nephew of M. d'Orleans; and by this means a reconciliation
was established. M. d'Orleans and M. de la Rochefoucauld joined hands
again, and the King looked on delighted.