tte--[The Intendant of Police.]--has rendered me great service, by
showing the King extracts from the letters broken open at the
post-office, concerning the report that Madame de Coaslin was coming into
favour: The King was much impressed by a letter from an old counsellor of
the Parliament, who wrote to one of his friends as follows: 'It is quite
as reasonable that the King should have a female friend and
confidante--as that we, in our several degrees, should so indulge
ourselves; but it is desirable that he should keep the one he has; she
is gentle, injures nobody, and her fortune is made. The one who is now
talked of will be as haughty as high birth can make her. She must have
an allowance of a million francs a year, since she is said to be
excessively extravagant; her relations must be made Dukes, Governors of
provinces, and Marshals, and, in the end, will surround the King, and
overawe the Ministers.'"

Madame de Pompadour had this passage, which had been sent to her by M.
Jannette, the Intendant of the Police, who enjoyed the King's entire
confidence. He had carefully watched the King's look, while he read the
letter, and he saw that the arguments of this counsellor, who was not a
disaffected person, made a great impression upon him. Some time
afterwards, Madame de Pompadour said to me, "The haughty Marquise behaved
like Mademoiselle Deschamps,

[A courtesan, distinguished for her charms, and still more so for an
extraordinary proof of patriotism. At a time when the public Treasury
was exhausted, Mademoiselle Deschamps sent all her plate to the Mint.
Louis XIV. boasted of this act of generous devotion to her country. The
Duc d'Ayen made it the subject of a pleasantry, which detracted nothing
from the merit of the sacrifice--but which is rather too gay for us to
venture upon.]

and she is turned off." This was not Madame's only subject of alarm. A
relation of Madame d'Estrades,

[The Comtesse d'Estrades, a relative of M. Normand, and a flatterer of
Madame de Pompadour, who brought her to Court, was secretly in the pay of
the Comte d'Argenson. That Minister, who did not disdain la Fillon, from
whom he extracted useful information, knew all that passed at the Court
of the favourite, by means of Madame d'Estrades, whose ingratitude and
perfidiousness he liberally paid.]

wife to the Marquis de C----, had made the most pointed advances to the
King, much more than were necessary for a man who justly thought himself