the father that the young
D'Antin was my living image, he replied to them, that they were to insist
no longer, to abandon their mission, and to abandon a child who would
never enjoy his favour since he resembled myself. Owing to this happy
circumstance I was able to preserve my son.

Since these unhappy disputes, and the suit which made so much noise, I
had heard no more talk of M. de Montespan in society. I only learned
from travellers that he was building, a short distance from the Pyrenees,
a chateau of a noble and royal appearance, where he had gathered together
all that art, joined with good taste, could add to nature; that this
chateau of Saint Elix, adorned with the finest orange grove in the world,
was ascribed to the liberality of the King. The Marquis, hurt by this
mistake of his neighbours, which he called an accusation, published a
solemn justification in these ingenuous provinces, and he proved, as a
clerk might do to his master, that this enormous expenditure was
exclusively his own.

Suddenly the report of his death spread through the capital, and the
Marquis d'Antin received without delay an official letter with a great,
black seal, which announced to him this most lamentable event. The
notary of Saint Elix, in sending him this sad news, took the opportunity
of enclosing a certified copy of the will.

This testament, replete with malignity, having been freely published in
the capital, I cannot refrain from reproducing it in these writings.

Here are its principal clauses;

In the name of the most blessed Trinity, etc.

Since I cannot congratulate myself on a wife, who, diverting herself as
much as possible, has caused me to pass my youth and my life in celibacy,
I content myself with leaving, her my life-sized portrait, by Bourdon,
begging her to place it in her bedchamber, when the King ceases to come
there.

Although the Marquis de Pardailhan d'Antin is prodigiously like his
mother (a circumstance of which I have been lamentably sensible!), I do
not hesitate to believe him my son. In this quality I give and bequeath
to him all my goods, as my eldest son, imposing on him, nevertheless, the
following legacies, liberalities and charges:

I leave to their Highnesses, M. le Duc du Maine, M. le Comte de Toulouse,
Mademoiselle de Nantes, and Mademoiselle de Blois (born during my
marriage with their mother, and consequently my presumptive children),
their right of legitimacy on the charge and con