, I last saw my mother, which is now nearly a year ago, she
was in health, and consoling herself for the advance of years by
that tendency to wean the thoughts from this world which (in her own
language) is the divinest comfort of old age!"

"Admirable woman!" said Madame de Maintenon, casting down her eyes;
"such are indeed the sentiments in which I recognize the Marechale. And
how does her beauty wear? Those golden locks, and blue eyes, and that
snowy skin, are not yet, I suppose, wholly changed for an adequate
compensation of the beauties within?"

"Time, Madame, has been gentle with her; and I have often thought,
though never perhaps more strongly than at this moment, that there is in
those divine studies, which bring calm and light to the mind, something
which preserves and embalms, as it were, the beauty of the body."

A faint blush passed over the face of the devotee. No, no,--not even at
eighty years of age is a compliment to a woman's beauty misplaced! There
was a slight pause. I thought that respect forbade me to break it.

"His Majesty," said the Bishop, in the tone of one who is sensible that
he encroaches a little, and does it with consequent reverence, "his
Majesty, I hope, is well?"

"God be thanked, yes, as well as we can expect. It is now nearly the
hour in which his Majesty awaits your personal inquiries."

Fleuri bowed as he answered,--

"The King, then, will receive us to-day? My young companion is very
desirous to see the greatest monarch, and, consequently, the greatest
man, of the age."

"The desire is natural," said Madame de Maintenon; and then, turning to
me, she asked if I had yet seen King James the Third.

I took care, in my answer, to express that even if I had resolved to
make that stay in Paris which allowed me to pay my respects to him at
all, I should have deemed that both duty and inclination led me, in the
first instance, to offer my homage to one who was both the benefactor of
my father and the monarch whose realms afforded me protection.

"You have not, then," said Madame de Maintenon, "decided on the length
of your stay in France?"

"No," said I,--and my answer was regulated by my desire to see how far I
might rely on the services of one who expressed herself so warm a friend
of that excellent woman, Madame la Marechale,--"no, Madame. France is
the country of my birth, if England is that of my parentage; and could
I hope for some portion of that royal favour which my fa