It was easy for a doting mother like Madame de Sévigné to credit everything her son manufactured for her delectation. The dramatic incident of de Sévigné taking letters from Ninon de l'Enclos partly by ingenuity and partly by force, resembled his tale that he had left Ninon and that he did not care for her while all the time they were inseparable. He was truly a lover of Penelope, the bow of Ulysses having betrayed his weakness. "The malady of his soul," says his mother, "afflicted his body. He thought himself like the good Esos; he would have himself boiled in a caldron with aromatic herbs to restore his vigor." But Ninon's opinion of him was somewhat different. She lamented his untimely end, but did not hesitate to express her views. "He was a man beyond definition," was her panegyric. "He possessed a soul of pulp, a body of wet paper, and a heart of pumpkin fricasseed in snow." She finally became ashamed of ever having loved him, and insisted that they were never more than brother and sister. She tried to make something out of him by exposing all the secrets of the female heart, and initiating him in the mysteries of human love, but as she said: "His heart was a pumpkin fricasseed in snow." CHAPTER XIV A Family Tragedy Some of Ninon's engagements following upon one another in quick succession were the cause of an unusual disagreement, not to say quarrel, between two rivals in her affections. A Marshal of France, d'Estrées and the celebrated Abbé Deffiat disputed the right of parentage, the dispute waxing warm because both contended for the honor and could not see any way out of their difficulty, neither consenting to make the slightest concession. Ninon, however, calmed the tempest by suggesting a way out of the difficulty through the hazard of the dice. Luck or good fortune for the waif declared in favor of the warrior, who made a better guardian than the Abbé could possibly have done, and brought him greater happiness. Ninon surrendered all her maternal rights in the child to the worthy Marshal, who became in reality a tender and affectionate father to the waif, cared for him tenderly and raised him up to a good position in life. He placed him in the marine service, where, as the Chevalier de la Bossière, he reached the grade of captain of a vessel, and died at an advanced age respected by his brother officers and by all who knew him. He inherited some of the talents of his mother, particularly music, in which he was remarkably proficient. His apartments at Toulon, where he was stationed, were crowded with musical instruments and the works of the greatest masters. All the musicians traveling back and forth between Italy and France made his house their headquarters. The Chevalier accorded them a generous welcome on all occasions; the only return demanded was an exhibition of their proficiency in instrumental music.