"Something like it: but he has appeared to me less culpable than I thought. He had only yielded to the solicitation of my personal enemy." "You cannot have one at my court, madame; the lieutenant of police would have done well not to have named her to you." "Thanks to him, however, I shall now know whom I ought to mistrust. I know also who is the author of the two scurrilous paragraphs." "Some scamp, no doubt; some beggarly scoundrel." "A monsieur Ledoux." "Ah, I know the fellow. His bad reputation has reached me. It must be stopped at last." So saying, Louis XV went to the chimney, and pulled the bell-rope with so much vehemence that ten persons answered it at once. "Send for the duc de la Vrillière; if he be not suitably attired let him come in his night-gown, no matter so that he appear quickly." On hearing an order given in this manner a stranger might have supposed the king crazy, and not intent on imprisoning a miserable libeller. I interceded in his favor, but Louis XV, delighted at an opportunity of playing the king at a small cost, told me that it was no person's business, and he would be dictated to by no one. I was silent, reserving myself until another opportunity when I could undertake the defence of the poor devil. The duc de la Vrillière arrived, not in a dressing-gown, as the king had authorized, but in magnificent costume. He piqued himself on his expenditure, and always appeared superbly attired, altho' the splendor of his apparel could not conceal the meanness of his look. He was the oldest secretary of state, and certainly was the least skilful, least esteemed, least considered. Some time after his death some one said of him in the presence of the duc d'Ayen, that he had been an unfortunate man, for he had been all his life the butt of public hatred and universal contempt. "Rather say," replied the duke, "that he has been a fortunate man; for if justice had been rendered to him according to his deserts, he would have been hanged at least a dozen times."