A curious figure was this descendant of the Great Condé; "_moitié plumet, moitié rabat_," monk by profession and soldier by choice; "owing two million livres in Paris and changing his mistress every day"; now regulating the affairs of one of his abbeys, now scandalising the devout by some _liaison_ with Opera girl or courtesan, anon distinguishing himself in battle; witty, affable, generous, brave, magnificent in his pleasures, and a lover and patron of literature; the only prince of his house then living in whom could be traced a resemblance to their illustrious ancestor. Mlle. de Camargo had by this time acquired the reputation of being a somewhat expensive luxury, even for a prince. Accordingly, before "taking her into his service," the count-abbé desired to rid himself of two other ladies, both of whom had claims upon his attention and his purse. One was the Duchesse de Bouillon, poor Adrienne Lecouvreur's enemy; the other, a siren of humble birth, named Quoniam, with whom he had carried on an intermittent _liaison_ since he was sixteen. On the principle that exchange is no robbery, it was arranged that the duchess and the Marquis de Sourdis should console each other; while Clermont experienced but little difficulty in persuading his nephew, the Prince de Conti, a promising young gentleman of seventeen, to take Mlle. Quoniam off his hands. The latter arrangement led to much unpleasantness in high circles, for the Prince de Conti had two years before taken unto himself a wife, in the person of Mlle. de Chartres, daughter of the late Regent and sister of the devout Duc d'Orléans. The duke and his mother, the dowager-duchess, were furious, and it was rumoured that they had obtained a _lettre de cachet_, in virtue of which Mlle. Quoniam had been spirited away to a convent. "This news," writes Barbier in his _Journal_, "was general in the fashionable world; however, it is not true. On Sunday, August 5, Mlle. Quoniam went to the Opera and took a seat in a box. So soon as the young men in the pit caught sight of her, they clapped their hands to show how delighted the public were to find that the rumour was unfounded. In the evening, she went to the Tuileries. All the princesses of the House of Condé were there, which caused the people to form themselves into two lines as they passed by. They did the same for Mlle. Quoniam, and congratulated her by their gestures."[110]