Louise seems really to have been the happiest of all the family, and to have lived with true contentment in her convent of Maubuisson. Sophie, who had the joy of visiting her there in 1679, wrote to the Elector:--"She has not changed. I find her very happy, for she lives in a beautiful place; her garden is large and very pleasant, which is one of the things I love best in the world."[4] In her next letter she remarked that Louise was very regular in her observance of convent rules, "which makes her pass for a saint;" and she added, with a little sigh of envy for the peace she witnessed, "I could easily accommodate myself to a life like that."[5] But the reply of Charles Louis was satirical and unsympathetic. "I know not if I dare ask you to make my very devoted 'baisemains' to my sister the Abbess of Maubuisson, provided that the offering of my profane lips, which still smack somewhat of the world, does not offend her abstracted thoughts, and that she can still spare some for her carnal brother, who is now only skin and bones. At least, I am always grateful that she asks of me nothing mundane."[6] Louise lived to a cheerful and healthful old age, retaining to the last her interest in art. Her own chapel and many neighbouring churches were beautified by the {347} productions of her brush; and in 1699, when she had reached the age of seventy-seven, she was painting a copy of Pousin's Golden Calf, as a gift for Sophie. Her life was simple but peaceful: she ate no meat, slept on a bed "as hard as a stone," sat only on a straw stool, and rose always at mid-night to attend chapel.[7] Yet she was never ill, nor did she ever lose her high spirits. "She is better tempered, more lively, sees, hears and walks better than I do," wrote her niece Elizabeth Charlotte, the daughter of Charles Louis, when Louise was eighty. "She is still able to read the smallest print without spectacles, has all her teeth complete, and is quite full of fun (popierlich), like my father when he was in a good humour."[8]