Louise Julie de Mailly-Nesle, the eldest of five sisters who all played a part at court, was of the same age as the King: like him she was born in 1710. Married in 1726 to Count Louis Alexandre de Mailly, her cousin-german, her fortune was small, and the need of money was said to be one occasion of her faults. The huntsman Le Roy, that master of the hunt who was so sagacious an observer, and whom Sainte-Beuve has qualified as La Bruyère on horseback, thus delineates the portrait of the countess: “This lady was very far from being pretty; but her figure and her manners were very graceful, her sensibility was already recognized, and she had a complaisant character adapted to the abridgment of formalities. This was essential to vanquish the timidity of a prince who was still a novice, whom the least reserve would have abashed. They were sure, moreover, of the disinterestedness of her who was destined to become the favorite, and of her aversion from all ambitious schemes. Some difficulty was experienced in establishing a complete familiarity between a prince excessively timid and a woman whose birth, at least, obliged her to have some regard for appearances.” Madame de Mailly was lady of the palace to the Queen. This facilitated matters. At first everything was managed with the utmost secrecy. “I have learned,” says the Duke de Luynes in his Memoirs, “that the commerce of the King with Madame de Mailly commenced as early as 1783. I know this to be true beyond all doubt, and at that time no one suspected it.” The favor of the King’s mistress was not known to the public until four years later, and the advocate Barbier declared “that there was nothing to say, the name of De Nesle being one of the first in the kingdom.” “The Queen,” says D’Argenson, “is in a cruel situation at present, on account of Madame de Mailly, whom she is obliged to retain as lady of the palace. During this lady’s weeks she is in a horrible humor, and all her domestics feel the effects of it. Certainly, to make a third after supper, between her and Madame de Mailly, is to render her a great service.” The poor Queen at last resigned herself. When a woman no longer appeals to either a man’s heart or his senses, what can she do? One day when Madame de Mailly asked her sovereign’s permission to go to a pleasure-house where Louis XV. was, Marie Leczinska merely replied: “You are the mistress.” Cardinal Fleury did not complain, because the favorite neither meddled with affairs nor cost the King much. At this time Louis XV. was as economical as he was timid. Count de Mailly, who had set up an equipage as soon as his wife came into favor, was soon obliged to sell it again, and continued to live a needy life.