In 1738, when Madame de Mailly was openly acknowledged as mistress, Louis XV. changed his bedchamber. He left that where Louis XIV. had died, and which he had himself occupied since 1722, to install himself in the chamber contiguous to the Council hall, and which, even in the time of Louis XIV., had been designated as the billiard room (room No. 126 of the _Notice du Musée de Versailles_, by M. Eudore Soulié). Louis XV. found this chamber more convenient than the other, because it opened the series of small rooms called the cabinets (rooms Nos. 126 to 134 of the _Notice_[11]), where Louis XV. admitted a very small number of courtiers to his intimacy. It was there he hid himself from the vulgar crowd; there that, living more like a private person than a king, he spent his time in trifles and futilities unworthy of a sovereign. There he made tapestry like a woman, or, like a cook, prepared side-dishes with truffles. There, supping after the chase, he sought forgetfulness of his remorse in bumpers of champagne. It was there he sought a remedy for his, alas! incurable melancholy; there that he allowed himself to be vanquished by his enemy, voluptuousness. Beneath the King’s chamber lodged the Countess de Toulouse, widowed within a year of the son of Louis XIV. and Madame de Montespan. The countess occupied the apartment called the apartment of the baths, which, after having been the abode of Madame de Montespan, had been given to the sons of the celebrated favorite, first to the Duke du Maine, and afterward to the Count de Toulouse (rooms Nos. 52, 53, and 54 of the _Notice du Musée_). This apartment had one great advantage: it communicated by a private staircase with the King’s study. The Count de Toulouse had the key to this precious staircase. His widow had sufficient address to induce the King to leave it with her. She was at this time a woman of about fifty, who no longer wore rouge, and often spent several hours in a confessional in the chapel, where she read by the light of a candle. In spite of her austere appearance, she was the intimate friend of the Countess de Mailly, and slanderous tongues accused her of facilitating the latter’s meetings with the King.