Another woman also lived in close friendship with Louis XV. This was Mademoiselle de Charolais, who was born in 1695 and died in 1758 unmarried. A sister of the Duke of Bourbon, she had the hauteur of the Condés and the wit of the Mortemarts. She was a type of the extravagant _grande dame_, a capricious, witty woman, greedy for pleasure, frolicsome as an elf, and fearless as a page. “This princess is very accommodating to the King,” says the Marquis d’Argenson; “she keeps company with Madame de Mailly, and, in the midst of her complaisance, she sometimes proposes to the King to take a prettier mistress. At other times she advises Madame de Mailly to profit by her reign, and secure all the riches and grandeur that she can.... Madame de Mailly is honest and well-intentioned, and confides in her. This is what sustains her, in spite of her lightheartedness, her temper, and the variety of opinions which torment her. But as she is noble in the midst of her necessities, her demands are not acrimonious nor her intrigues underhanded and circuitous.” Among the influential persons surrounding the King let us not forget his first _valet de chambre_, Bachelier, the master’s confidant; Bachelier with his occult power, his fifty thousand pounds of income, his charming property of La Celle, which the sovereign honors by visiting. Listen again to D’Argenson: “Le sieur Bachelier is a philosopher, well content with his fortune, which is a good one. He has an income, a country house, and a mistress. He loves his master and is loved by him; he desires the public welfare. People of this character are difficult to displace; it is this also which accounts for the force and elevation of our cardinal, and, fortunately for France, the King likes men of this sort. It is true that Bachelier is still a go-between” (D’Argenson employs a stronger word). “But his office allows this, just as that of a soldier permits him to be a slayer of men. Perhaps it is he who prescribed to the King to limit himself to a single mistress, as he has done up to the present with little Mailly; or to seldom change them, and not to be prodigal of money or power.” Nothing great could issue from such a society. This voluptuous existence, parodied without poetry or enthusiasm from the scenes of Lancret and Watteau, belittled and atrophied the moral sense of the King. What could he learn from a futile and idle woman like Madame de Mailly, entirely devoted to trifles and her toilet? Listening from morning to night to silly and insignificant tittle-tattle, Louis XV. himself became womanish. His preoccupations were mean, his ideas narrow. He interested himself in petty gossip unworthy of a king, unworthy of a man. Madame de Mailly had neither wit enough to amuse him nor tact enough to lead him. After awhile she wearied him. He kept her near him, however, while looking about for her successor. VI THE COUNTESS DE VINTIMILLE