Sainte-Beuve has poured witty contempt on this adulterous dream. “It seems to me,” says the prince of critics, “that one lights unexpectedly on the perverted but persistent bourgeois vein in this wish of Madame de Pompadour; she brings ideas of affection and family arrangements even into her adulterous combinations. She has sentiments; she thinks of herself already as a most affectionate grandmother. A picture, which I would call a Greuze-Pompadour, might be made of this scene, the Marquise tearfully pointing out the two children to the King.” The favorite found it hard to renounce her cherished project of this alliance. Afterwards she thought of the young Duke de Fronsac, Richelieu’s son, as a husband for her daughter. She caused overtures to be made to the celebrated courtier. He answered by a disguised refusal. “My son,” said he, “has the honor of belonging, on his mother’s side, to the house of Lorraine; hence I cannot dispose of him without the consent of that family, but I shall proceed to demand it urgently if the Marquise still persists in her intentions.” Madame de Pompadour understood, and insisted no further. She planned another marriage for her daughter, who was promised to the young Duke de Pecquigny, son of the Duke de Chaulnes of the De Luynes family. But Mademoiselle d’Étioles died prematurely at the very time when the marriage was about to be contracted. She was buried in the sepulchre her mother had bought from an illustrious family. “The bones of the La Trémoille,” said the Princess de Talmond, “must have been must astonished at finding fish bones (_les arêtes des Poisson_) near them.” We have seen the disgusting flatteries of which the Marquise was the object. These hyperboles of interested praise had a terrible counterpart. While the court was obsequious, Paris remained implacable. There was an incessant succession of sneers, satires, and invectives. There had been _mazarinades_ of old; now there were _poissonades_. Minister Maurepas was the instigator and often the author of these violent rhymed diatribes, which made people say France was an absolute monarchy tempered by ballads. The masses avenged themselves by refrains of more than Gallic animation. We cite one among a thousand. It was sung to the air _Trembleurs d’Isis_:-- “Les grands seigneurs s’avilissent, Les financiers s’enrichissent, Et les Poissons s’agrandissent; C’est le règne des vauriens. On épuise la finance, En bâtiments, on dépense, L’État tombe en décadence, Le roi ne met ordre à rien. “Une petite bourgeoise, Élevée à la grivoise, Mesurant tout à sa toise, Fait de la cour un taudis; Louis, malgré son scrupule, Froidement pour elle brûle, Et son amour ridicule A fait rire tout Paris....