Other events of his ministry were less impressive, but not less important. As President of the Council of Finance (January, 1718), he succeeded during his first year in extinguishing arrears to the amount of sixteen million livres;[38] and he was the first to apply the system of direct collection (Régie) in regard to certain of the taxes.[39] As a financial minister he had only one failing. His homely prejudice in favour of honest dealing sometimes got him into trouble with the Regent;[40] but their occasional quarrels were only on the surface; and when d'Argenson was dismissed, as he was in June, 1720, for speeding the Bank upon its downward way,[41] he was allowed to keep his emoluments and his violet robe:[42] and a few years after he had quitted office, the Regent sent him a purse of gold, which was an annual perquisite of the Warden of the Seals.[43] St. Simon shall finish the picture.[44] "His retirement was of the strangest. He withdrew into a convent in the Faubourg St. Antoine, called La Madeleine de Tresnel. A long time before, he had fitted up an apartment in the convent buildings which he had furnished handsomely and well. It was as convenient as a house, and for many years he was in the habit of going there as often as he could. He had procured, even given, large sums to this convent for the sake of a Madame du Veni, who was the Superior--a relation, he said--and of whom he was very fond. She was a very charming person, extremely witty, and one of whom none have ever thought of speaking ill. All the Argensons paid court to her; but the strange thing about it was that when he was chief of police and fell ill, she left her convent to come to his house and to remain near him."[45] A strong man and a strange one, and withal, a lovable, as we learn from many besides Madame du Veni. In June, 1720, his "brief and troublous ministry"[46] came to an end, and the Palais Royal knew him no longer. He had but a short time to enjoy the rest which had come to him as a happy release. On May 8, 1721, he died. Many was the shrewd encounter he had had with the rabble of the slums; and as the old chief was borne to his last home, he was pursued by the curses of the basket-women of Paris. And hearing of it, proud and beautiful old Mathieu Marais turned in disgust from "this mad populace, which, while he lived, dared never look him in the face;" and alone with his journal, with his mind upon the man who had passed away, he writes:-- "Who will have his soul, I know not. In the other world, as in this, there must be a fine debate over it."[47]