that she had learned that habit of abstinence from Saint-Germain;
that HE might do as he pleased, "but you, madame, whose health is
precious to me, I forbid to imitate the regimen of such a dubious
character." Gleichen, who tells the anecdote, says that he was
present when de Choiseul thus lost his temper with his wife. The
dislike of de Choiseul had a mournful effect on the career of
Saint-Germain.

In discussing the strange story of the Chevalier d'Eon, one has
seen that Louis XV. amused himself by carrying on a secret scheme
of fantastic diplomacy through subordinate agents, behind the backs
and without the knowledge of his responsible ministers. The Duc de
Choiseul, as Minister of Foreign Affairs, was excluded, it seems,
from all knowledge of these double intrigues, and the Marechal de
Belle-Isle, Minister of War, was obviously kept in the dark, as was
Madame de Pompadour. Now it is stated by Von Gleichen that the
Marechal de Belle-Isle, from the War Office, started a NEW secret
diplomacy behind the back of de Choiseul, at the Foreign Office.
The King and Madame de Pompadour (who was not initiated into the
general scheme of the King's secret) were both acquainted with what
de Choiseul was not to know--namely, Belle-Isle's plan for secretly
making peace through the mediation, or management, at all events,
of Holland. All this must have been prior to the death of the
Marechal de Belle-Isle in 1761; and probably de Broglie, who
managed the regular old secret policy of Louis XV., knew nothing
about this new clandestine adventure; at all events, the late Duc
de Broglie says nothing about it in his book The King's Secret.[1]


[1] The Duc de Broglie, I am privately informed, could find no clue