Page:Memoirs of Madame de Motteville on Anne of Austria and her court.djvu/54

32 that I give him I heard from the queen herself, for he was the person in the world of whom I have heard her say the most good. It is, no doubt, to be presumed that his regard was not unwelcome, and that his vows were received with a certain amount of complacency. The queen, making no secret of it, had no difficulty in telling me later (wholly undeceived then about such dangerous illusions) that, being young, she did not comprehend that fine conversation, other- wise called polite gallantry, in which no pledges were given, could be blamable any more than that which Spanish ladies practise in the palace, where, living like nuns and speaking to men only in presence of the King and Queen of Spam, they nevertheless boast of their conquests and talk of them as a thing which, far from injuring their reputation, adds to it. She had in the Duchesse de Chevreuse a friend who was wholly given up to these vain amusements; and the queen, by her counsels, had not avoided, in spite of the purity of her soul, taking pleasure in the charms of that passion which she accepted with a certain complacency, for it flattered her glory more than it shocked her virtue.

Much has been said of a walk she took in the garden of a house where she lodged when she went to conduct the Queen of England to Amiens. But this was most unjust, for I know from herself, who did me the honour to confide it to me without reserve, that she only wished to walk in that garden because the king had forbidden every one to enter it, and, as difficulty increases desire, this gave her a very strong wish to go there ; so that, after getting the keys with much trouble from the captain of the guard, she walked there one evening with Madame de Chevreuse and her little Court. The walk was taken in presence of her whole suite, which accompanied the princess as usual. I have seen persons who were present and who told me the truth. The