Free Madame de Pompadour by Nancy Mitford Page A

and had lost sight of each other in the general confusion.
    Then up to the King galloped Richelieu, adorer of battles, who ‘despised death as a gambler despises ruin’; he had been all over the front and was so covered with dust as to be unrecognizable. ‘What news?’ The reply was most unexpected: ‘The day is won. We must use our cannon and then the King’s Household will charge.’ There were only four guns left, they opened fire on the English column with some effect, after which Richelieu, Biron and d’Estrées took the King’s bodyguard into action, leaving the King and the Dauphin with nobody to defend them. It was a bold stroke and it succeeded perfectly. The English, on the face of it still as unshakable as ever, had really had about enough; under the impact of Richelieu’s charge they positively melted away. ‘It was like fighting against magic regiments which could be visible or invisible at will.’ Cumberland and his officers were the last to leave the field.
    No doubt the presence of the King had greatly contributed to this victory; his soldiers could hardly allow their monarch and his only heir to be taken prisoner before their very eyes, and the fresh troops of his bodyguard had formed an invaluable reserve. When he had warmly thanked Saxe, the other general officers, Biron and the
Régiment du Roi
which had played such a glorious part earlier in the engagement, with a special word to Richelieu, he took the Dauphin round the battlefield. The slaughter had been terrible, and the King, always a pacifist at heart, wanted his son to realize at what cost such victories are won. The wounded, French and English alike, were carted into Lille where the hospital arrangements were better than they had ever been after a battle; the rich merchants’ wives gave up all frivolity, turned themselves into nurses and looked after the soldiers.
    There was no singing with his men that night; the King retired to bed early and slept very little. He was heard to sigh, often and deeply.
    The battle of Fontenoy marked the apogee of Louis XV’s popularity; never again was the mystical link between him and his people, of all classes, to be so strong. Voltaire pounced upon the occasion to write a laudatory poem,
La Bataille de Fontenoy
, dedicated to
Notre Adorable Monarque
, for which he dug out a good many epithets and mythological allusions formerly applied by Boileau to Louis XIV. Richelieu, a great friend of Voltaire’s, got even more praise in it than he deserved; and the cunning old poet mentioned a lot of other people who might be useful to him. Soon he was besieged by women begging a line or two for sons and lovers. This poem sold ten thousand copies in ten days, mostly to the army; subsequent editions brought in so many sons and lovers that the thing became a farce.
    The population of Paris arranged fêtes and ceremonies, lasting three days, to welcome the King on his return from the front, and received him with delirium. The Queen, the Princesses and all the Court came up from Versailles and stayed at the Tuileries with him. He had not one moment for himself, but sent various friends to call on Madame de Pompadour at her uncle’s house. During the great banquet at the Hôtel de Ville she and her family dined upstairs in a private room; the proud Dukes of Richelieu, Bouillon and Gesvres left the King’s table in turns with messages for the newly-made Marquise.
    On 10 September the Court returned to Versailles; and that same evening one of the royal carriages drove up to a side door. Madame de Pompadour got out of it, accompanied by her cousin Madame d’Estrades, and went quickly upstairs to an apartment which had been prepared for her. Next day the King supped there with her alone; her reign of nearly twenty years had begun.

5
Presentation at Court
    ‘AND WHICH OF our trollops is going to present this adventuress to the Queen?’ an
abbé de cour
threw the question at the tittering, twittering company in