Colbert took the trouble one day to go and call upon old M.d'Ormesson, the counsel's father, to complain of the delays that the son, as he said, was causing in the trial: "It is very extraordinary," said the minister, "that a great king, feared throughout Europe, cannot finish a case against one of his own subjects." "I am sorry," answered the old gentleman, "that the king is not satisfied with my son's conduct; I know that he practises what I have always taught him,--to fear God, serve the king, and render justice without respect of persons.

The delay in the matter does not depend upon him; he works at it night and day, without wasting a moment." Oliver d'Ormesson lost the stewardship of Soissonness, to which he had the titular right, but he did not allow himself to be diverted from his scrupulous integrity.

Nay, he grew wroth at the continual attacks of Chancellor Seguier, more of a courtier than ever in his old age, and anxious to finish the matter to the satisfaction of the court.

"I told many of the Chamber," he writes, "that I did not like to have the whip applied to me every morning, and that the chancellor was a sort of chastiser I would not put up with." [_Journal d' Oliver d' Ormesson,_ t.ii.

p.