and the pacific Fleury have been got into this sublimely adventurous mood?
By Belleisle chiefly, men say;--and by King Louis's first Mistresses, blown upon by Belleisle; poor Louis having now, at length, left his poor Queen to her reflections, and taken into that sad line, in which by degrees he carried it so far.

There are three of them, it seems;--the first female souls that could ever manage to kindle, into flame or into smoke: in this or any other kind, that poor torpid male soul: those Mailly Sisters, three in number (I am shocked to hear), successive, nay in part simultaneous! They are proud women, especially the two younger; with ambition in them, with a bravura magnanimity, of the theatrical or operatic kind; of whom Louis is very fond.

"To raise France to its place, your Majesty; the top of the Universe, namely!" "Well; if it could be done,--and quite without trouble ?" thinks Louis.

Bravura magnanimity, blown upon by Belleisle, prevails among these high Improper Females, and generally in the Younger Circles of the Court; so that poor old Fleury has had no choice but to obey it or retire.

And so Belleisle stalks across the OEil-de-Boeuf in that important manner, visibly to Geusau; and is the shining object in Paris, and much the topic there at present.
A few weeks hence, he is farther--a little out of the common turn, but not beyond his military merits or capabilities--made Marechal de France; [_Fastes de Louis XV.,_ i.