proposed remaining some time,) and omitted nothing which luxury could devise to make his journey easy and delightful. The sole stipulation which De Rosier himself made was, that he might be permitted to travel alone. With this the Marquis complied; and De Rosier quitted Paris, where he had some time resided, escorted only by two servants, who had long attended his person. Not even the Comte de l'Avignon, who had formerly been entrusted with all his designs, knew any thing of the route he had taken; and a long time elapsed before the Marquis received any tiding of his welfare. At length a letter reached him, which appeared by the post-mark to have come by Genoa. De Rosier informed him briefly, that he was well, and had recovered some degree of that tranquillity, which, however, he had little hope of ever perfectly establishing; that he would write to him from time to time, when when opportunity served; but that he must not expect to find him a punctual correspondent; and, having no fixed residence, he was not always apprised of conveyances for his letters in time to avail himself of them. At the end of eight months, he wrote, that his banker at Genoa had failed; and requested that his father would transmit his subsequent remittances to the hands of a banker whom he named at Geneva. These were the only letters which the Marquis received from his son during an absence of thirteen months. He wrote but once to De l'Avignon, and the only regular channel of information, by which their fears for his welfare were relieved, was through the correspondence of one of the servants who had accompanied him from Paris; who, by De Rosier's private orders, wrote punctually at stated times to his father's maître d'hôtel; giving, among among other general news, such accounts of his health and spirits as satisfied the Marquis, that to the languid state of the latter alone his son's silence might be attributed. CHAP. III. **Men, like butterflies, shew not their mealy ABOUT this period some changes in the ministry took place, and some revolutions at court, in consequence of the King's illness, which threw the affairs of state and the distribution of power into the hands of certain nobles, who only wanted oppor❤ VOL. I. C opportunity to aim a deadly blow at the ambition of several of their cotemporaries, who had long been obnoxious to them. The Marquis de Bellefonde had been too long a court-favorite not to have many rivals and enemies; and he found the ruling party prevailing against him, before he suspected what were their designs, or was even apprised of the extent of their influence. His pensions were suddenly withdrawn ; he was involved in pecuniary embarrasments, and his general interests at court, as well as with the King, were so much weakened, that, without some bold effort to sustain himself in office, he found he was in danger of being obliged to withdraw from that sphere which custom had rendered necessary to his happiness, and which to relinquish now would prove the severest mortification to his pride ;—not less than a death-stroke to his ambition. An An alliance had been projected for his son, which, by uniting his interests with those of one of the most powerful noblemen of France, and who was also a member of the leading faction, seemed now doubly desirable, and was indeed the only prop which could uphold his declining fortune. This was a marriage with that nobleman the Duc de B's. niece; who was also his ward, and the heiress of immense riches; and, as he could have no doubt of the acquiescence of a young girl who was naturally of a mild yielding disposition, and who, being educated in the seclusion of a convent, could be in no danger of forming any other attachment, he had offered this alliance to the Marquis, without reserve, at the first commencement of his guardianship. The Vicomte de Rosier was at that time preparing to leave France, with a heart fettered by other engagements; and his father did not then see all the future importance of such a connection; though he was not then |