FALL OF VENDOME. 69

de Vend6me a considerable advantage, because he was thus
delivered from a rival most embarrassing by the superiority of
his birth, just when he was about to be placed in a high
military position. I have already mentioned Vendome's ex-
clusion from command. The fall of this Prince of the Proud
had then begun: we have now reached the second step, between
which and the third there was a space of between two and
three months; but as the third had no connection with any
other event, I will relate it at once.

Whatever reasons existed to induce the King to take from
M. de Vendome the command of his armies, I know not, if all
the art and credit of Madame de Maintenon would not have
been employed in vain, together with the intrigues of M.
du Maine, without an adventure, which I must at once
•explain, to set before the reader's eyes the issue of the terrible
struggle, pushed to such extremes, between Vendome, seconded
by his formidable cabal, and the necessary heir of the Crown,
.supported by his wife, the favourite of the King, and Madame
de Maintenon, which last, to speak clearly, as all the Court
saw, for thirty years governed him completely.

When M. de Vendome returned from Flanders, he had a
.short interview with the King, in which he made many bitter
complaints against Puysegur, one of his lieutenant-generals,
whose sole offence was that he was much attached to M.
de Bourgogne. Puysegur was a great favourite with the King,
•and often, on account of the business of the infantry regiment,
•of which the King thought himself the private colonel, had
private interviews with him, and was held in high estimation
for his capacity and virtue. He, in his turn, came back from
Flanders, and had a private audience of the King. The com-
plaints that had been made against him by M. de VendSme
were repeated to him by the King, who, however, did not
mention from whom they came. Puysegur defended himself
so well, that the King in his surprise mentioned this latter
fact. At the name of Vendome, Puysegur lost all patience.
He described to the King all the faults, the impertinences, the
•obstinacy, the insolence of M. de Vendome, with a precision