163 
highest pink crayon, or something like it. The 
King is a pretty good person, rather fat, his coun- 
tenance agreeable : he had some prodigiously fine 
diamonds. In the evening, after making two or 
three visits, seeing the menagerie, &c., we went to 
St. Germain-en-laye, and slept at the country-house 
of the Marechal de Nouailles, a fine old gentleman 
who was a great favourite of the late King, as he is 
of the present; he contributed chiefly to give the 
late King a taste for gardening and botany, and was 
a correspondent of Linnzus ; he received us very 
politely, but had a large party of his family with 
him, so we had little conversation. With him lives 
Mr. Le Breton, a young man of genius whom he 
patronizes, and who was in England with Brous- 
sonet this spring. It is he who is translating my 
two pamphlets into French. When the preface 
to the last one was read to the marechal, it drew 
tears from his eyes, and he expressed the highest 
approbation of it. You have heard of the Chateau 
de St. Germain, built by Francis I.: its situation is 
very fine, but Louis XIV. did not like it, because 
from it the spires of St. Denis (where he was to be 
buried) appear in view; so he built Versailles, in a 
situation by no means comparable to it. 
After an early dinner, hearing that the King was 
coming to St. Germain to shoot, the marechal sent 
Broussonet and myself in his chariot, and himself 
and Le Breton rode on horseback to the place. 
The game had been all driven together into some 
fields and thickets, around which the people were 
kept at a distance by soldiers. The King came 
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