Germains, he could catch a
glimpse, in the distance, of a certain white spire of St. Denis, where his
race lay buried, he would say to his courtiers, with a sublime
condescension, "Gentlemen, you must remember that I, too, am mortal."
Surely the lords in waiting could hardly think him serious, and vowed that
his Majesty always loved a joke. However, mortal or not, the sight of that
sharp spire wounded his Majesty's eyes; and is said, by the legend, to
have caused the building of the palace of Babel-Versailles.
In the year 1681, then, the great king, with bag and baggage--with guards,
cooks, chamberlains, mistresses, Jesuits, gentlemen, lackeys, Fenelons,
Molieres, Lauzuns, Bossuets, Villars, Villeroys, Louvois, Colberts--
transported himself to his new palace: the old one being left for James of
England and Jaquette his wife, when their time should come. And when the
time did come, and James sought his brother's kingdom, it is on record
that Louis hastened to receive and console him, and promised to restore,
incontinently, those islands from which the canaille had turned him.
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