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A grand jury brought in a true bill against the French ambassador, and the ambassador's butler, accused of having drugged d'Éon, fled. The granting of the nolle prosequi is denied. The ambassador was mobbed and took leave of absence, and Louis XV., through de Broglie, offered to d'Éon terms humiliating to a king.
The official order for the Chevalier's return to France was actually delivered to the King's Council; but Louis XV. delayed the departure of the courier who was to be its bearer, and sent off another courier privately, who gave the Chevalier d'Eon a letter in his own writing, in which he said, "I know that you have served me as effectually in the dress of a woman as in that which you now wear.
The death of Louis XV., in 1774, brought the folly of the secret policy to an end, but in the same year rumours about d'Éon's dubious sex appeared in the English newspapers on the occasion of his book, Les Loisirs du Chevalier d'Éon, published at Amsterdam. Bets on his sex were made, and d'Éon beat some bookmakers with his stick.
In the language of the affections as employed by the black natives of Australia, this would have meant that de Nivernais was the recognised rival of Louis XV. in the favour of the lady; but the inference must not be carried to that length. There are different versions of a trick which d'Éon, as secretary, played on Mr.
But when we consider the predicament of Louis, obliged to recall d'Éon publicly, while all his ruinous secrets remained in the hands of that disgraced and infuriated little man, it seems not quite impossible that he may have committed the folly of writing this letter. For the public recall says nothing about the secret papers of which d'Éon had quantities.
The discovery in London of the true sex of this pretended woman makes it probable that the few words uttered by the Minister contained a solution of the enigma. The Chevalier d'Eon had been useful in Russia as a spy of Louis XV. while very young he had found means to introduce himself at the Court of the Empress Elizabeth, and served that sovereign in the capacity of reader.
What was to become of them, if he returned to France in disgrace? If they reached the hands of de Guerchy they meant an explosion between Louis XV. and his mistress, and his ministers. To parry the danger, then, according to d'Éon, Louis privately bade him flee disguised, with his cargo of papers, and hide in female costume. Yet what folly was so great as to be beyond the capacity of Louis?
He also succeeded in irritating de Praslin, the French minister, before returning to his new post in London, for d'Éon was a partisan of the two de Broglies, now in the disgrace of Madame de Pompadour and of Louis XV.; though the Comte de Broglie, 'disgraced' as he was, still managed the secret policy of the French King. D'Éon's position was thus full of traps.
As Louis XV. certainly allowed that maidenly captain of dragoons, d'Eon, to manage his hidden policy in London, it is not at all improbable that he really intrusted this fresh cabal in Holland to Saint- Germain, whom he admitted to great intimacy. To The Hague went Saint-Germain, diamonds, rubies, senna tea, and all, and began to diplomatize with the Dutch.
D'Éon also declares that he led a force which 'dislodged the Highland mountaineers in a gorge of the mountain at Einbeck. I know not what Highland regiment is intended, but D'Éon's orders bear that he was to withdraw troops opposed to the Highlanders, and a certificate in his favour from the Duc and the Comte de Broglie does not allude to the circumstance that, instead of retreating before the plaids, he drove them back to the English camp.
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