Unluckily Mercy disapproved of the idea.

It is impossible to read his correspondence with the empress, and in subsequent years with Marie Antoinette herself, without being forcibly impressed with respect for his consummate prudence, his sound judgment in matters of public policy, and his unswerving fidelity to the interests of both mother and daughter.

But at the same time it is difficult to avoid seeing that he was too little inclined to make allowance for the youthful eagerness for amusements which was natural to her age, and that at times he carried his supervision into matters on which his statesman-like experience and sagacity had hardly qualified him to form an opinion.

He was proud of his princess's beauty; and, considering himself in charge of her figure as well as of her conduct, he had made himself very uneasy by the fancied discovery that she was becoming crooked.

He was sure that one shoulder was growing higher than the other; he earnestly recommended stays, and was very much displeased with her aunts for setting her against them, because they were not fashionable in Paris.