The opening acts of Latude's Bastille story carry more than a whiff of farce. After serving as a surgeon and barber in the army (the two professions being interchangeable at the time), he came to Paris in 1748, and devised a hare-brained scheme to find fortune and favour among the royal court. His plan was to foil an assassination plot against the king's mistress, the Marquise de Pompadour. A noble cause, perhaps. Except that Latude had manufactured the plot himself after overhearing two men criticising the Marquise while walking in the garden of the Tuileries. He sent a poison letter (in fact containing a harmless powder) to his mark, and then obtained an audience with her at Versailles to warn her of the danger. Before he could leave, however, he was tricked into providing a sample of his own handwriting. When this was compared to the script on the letter, it was immediately clear that saviour and conspirator were one.
Within days Latude was making his first acquaintance with the Bastille. After a few months, he was transferred to the prison of Vincennes. He duly escaped, making his way through fields and vineyards to a safe-house in Paris. From there, he wrote to the king for clemency - including on his memorandum a return address. Latude was back in the Bastille in a matter of hours.
- from Fallen Glory, James Crawford, 353
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