Those who would have suited our purposes did not meet
with the king's approbation, and he had not yet sufficient courage
to venture upon electing one who should be disagreeable to us; he
therefore hit upon a curious provisional election; the abbe Terray,
for instance, was placed at the head of the war department. This
measure was excused by the assertion, that it would require the
head of a financier to look into and settle the accounts, which
the late minister had, no doubt, left in a very confused state.
Upon the same principle, M. Bertin was appointed to the direction
of foreign affairs, and M. de Boynes was invested solely with the
management of naval affairs. This man, who was counsellor of
state, and first president of the parliament of Besancon, knew
not a letter of the office thus bestowed upon him, but then he
was bound body and soul to the chancellor; and it was worth
something to have a person who, it might be relied on, would
offer no opposition to the important reforms which were to be set
on foot immediately. We required merely automata, and M. de Boynes
answered our purpose perfectly well; for a provisional minister
nothing could have been better.
The king had at length (in his own opinion), hit upon a very
excellent minister of war; and the person selected was the
chevalier, afterwards comte de Muy, formerly usher to the late
dauphin: he was a man of the old school, possessing many sterling
virtues and qualities.
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