But She Had Such a Sweet Winning Smile

Louis the Fifteenth, king of France, Adored Madame du Barry. His royal ardor was not bound To the person he did marry. His paramour was hard to please. The king brooded day and night On what act of loving kindness Might appease her appetite. One day he called his jeweller, Whose face turned pale, then green, When told to make a necklace The likes of which no eyes had seen. Vanity of vanities! Let nobody forget: All humankind proposes yields to a Higher Will. For the king lay dead and buried When it was time to pay the bill. They asked:' Who has got the money? Who is there so rich As to settle payment And haul us from this ditch? Louis the Sixteenth was now king, But not long on the throne. To purchasing the necklace He himself was prone. His wife strongly objected. She thought the whole thing crazy.' 'We need to spend on self-defence: More vessels for the navy!' Now Cardinal De Rohan was a worldly priest, Not averse to 'oo la la.' Especially not in the matter of Jeanne de la Motte Valois. As a young girl she was naughty, But she confessed in style. The priest let her off counting rosary beads All for the sake of her sweet winning smile. Jeanne told the cardinal They could have a sales deal signed As friends at court had signaled That the queen had changed her mind. The queen and cardinal soon met And the queen signed with aplomb. De Rohan was too befuddled To sense something was wrong The queen received the necklace But the queen was not the queen. Charming though the lady was, Who knew where she had been? The necklace was picked to pieces And sold off part by part. O woeful desecration Of this glorious objet d'art? The cardinal faced the music A victim of delusion 'Gullable, not guilty,' came the court's conclusion. Madame de la Motte Valois Had no basis for a plea And she was branded on both arms With the letter V. This letter stood for 'Voleuse,' Meaning in English 'thief.' Somehow she got to London, And there she came to grief. When fleeing from her creditors, She fell from an upper floor. Those creditors she did escape, But only at death's door. During her interment Wagging tongues spoke of her guile But someone chirped in her defence: 'But she had such a sweet winning smile.'