The aunts too, and especially the eldest, Madame Adelaide, had schemes of their own, which, they also sought to carry out by underhand methods. The more conscious they were that they themselves had no influence over their father, the less could they endure the chance of their niece acquiring any, though it could not have been said to have been established at their expense. On the other hand, they had before his marriage had considerable power with the dauphin, which they had now but little hope of retaining. They saw also that Marie Antoinette had in a few weeks gained a general popularity such as they had never won in their whole lives, and on all these accounts they were painfully jealous of her. They put ideas and plans into her head which they expected to grate upon their father's taste or indolence, and then contrived to have them represented or misrepresented to him, though he disappointed their malice by regarding such things as childish ebullitions natural to a girl of her age, and was far more inclined to humor than to reprove her. With the same object, they tried to induce her to interfere in appointments in which she had no concern; but she remembered her mother's advice, and on this point kept steadily in the path which that affectionate adviser had marked out for her. They even ventured to make disparaging observations on her manners, as inexperienced and unformed, to the dauphin himself, till he silenced them by the warmth of his praises alike of her beauty and of her disposition; and they were so afraid of any addition to her popularity with the nation at large, that, when the city of Paris and the states of Languedoc presented her with an address, they recommended her to make no reply, assuring her that on similar occasions they themselves had never given any answers. Luckily, she had a better adviser, who on this occasion was the Abbe de Vermond. He told her truly that in this matter the conduct which the older princesses had pursued was a warning, not a pattern: that they had made all France discontented; and at his suggestion Marie Antoinette gave to each address "an answer full of graciousness, with which the public was enchanted."

Thus in the first year of her marriage, by her kindness of heart, guided by the advice of Mercy and the abbe, to which she listened with the greatest docility, she had won general affection, and had made no enemies but those whose enmity was an honor. She was, as she wrote to her mother, perfectly happy, though, had she not wished to make the best of matters, she was not, in fact, wholly free from disappointments and vexations, some of which continued for years to cause her uneasiness and anxiety, though others were comparatively trivial or temporary, while one was of an almost comical nature.

She had conceived a great desire to learn to ride. Her mother had been a great horsewoman; and, as the dauphin, like the king, was passionately addicted to hunting, which hitherto she had only witnessed from a carriage, Marie Antoinette not unnaturally desired to be mistress of an accomplishment which would enable her to give him more of her companionship. 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. And when the horse exercise was proposed, he set his face against it; he wrote to Maria Teresa, who agreed with him in thinking it ruinous to the complexion, injurious to the shape, and not to be safely indulged in under thirty years of age[8]; and, lest distance should weaken the authority of the empress, he enlisted Madame de Noailles and Choiseul on his side, and Choiseul persuaded the king that it was a very objectionable pastime for a young bride.

There was not as yet the slightest prospect of the dauphiness becoming a mother (a circumstance which was, in fact, the most serious of her vexations, and that which lasted longest): but the king on this point agreed with his minister, and after some discussion a compromise was hit upon, and it was decided that she might ride a donkey. The whole country was immediately ransacked for a stud of quiet donkeys.[9] In September the court moved to Compiegne, and day after day, while the king and the dauphin were shooting in one part of the woods, on the other side a cavalcade of donkey-riders, the aunts and the king's brothers all swelling Marie Antoinette's train, trotted up and down the glades, and sought out shady spots for rural luncheons out-of-doors; and, though even this pastime was occasionally found liable to as much danger as an expedition on nobler steeds, the merry dauphiness contrived to extract amusement for herself and her followers from her very disasters. It was long a standing joke that on one occasion, when her donkey and herself came down in a soft place, her royal highness, before she would allow her attendants to extricate her from the mud, bid them go to Madame de Noailles, and ask her what the rules of etiquette prescribed when a dauphiness of France failed to keep her seat upon a donkey.

She had also another annoyance which was even of a less royal character than being doomed to ride on a donkey. She had absolutely no pocket-money. For many generations the princes of the country had been accustomed to dip their hands so unrestrainedly into the national treasury, that their legitimate appointments had been fixed on a very moderate, if not scanty, scale; so that any one who, like the dauphin and dauphiness, might be scrupulous not to exceed their income (though that scruple had probably affected no one before) could not fail to be greatly straitened. The allowance of Marie Antoinette was fixed at no higher amount than six thousand francs a month; and of this small sum, according to a report which, in the course of the autumn, Mercy made to the empress, not a single crown really reached the princess for her private use.[10] Nearly half of the money was stopped to pay some pensions granted Marie Leczinska, with which the dauphiness could by no possibility have the slightest concern. Almost as much more was intrusted to the gentlemen of her chamber for the expenses of the play table, at which she was expected to preside, since there was no queen to discharge that duty; and whether her royal highness's cards won or lost, the money equally disappeared,[11] and the remainder was distributed in presents to her ladies, at the discretion of Madame de Noailles. Had not Maria Teresa, when she first quit Vienna, intrusted Mercy with a thousand pounds for her use, and had she not herself been singularly economical in her ideas, she would have been in the humiliating position of being unable to provide for her own most ordinary wants, and, a matter about which she was even more anxious, for her constant charities. Yet so inveterate was the mismanagement in both the court and the government, that it was some time before Mercy could succeed, by the strongest remonstrances supported by clear proofs of the real situation of her royal highness, in getting her affairs and her resources placed upon a proper footing.

In spite of all the efforts of the cabal, the king's regard for her increased daily. He had not for many years been used to being treated with respect, and she, not from any artfulness, but from her native propriety of feeling, which forbade her ever to forget that he was her husband's grandfather and her king, united a tone of the most loyal respect with her filial caresses. She called him papa, and even paid him the tacit compliment of grounding occasional requests on considerations of humanity and justice, little as such motives had ever influenced Louis, and rarely as their names had of late been heard in the precincts of the palace. She even induced him to pardon Madame de Grammont; insisting on such a concession as due to herself, when she demanded it for one of her own retinue, till he laughed, and replied, "Madame, your orders shall be executed." And the steadiness she thus showed in protecting her own servants won her many hearts among the courtiers, at the same time that it filled her aunts with astonishment, who, while commending her firmness, could not avoid adding that "it was easy to see that she did not belong to their race.[12]" And how strong as well as how general was of respect and good-will which she had thus diffused was seen in a remarkable manner at some of the private theatricals, which were a frequent diversion of the king, when the actor, at the end of one of his songs, introduced some verses which he had composed in her honor, and the whole body of courtiers who were present showed their approbation by a vehement clapping of their hands, in defiance of a standing order of the court, which prohibited any such demonstrations being made in the sovereign's presence.[13]

It, however, more than counterbalanced these triumphs that, before the end of the year, the cabal of the mistress succeeded in procuring the dismissal of the Choiseul, and the appointment of the Duc d'Aiguillon as minister. For Choiseul had been not only a faithful, but a most judicious, friend to her. If others showed too often that they regarded her as a foreigner, he only remembered it as a reason for giving her hints as to the feelings of the nation or of individuals which a native would not have required. And she thankfully acknowledged that his suggestions had always been both kind and useful, and expressed her sense of her obligations to him, and her concern at his dismissal to her mother, who fully shared her feelings on the subject.

And, encouraged by this victory over her most powerful adherent, the cabal began to venture to attack Marie Antoinette herself. They surrounded her with spies; they even spread a report that Louis had begun to see through and to distrust her, in the hope that, when it should reach the king's own ears, it might perhaps lay the foundation of the alienation which it pretended to assert; and they grew the bolder because the king's next brother was about to be married to a Savoyard princess, of whose favor De la Vauguyon flattered himself that he was already assured. Under these circumstances Marie Antoinette behaved with consummate prudence, as far at least as her enemies were concerned. She despised the efforts made to lower her in the general estimation so completely that she seemed wholly unconscious of them. She did not even allow herself to be provoked into treating the authors of the calumnies with additional coldness; but gave no handle to any of them to complain of her, so that the critical and anxious eyes of Mercy himself found nothing to wish altered in her conduct toward them.[14] And throughout the winter she pursued the even tenor of her way, making herself chiefly remarkable by almost countless acts of charity, which she dispensed with such judgment as showed that they proceeded, not from a heedless disregard of money, but from a thoughtful and vigilant kindness, which did not think the feelings any more than the necessities of the poor beneath her notice.

Circumstances to which she contributed only indirectly enhanced her popularity and weakened the effects of the mistress's hostility. Versailles had not been so gay for many winters, and the votaries of mere amusement, always a strong party at every court, rejoiced at the addition to the royal family to whom the gayety was owing. Louis roused himself to gratify the young princess, who enlivened his place with the first respectable pleasures which it or he had known for years. When he saw that she liked dramatic performances, he opened the private theatre of the palace twice a week. Because she was fond of dancing, he encouraged her to have a weekly ball in her own apartments, at which she herself was the principal attraction, not solely by the elegance of her every movement, but still more by the graciousness with which she received and treated her guests, having a kind smile and an affable word for all, apparently forgetting her rank in the frankness of her condescension, yet at the same time bearing herself with an innate dignity which prevented the most forward from presuming on her kindness or venturing on any undue familiarity.[15]

The winter of 1770 was one of unusual severity; and she found resources for a further enlivenment of the court in the frost itself. Sledging on the snow was an habitual pastime at Vienna, where the cold is more severe than at Paris; nor in former years had sledges been wholly unknown in the Bois de Boulogne. And now Marie Antoinette, whose hardy habits made exercise in the fresh air almost a necessity for her, had sledges built for herself and her attendants; and the inhabitants of Versailles and the neighborhood, as fond of novelty as all their countrymen, were delighted at the merry sledging-parties which, as long as the snow lasted, explored the surrounding country, while the woods rang with the horses' bells, and, almost as loudly and still more cheerfully, with the laughter of the company.

Her liveliness had, as it were, given a new tone to the whole court; and though the dauphin held out longer against the genial influence of his wife's disposition than most people, it at last in some degree thawed even his frigidity. She ascribed his apathy and apparent dislike to female society rather to the neglect or malice of his early tutors than to any natural defect of capacity or perversity of disposition; and often lectured him on his deficiencies, and even on some of his favorite pursuits, which she looked upon as contributing to strengthen his shyness with ladies. She was not unacquainted with English literature, in which the rusticity and coarseness of the fox-hunting squires formed a piquant subject for the mirth of dramatists and novelists; and if Squire Western had been the type of sportsmen in all countries, she could not have inveighed more vigorously than she did against her husband's addiction to hunting. One evening, when he did not return from the field till the play in the theatre was half over, she not only frowned upon him all the rest of the entertainment, but when, after the company had retired, he began to enter into an explanation of the cause of his delay, a scene ensued which it will be best to give in the very words of Mercy's report to the empress.

"The dauphiness made him a short but very energetic sermon, in which she represented to him with vivacity all the evils of the uncivilized kind of life he was leading. She showed him that no one of his attendants could stand that kind of life, and that they would like it the less that his own air and rude manners made no amends to those who were attached to his train; and that, by following this plan of life, he would end by ruining his health and making himself detested. The dauphin received this lecture with gentleness and submission, confessed that he was wrong, promised to amend, and formally begged her pardon. This circumstance is certainly very remarkable, and the more so because the next day people observed that he paid the dauphiness much more attention, and behaved toward her with a much more lively affection than usual.[16]"

We do not, however, find in reality that the severity of her admonitions produced any permanent diminution of his fondness for hunting and shooting; but the gentleness of her general manners, and the delight which he saw that all around her took in her graciousness, so far excited his admiration that he began to follow her example. He said that "she had such native grace that every thing which she did succeeded to perfection; that it must be admitted that she was charming." And before the end of the winter he had come to take an active part both in her Monday balls, and in those which her ladies occasionally gave in her honor; "dancing himself the whole of the evening, and conversing with all the company with an air of cheerfulness and good-nature of which no one before had ever thought him capable.[17]" The happy change in his demeanor was universally attributed to the dauphiness; and, as the character of their future king was naturally watched with anxiety as a matter of the highest importance, it greatly increased the attachment of all who had the welfare of the nation at heart to the princess, whose general example had produced so beneficial an effect.



CHAPTER V.

Mercy's Correspondence with Empress.—Distress and Discontent pervade France.—Goldsmith predicts a Revolution.—Apathy of the King.—The Aunts mislead Marie Antoinette.—Maria Teresa hears that the Dauphiness neglects her German Visitors.—Marriage of the Count de Provence.—Growing Preference of Louis XV. for the Dauphiness.—The Dauphiness applies herself to Study.—Marie Antoinette becomes a Horsewoman.—Her Kindness to all beneath her.—Cabals of the Adherents of the Mistress.—The Royal Family become united.—Concerts in the Apartments of the Dauphiness.

Marie Antoinette was not a very zealous or copious letter-writer. Her only correspondent In her earlier years was her mother, and even to her her letters are less effusive and less full of details than might have been expected, one reason for their brevity arising out of the intrigues of the court, since she had cause to believe herself so watched and spied upon that her very desk was not safe; and, consequently, she never ventured to begin a letter to the empress before the morning on which it was to be sent, lest it should be read by those for whose eyes it was not intended. For our knowledge, therefore, of her acts and feelings at this period of her life, we still have to rely principally on Mercy's correspondence, which is, however, a sufficiently trustworthy guide, so accurate was his information, and so entire the frankness with which she opened herself to him on all occasions and on all subjects.

The spring of 1771 opened very unfavorably for the new administration; omens of impending dangers were to be seen on all sides. Ten or twelve years before, Goldsmith, whose occasional silliness of manner prevented him from always obtaining the attention to which his sagacity entitled him, had named the growing audacity of the French parliaments as not only an indication of the approach of great changes in that country, but as likely also to be their moving cause.[1] And they had recently shown such determined resistance to the royal authority, that, though in the most conspicuous instance of it, their assertion of their right to pronounce an independent judgment on the charges brought against the Duc d'Aiguillon, they were unquestionably in the right; and though their pretensions were supported by almost the whole body of the princes of the blood, some of whom were immediately banished for their contumacy, Louis had been persuaded to abolish them altogether. And Marie Antoinette, though she carefully avoided mixing herself up with politics, was, as she reported to her mother,[2] astonished beyond measure at their conduct, which she looked upon as arising out of the grossest disloyalty, and which certainly indicated the existence of a feeling very dangerous to the maintenance of the royal authority on the part of those very men who were most bound to uphold it. There was also great and general distress. For a moment in the autumn it had been relieved by a fall in the price of bread, which the unreasoning gratitude of the populace had attributed to the benevolence of the dauphiness; but the severity of the winter had brought it back with aggravated intensity till it reached even to the palace, and compelled a curtailment of some of the festivities with which it had been intended to celebrate the marriage of the Count de Provence, which was fixed for the approaching May.

Distress is the sure parent of discontent, unless the people have a very complete confidence in their government. And this was so far from being the case in France at this time, that the distrust of and contempt for those in the highest places increased daily more and more. The influence which Madame du Barri exerted over the king became more rooted as he became more used to submit to it, and more notorious as he grew more shameless in his avowal of it. She felt her power, and her intrigues became in the same proportion more busy and more diversified in their objects. In the vigorous description of Mercy, Versailles was wholly occupied by treachery, hatred, and vengeance; not one feeling of honesty or decency remained; while the people, ever quick-witted to perceive the vices of their rulers, especially when they are indulged at their expense, revenged themselves by bitter and seditious language, and by satires and pasquinades in which neither respect nor mercy was shown even to the sacred person of the sovereign himself. He was callous to all marks of contempt displayed for himself; but was, or was induced to profess himself, deeply annoyed at the conduct of the dauphin, who showed a fixed aversion for the mistress, which, however, his grandfather did not regard as dictated by his own feelings. Louis rather believed that it was fostered by Marie Antoinette, and that she, in encouraging her husband, was but following the advice of her aunts; and he threatened to remonstrate with the dauphiness on the subject, though, as Mercy correctly divined, he could not nerve himself to the necessary resolution.

It was true that Marie Antoinette did often allow herself to be far too much influenced by those princesses. She confessed to Mercy that she was afraid to displease or thwart them; a feeling which he regarded as the more unfortunate because, when she was not actuated by that consideration, her own judgment and her own impulses would always guide her aright; and because, too, the elder princesses were the most unsafe of all advisers. They were notoriously jealous of one another, and each at times tried to inspire her niece with her feelings toward the other two; and they often, without meaning it, played into the hands of the mistress's cabal, intriguing for selfish objects of their own with as much malice and meanness as could be practiced by Madame du Barri herself.

Still, in spite of these drawbacks, it was almost inevitable that they should have great influence over their niece. Their experience might well be presumed by her to have given them a correct insight into the ways of the court, and the best mode of behaving to their own father; and she, a foreigner and almost a child, was not only in need of counsel and guidance, but had no one else of her own sex to whom she could so naturally look for information or advice. They were, as she explained to Mercy, her only society; and, though she was too clear-sighted not to see their faults, and not at times to be aware that she was suffering from their perverseness, she, like other people, was often compelled to tolerate what she could not mend, and to shut her eyes to disagreeable qualities when forced to live on terms of intimacy with the possessors.

On this point Maria Teresa was, perhaps, hardly inclined to make sufficient allowance for her difficulties, and insisted over and over again on the mischief which would arise to her from the habit of surrendering her judgment to these princesses. She told her that, though far from being devoid of virtues and real merit, "they had never succeeded in making themselves loved or esteemed by either their father or the public;[3]" and she added other admonitions which, as they were avowedly suggested by reports that had reached her, may be taken as indicating some errors into which her daughter's lightness of heart had occasionally betrayed her. She entreated her not to show an exclusive preference for the more youthful portion of her society, to the neglect of those who were older, and commonly of higher consideration; never to laugh at people or turn them into ridicule—no habit could be more injurious to herself, and indulgence in it would give reason to doubt her good-nature; it might gain her the applause of a few young people, but it would alienate a much greater number, and those the people of the most real weight and respectability. "This is not," said the experienced and wise empress, "a trivial matter in a princess. We live on the stage of the great world, and it is above all things essential that people should entertain a high idea of us. If you will only not allow others to lead you astray, you are sure of success; a kind Providence has endowed you so liberally with beauty, and with so many charms, that all hearts are yours if you are but prudent.[4]"

The empress would have had her exhibit this prudence in her conduct also to Madame du Barri. She pressed upon her that she was justified in appearing ignorant of that lady's real position and character; that she need only be aware that she was received at court, and that respect for the king should prevent her from suspecting him of countenancing undeserving people.

One other detail in the accounts of Marie Antoinette's conduct, which from time to time reached Vienna, had also vexed the empress, and it should be kept in mind by any one who would fairly estimate the truth of the charge brought against her, and urged with such rancor after she had become queen—of postponing the interests of France to those of her native land, of being Austrian at heart. Maria Teresa had heard, on the contrary, that she had given those Austrians who had presented themselves at Versailles but a cold reception, and she did not attempt to conceal her discontent. With a natural and becoming pride in and jealousy for her own loyal and devoted subjects, she entreated her daughter never to feel ashamed of them, or ashamed of being German herself, even if, comparatively speaking, the name should imply some deficiency in polish. "The French themselves would esteem her more if they saw in her something of German solidity and frankness.[5]"

The daughter answered the mother with some adroitness. She took no notice of the advice about her behavior to Madame du Barri. It was the one topic on which her own feelings of propriety, as well as those of the dauphin, coincided with the suggestions of the aunts, and she did not desire to vex or provoke the empress by a prolonged discussion of the question; but the charge of coldness to her own countrymen she denied earnestly. "She should always glory in being a German. Some of those nobles whom the empress had expressly named she had treated with careful distinction, and had even danced with them, though they were not men of the very highest character. She well knew that the Germans had many good qualities which she could wish that the French shared with them;" and she promised that, whenever any of her mother's subjects of such standing and merit as to be worthy of her attention came to the court, they should have no cause to complain of her reception of them. Her language on the subject is so measured and careful as to lead us almost inevitably to the inference that the reports which had excited such dissatisfaction at Vienna were not without foundation, but that the French gayety, even if often descending to frivolity, was more to her taste than the German solidity which her mother so highly esteemed, and that she had been at no great pains to hide a preference which must naturally he acceptable to those among whom her future life was to be spent.

In the middle of May, the Count de Provence was married to the Princess Josephine Louise of Savoy, and the court went to Fontainebleau to receive the bride. The necessity for leaving Madame du Barri behind threw the king more into the company of the dauphiness than he had been on any previous occasion, and her unaffected graces seemed for the moment to have made a complete conquest of him. He came in his dressing-gown to her apartments for breakfast, and spent a great portion of the day there. The courtiers again began to speculate on her breaking down the ascendency of the favorite, remarking that, though Louis was careful to pay his new relative the honors which, were her due as a stranger and a bride, he returned as speedily as he could with decency to the dauphiness as if for relief; and that, though she herself took care to put her new sister-in-law forward on all occasions, and treated her with the most marked cordiality and affection, every one else made the dauphiness the principal object of homage even in the festivities which were celebrated in honor of the countess. Indeed, it was evident from the very first that any attempt of the mistress's cabal to establish a rivalry between the two princesses must be out of the question. The Countess de Provence had no beauty, nor accomplishments, nor graciousness. Horace Walpole, who was meditating a visit to Paris, where he had some diligent correspondents, was told that he would lose his senses when he saw the dauphiness, but would be disenchanted by her sister; and the saying, though that of a blind old lady, expressed the opinion of all Frenchmen who could see.[6]

Indeed, so obvious was the king's partiality for her that even Madame du Barri more than once sought to propitiate her by speaking in praise of her to Mercy, and professing an eager desire to aid in procuring the gratification of any of her wishes. But he was too shrewd and too well-informed to place the least confidence in her sincerity, though he did not fear half as much harm to his pupil from her enmity as from the pretended affection of the aunts, who, from a mixture of folly and treachery, were unwearied in their attempts to keep her at a distance from the king, by inspiring her with a fear of him, for which his disposition, which had as much good-nature in it as was compatible with weakness, gave no ground whatever. Indeed, the mischief they did was not confined to their influence over her, if Mercy was correct in his belief that it was their disagreeable tempers and manners which at this time, and for the remainder of the reign, prevented Louis from associating more with his family, which, had all been like the dauphiness, he would have preferred to do.

It would probably have been in vain that Mercy remonstrated against her submitting as she did to the aunts, had he not been at all times able to secure the co-operation of the empress, who placed the most implicit confidence in his judgment in all matters relating to the French court, and remonstrated with her daughter energetically on the want of proper self-respect which was implied in her surrendering her own judgment to that of the aunts, as if she were a slave or a child. And Marie Antoinette replied to her mother in a tone of such mingled submissiveness and affection as showed how sincere was her desire to remove every shade of annoyance from the empress's mind; and which may, perhaps, lead to a suspicion that even her subservience to the aunts proceeded in a great degree from her anxiety to win the good-will of every one, and from the kindness which could not endure to thwart those with whom she was much associated; though at the same time she complained to the ambassador that her mother wrote without sufficient knowledge of the difficulties with which she was surrounded. But she had too deep an affection and reverence for her mother to allow her words to fall to the ground; and gradually Mercy began to see a difference in her conduct, and a greater inclination to assert her own independence, which was the feeling that above all others he thought most desirable to foster in her.

Another topic which we find constantly urged in the empress's letters would seem strangely inconsistent with Marie Antoinette's position, if we did not remember how very young she still was. For her mother writes to her in many respects as if she were still at school, and continually inculcates on her the necessity of profiting by De Vermond's instructions, and applying herself to a course of solid reading in theology and history. And here, though her natural appetite for amusement interfered with her studies somewhat more than the empress, prompted by Mercy, was willing to make allowance for, she profited much more willingly by her mother's advice, having indeed a natural inclination for the works of history and biography, and a decided distaste for novels and romances. She could not have had a better guide in such matters than De Vermond, who was a man of extensive information and of a very correct taste; and under his guidance and with his assistance she studied Sully's memoirs, Madame de Sevigne's letters, and any other books which he recommended to her, and which gave her an idea of the past history of the country as well as the masterpieces of the great French dramatists.[7]

The latter part of the year 1771 was marked by no very striking occurrences. Marie Antoinette had carried her point, and had begun to ride on horseback without either her figure or her complexion suffering from the exercise. On the contrary, she was admitted to have improved in beauty. She sent her measure to Vienna, to show Maria Teresa how much she had grown, adding that her husband had grown as much, and had become stronger and more healthy-looking, and that she had made use of her saddle-horses to accompany him in his hunting and shooting excursions. Like a true wife, she boasted to her mother of his skill as a shot: the very day that she wrote he had killed forty head of game. (She did not mention that a French sportsman's bag was not confined to the larger game, but that thrushes, blackbirds, and even, red-breasts, were admitted to swell the list.) And the increased facilities for companionship with him that her riding afforded increased his tenderness for her, so that she was happier than ever. Except that as yet she saw no prospect of presenting the empress with a grandchild, she had hardly a wish ungratified.

Her taste for open-air exercise of this kind added also to the attachment felt for her by the lower classes, from the opportunities which arose out of it for showing her unvarying and considerate kindness. The contrast which her conduct afforded to that of previous princes, and indeed to that of all the present race except her husband, caused her actions of this sort to be estimated rather above their real importance. But how great was the impression which they did make on those who witnessed them may be seen in the unanimity with which the chroniclers of the time record her forbidding her postilions to drive over a field of corn which lay between her and the stag, because she would rather miss the sight of the chase than injure the farmer; and relate how, on one occasion, she gave up riding for a week or two, and sent her horses back from Compiegne to Versailles, because the wife of her head-groom was on the point of her confinement, and she wished her to have her husband near her at such a moment; and on another, when the horse of one of her attendants kicked her, and inflicted a severe bruise on her foot, she abstained from mentioning the hurt, lest it should bring the rider into disgrace by being attributed to his awkward management.

Not that the intrigues of the mistress and her adherents were at all diminished. They were even more active than ever since the marriage of the Count de Provence, who, in an underhanded way, instigated his wife to show countenance to Madame du Barri, and who allowed, if he did not encourage, the mistress and her friends to speak slightingly of the dauphiness in his presence. But, as Marie Antoinette felt firmer in her own position, she could afford to disregard the malice of these caballers more than she had felt that she could do at first, and even to defy them. On one occasion that the Count de Provence was imprudent enough to discuss some of his schemes with the door open while she was in the next room, she told him frankly that she had heard all that he said, and reproached him for his duplicity; and the dauphin coming in at the moment, she flew to him, throwing her arms round his neck, and telling him how she appreciated his honesty and candor, and how the more she compared him with the others, the more she saw his superiority. Indeed, she soon began to find that the Countess de Provence was as little to be trusted as her husband; and the only member of the family whom she really liked, or of whom she had at all a favorable opinion, was the Count d'Artois, who, though not yet out of the school-room, "showed," as she told her mother, "sentiments of honesty which he could never have learned of his governor.[8]"

Her indefatigable guardian, Mercy, reported to the empress that she improved every day. He had learned to conceive a very high idea of her abilities; and he dilated with especial satisfaction on the powers of conversation which she was developing; on her wit and readiness in repartee; on her originality, as well as facility of expression; and on her perfect possession of the royal art of speaking to a whole company with such notice of each member of it, that each thought himself the person to whom her remarks were principally addressed. She possessed another accomplishment, also, of great value to princes—a tenacious recollection of faces and names. And she had made herself acquainted with the history of all the chief nobles, so as to be able to make graceful allusions to facts in their family annals of which they were proud, and, what was perhaps even more important, to avoid unpleasant or dangerous topics. The king himself was not insensible to the increase of attraction which her charms, both of person and manner, conferred on the royal palace. He was perfectly satisfied with the civility of her behavior to Madame du Barri, who admitted that she had nothing to complain of. And the only point in which even Mercy, the most critical of judges, saw any room for alteration in her conduct was a certain remissness in bestowing her notice on men of real eminence, and on foreign visitors if they were not of the very highest rank; the remark as to the latter class being perhaps dictated by a somewhat excessive natural susceptibility, and by a laudable desire that any Germans who returned from France to their own country should sing her praises in her native land.

Perhaps one of the strongest proofs of the regard in which, at this time, she was held by all parties in the court is found in the circumstance that the Count de Provence himself very soon found it impossible to continue his countenance to the intrigues against her which he had previously favored. He preferred ingratiating himself and the countess with her. Marie Antoinette was always placable, and from the first had been eager, as the head of the family, to place her sister-in-law at her ease; so that when the count evinced his desire to stand on a friendly footing with her, she showed every disposition to meet his wishes, and the spring and summer of 1772 exhibited to the courtiers, who were little accustomed to such scenes, a happy example of an intimate family union. Marie Antoinette had always been fond of music, and, as we have seen before, ever since her arrival in France, had devoted fixed hours to her music-master. And now, on almost every evening which was not otherwise preoccupied, she gave little concerts in her apartments to the royal family, their principal attendants, and a few of the chief nobles of the court; being herself occasionally one of the performers, and maintaining her character as a hostess by a combined affability and dignity which made all her guests pleased with themselves as with her, and set all imitation and all detraction alike at defiance.



CHAPTER VI.

Marie Antoinette wishes to see Paris.—Intrigues of Madame Adelaide.— Characters of the Dauphin and the Count de Provence.—Grand Review at Fontainebleau.—Marie Antoinette ill the Hunting Field.—Letter from her to the Empress.—Mischievous Influence of the Dauphin's Aunts on her Character.—Letter of Marie Antoinette to the Empress.—Her Affection for her Old House.—The Princes are recalled from Exile.—Lord Stormont.— Great Fire at the Hotel-Dieu.—Liberality and Charity of Marie Antoinette.—She goes to the Bal d'Opera.—-Her Feelings about the Partition of Poland.—The King discusses Politics with her, and thinks highly of her Ability.

It was a curious proof of the mischievousness as well as of the extent of the influence which Madame Adelaide and her sister were able to exert over the indolence and apathy of their father, that when Marie Antoinette had for more than two years been married and living within twelve miles of Paris, she had never yet seen it by daylight, although the universal and natural expectation of the citizens had been that the royal pair would pay the city a state visit immediately after their marriage. Her own wishes had not been consulted in the matter; for she was naturally anxious to see the beautiful city of which she had heard so much; and the delay which had taken place was equally at variance with Madame de Noailles' notions of propriety. But when the countess suggested a plan for visiting the capital incognito, proposing that the dauphiness should drive as far as the entrance to the suburbs, and then, having sent on her saddle-horses, should ride along the boulevards, Madame Adelaide, professing a desire to join the party, raised so many difficulties on the subject of the retinue which was to follow, and was so successful in creating jealousies between her own ladies and those in attendance on Marie Antoinette, that Madame de Noailles was forced to recommend the abandonment of the project. Mercy was far more annoyed than his young mistress; he saw that the secret object of Madame Adelaide was to throw as many hindrance as possible in the way of the dauphiness winning popularity by appearing in public, while he also correctly judged hat it would be consistent both with propriety and with her interest, as the future queen of the country, rather to seek and even make opportunities for enabling the people to become acquainted with her. But to Marie Antoinette any disappointment of that kind was a very trifling matter. She had vexations which, as she told the embassador, she could not explain even to him; and they kept alive in her a feeling of homesickness which, in all persons of amiable and affectionate disposition, must require some, time to subdue. Even when her brother, the Archduke Ferdinand, had quit Vienna in the preceding autumn to enter on the honorable post of Governor of Lombardy, she had not congratulated, but condoled with him, "feeling by her own experience how much it costs to be separated from one's family." And what she had found in her own home did not as yet make up to her for all she had left behind. Even her husband, though uniformly kind in language and behavior, was of a singularly cold and undemonstrative disposition; and it almost seemed as if the gayety which he exhibited at her balls were an effort so foreign to his nature that he indemnified himself by unpardonable boorishness on other occasions. The Count de Provence had but little more polish, and a far worse temper. Squabbles often took place between the two brothers. Though both married men, they were still in age only boys; and on more than one occasion they proceeded to acts of personal violence to each other in her presence. Luckily no one else was by, and she was able to pacify and reconcile them; but she could hardly avoid feeling ashamed of having been called on to exert herself in such a cause, or contrasting the undignified boisterousness (to give it no worse name) of such scenes with the decorous self-respect which, with all their simplicity of character, had always governed the conduct of her own relations.

Not but that, in the opinion of Mercy,[1] the dauphin was endowed by nature with a more than ordinary share of good qualities. His faults were only such as proceeded from an excessively bad education. He had many most essential virtues. He was a young man of perfect integrity and straightforwardness; he was desirous to hear the truth; and it was never necessary to beat about the bush, or to have recourse to roundabout ways of bringing it before him. On the contrary, to speak to him with perfect frankness was the surest way both to win his esteem and to convince his reason. On one or two occasions in which he had consulted the embassador, Mercy had expressed his opinions without the least reserve, and had perceived that the young prince had liked him better for his candor.

The king still kept up the habit of spending the greater part of the autumn at Compiegne and Fontainebleau, visits which Marie Antoinette welcomed as a holiday from the etiquette of Versailles. She wrote word to her mother that she was growing very fast, and taking asses' milk to keep up her strength; that that regimen, with constant exercise, was doing her great good; and that she had gained great praise for the excellence of her riding. On one occasion, when they were at Fontainebleau, she especially delighted the officers of her husband's regiment of cuirassiers, when the king reviewed it in person. The dauphin himself took the command of his men, and put them through their evolutions while she rode by his side; he then presented each of the officers to her separately, and she distributed cockades to the whole body. The first she gave to the dauphin himself,[2] who placed it in his hat. Each officer, as he received his, did the same. And after the king had taken his departure, she, with her husband, remained on the field for an hour, conversing freely with the soldiers, and showing the greatest interest in all that concerned the regiment. Throughout the day the young prince had exhibited a knowledge of the profession, and a readiness as well as an ease of manner, which had surprised all the spectators, and Mercy had the satisfaction of hearing every one attribute the admirable appearance which he had made on so important an occasion (for it was the first time of his appearing in such a position) to the example and hints of the dauphiness.

It was scarcely less of a public appearance, while it was one in which the king himself probably took more interest, when, a few days afterward, on the occasion of a grand stag-hunt in the forest, she joined in the chase in a hunting uniform of her own devising. The king was so delighted that he scarcely left her side, and extolled her taste in dress, as well as her skill in horsemanship, to all whom he honored with his conversation. But the empress was not quite so well pleased. Her disapproval of horse exercise for young married women was as strong as ever. She had also interpreted some of her daughter's submissive replies to her admonitions on the subject as a promise that she would not ride, and she scolded her severely (no weaker word can express the asperity of her language) for neglect of her engagement, as well as for the risk of accidents which are incurred by those who follow the hounds, and some of which, as she heard, had befallen the dauphiness herself. Her daughter's explanation was as frank as it deserved to be accounted sufficient, while her letter is interesting also, as showing her constant eagerness to exculpate herself from the charge of indifference to her German countrymen, an eagerness which proves how firmly she believed the notion to be fixed in the empress's mind.

"I expect, my dear mamma, that people must have told you more about my rides than there really was to be told. I will tell you the exact truth. The king and the dauphin both like to see me on horseback. I only say this because all the world perceives it, and especially while we were absent from Versailles they were delighted to see me in my riding-habit. But, though I own it was no great effort for me to conform myself to their desires, I can assure you that I never once let myself he carried away by too much eagerness to keep close to the hounds; and I hope that, in spite of all my giddiness, I shall always allow myself to be restrained by the experienced hunters who constantly accompany me, and I shall never thrust myself into the crowd. I should never have supposed any one could have reported to you as an accident what happened to me in Fontainebleau. Every now and then one finds in the forest large stepping stones; and as we were going on very gently my horse stumbled on one covered with sand, which he did not see; but I easily held him up, and we went on.... Esterhazy was at our ball yesterday. Every one was greatly pleased with his dignified manner and with his style of dancing. I ought to have spoken to him when he was presented to me, and my silence only proceeded from embarrassment, as I did not know him. It would be doing me great injustice to think that I have any feeling of indifference to my country; I have more reason than any one to feel, every day of my life, the value of the blood which flows in my veins, and it is only from prudence that at times I abstain from showing how proud I am of it.... I never neglect any mode of paying attention to the king, and of anticipating his wishes as far as I can. I hope that he is pleased with me. It is my duty to please him, my duty and also my glory, if by such means I can contribute to maintain the alliance of the two houses....[3]"

The empress was but half pacified about the riding and hunting. She owned that, if both the king and the dauphin approved of it, she had nothing more to say, though she still blamed the dauphiness for forgetting a promise which she understood to have been made to herself. At the same time, no language could be kinder than that in which she asked "whether her daughter could believe that she would wish to deprive her of so innocent a pleasure, she who would give her very life to procure her one, if she were not apprehensive of mischievous consequences;" her apprehensions being solely dictated by her anxiety to see her daughter bear an heir to the throne. But she would by no means admit her excuses for giving the Hungarian prince a cold reception. "How," she said, "could she forget that her little Antoinette, when not above twelve or thirteen years old, knew how to receive people publicly, and say something polite and gracious to every one, and how could she suppose that the same daughter, now that she was dauphiness, could feel embarrassment? Embarrassment was a mere chimera."

But the truth was that it was not a mere chimera. Mercy had more than once deplored, as one among the mischievous effects of Madame Adelaide's constant interference and domineering influence, that it had bred in Marie Antoinette a timidity which was wholly foreign to her nature. And indeed it was hardly possible for one still so young to be aware that she was surrounded by unfriendly intriguers and spies, and to preserve that uniform presence of mind which her rank and position made so desirable for her, and which was in truth so natural to her that she at once recovered it the moment that her circumstances changed.

And a probability of an early change was already apparent. During the last months of 1772 there was a general idea that the king's health and mental faculties were both giving away; and all the different parties about Versailles began to show their sense of her approaching authority. It was remarked that both the ministers and the mistress had become very guarded in their language, and in their behavior to her and her husband. The Count de Provence took a curious way of showing his expectation of a change, by delivering her a long paper of counsels for her guidance, the chief object of which was to warn her against holding such frequent conversations with Mercy. She apparently thought that the writer's desire was to remove the embassador from her confidence that he himself might occupy the vacant place, and she showed her opinion of the value of the advice by reading it to Mercy and then putting it into the fire.

Some extracts from the first letter which she wrote to her mother in 1773 will serve to give us a fair idea of her feelings at this time, both from what it does and from what it does not mention. The intelligence which has reached her about her sister recalls to her mind her own anxiety to become a mother, her disappointment in this matter being, indeed, one of the most constant topics of lamentation in the letters of both daughter and mother, till it was removed by the birth of the princess royal. But that is her only vexation. In every other respect she seems perfectly contented with the course which affairs are taking; while we see how thoroughly unspoiled she is both in the warmth of the affection with which she speaks of her family and greets the little memorials of home which have been sent her; and still more in the continuance of her acts of charity, and in her design that her benevolence should be unknown.

"I hear that the queen[4] is expecting to be confined. I hope her child will be a son. When shall I be able to say the same of myself? They tell me, too, that the grand duke[5] and his wife are going into Spain. I greatly wish that they would conceive a dread of the sea-voyage, and take this place in their way. The journey would be a little longer; but they would be well received here, for my brother is very highly thought of; and, besides, I am somewhat jealous at being the only one of my family unacquainted with my sister-in-law.

"The pictures of my little brothers which you have sent me have given me great pleasure. I have had them set in a ring, and wear it every day. Those who have seen my brothers at Vienna pronounce the pictures very like, and every one thinks them very good-looking. New-year's-day here is a day of a great crowd and grand ceremony. There was nothing either to blame or to praise in the degree in which I adopted my dear mamma's advice. The Favorite came to pay her respects to me at a moment when my apartment was very full It was impossible for me to address myself to every one separately, so I spoke to the whole company in a body; and I have reason to believe that both the Favorite and her sister, who is her principal adviser, were pleased; though I have also reason to believe that, two days afterward, M. d'Aiguillon tried to persuade them that they had been ill-treated. As for the minister himself, he has never complained of me, and, indeed, I have always been careful to treat him equally well with the rest of his colleagues.

"You will have learned, my dear mamma, that the Duc d'Orleans and the Duc de Chartres are returned from banishment. I am glad of it for the sake of peace, and for that of the tranquillity and comfort of the king. But, if she had been in the king's place, I do not think my dear mamma would have accepted the letter which they have dared to write, and which they have got printed in foreign newspapers.[6]

"I was glad to see M. de Stormont.[7] I asked him all the news about my dear family, and it was a pleasure to him to inform me. He seems to me to have overcome his prejudices, and every one here thinks him a man of thorough high-breeding. I have desired M. de Mercy to invite him to one of my Monday balls. We are going to have one at, Madame de Noailles'. They will last till Ash-Wednesday. They will begin an hour or two later than they used to, that we may not be so tired as we were last year when we came to Lent In spite of the amusements of the carnival, I am always faithful to my poor harp, and they say that I make great progress with it. I sing, too, every week at the concert given by my sister of Provence. Although there are very few people there, they are very well amused; and my singing gives great pleasure to my two sisters.[8] I also find time to read a little. I have begun the 'History of England' by Mr. Hume. It seems to me very interesting, though it is necessary to recollect that it is a Protestant who has written it.

"All the newspapers have spoken of the terrible fire at the Hotel-Dieu.[9] They were obliged to remove the patients into the cathedral and the archbishop's palace. There are generally from five to six thousand patients in the hospital. In spite of all the exertions that were made, it was impossible to prevent the destruction of a great part of the building; and, though it is now a fortnight since the accident happened, the tire is still smoldering in the cellars. The archbishop has enjoined a collection to be made for the sufferers, and I have sent him a thousand crowns. I said nothing of my having done so to any one, and the compliments which they have paid me on it have been embarrassing to me; but they have said it was right to let it be known that I had sent this money, for the sake of the example."

She was on this, as on many other occasions, one of those who

"Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame."

One of her sayings, with which she more than once repressed the panegyrics of those who, as it seemed to her, extolled her benevolence too loudly, was that it was not worth while to say a great deal about giving a little assistance; and, on this occasion, so secret had she intended to keep her benevolence that she had not mentioned it to De Vermond, or even to Mercy. But she judged rightly that the empress would enter into the feelings which had prompted both the act and also the silence; and she was amply rewarded by her mother's praise.

"I have been enchanted," the empress wrote, in instant reply, "with the thousand crowns that you have sent to the Hotel-Dieu, and you speak very properly in saying that you have been vexed at people speaking to you about it. Such actions ought to be known to God alone, and I am certain that you acted in that spirit. Still, those who published your act had good reasons for what they did, as you say yourself, thinking of the influence of your example. My dear little girl, we owe this example to the world, and to set such is one of the most essential and most delicate duties of our condition. The more frequently you can perform acts of benevolence and generosity without crippling your means too much, the better; and what would be ostentation and prodigality in another is becoming and necessary for those of our rank. We have no other resources but those of conferring benefits and showing kindness; and this is even more the case with a dauphiness or a queen consort, which I myself have not been."

There could hardly be a better specimen of the principles on which the empress herself had governed her extensive dominions, or of the value of her example and instructions to her daughter, than that which is contained in these few lines; but it is not always that such lessons are so closely followed as they were by the virtuous and beneficent dauphiness. The winter passed on cheerfully; the ordinary amusements of the palace being varied by her going with the dauphin and the Count and Countess of Provence to one of the public masked balls of the opera-house, a diversion which, considering the unavoidably mixed character of the company, it is hard to avoid thinking somewhat unsuited to so august a party, but one which had been too frequently countenanced by different members of the royal family for several years for such a visit to cause remarks, though the masks of the princes and princesses could not long preserve their secret Another favorite amusement of the court at this time was the representation of proverbs, in which Marie Antoinette acted with the little Elizabeth; and we have a special account of one such performance, which was given in her honor by one of her ladies, having been originally devised for the Day of Saint Anthony, as her saint's day,[10] though it was postponed on account of her being confined to her room with a cold. The proverb was, "Better late than never;" and, as the most acceptable compliment to the dauphiness, the managers introduced a number of characters attired in a diversity of costumes, intended to represent the natives of all the countries ruled over by the Empress-queen, each of whom made a speech, in which the praises of Maria Teresa and Marie Antoinette were happily combined.

The king got better, and intrigues of all kinds were revived; but, aided by Mercy's counsels, and supported by the dauphin's unalterable affection, Marie Antoinette disconcerted all that were aimed at her by the uniform prudence of her conduct. Happily for her, with all his defects, her husband was still one in whom she could feel perfect confidence. As she told Mercy, under any conceivable circumstances she was sure of his views and intentions being always right; the only difficulty was to engage him in a sufficiently decided course of action, which his timid and sluggish disposition rendered almost painful to him. And just at this moment she was more anxious than usual to inspire him with her own feelings and spirit, because she could not avoid fearing that the discontent with which the few people in France who deserved the name of statesmen regarded the recent partition of Poland might create a coolness between France and Austria, calculated to endanger the alliance, the continuance of which was so indispensable to her happiness, and, as she was firmly convinced, to the welfare of both countries. She conversed more than once with Mercy on the subject, and her reflections, both on the partition, and on the degree in which the mutual interest of the two nations was concerned in their remaining united, gave him a very good idea of her political capacity. He also reported to his imperial mistress that he had found out that King Louis had conceived the same opinion of her, and had begun to discuss affairs of importance with her. He trusted that his majesty would get a habit of doing so; since, if his life should be spared, she would thus in time become able to exert a very useful influence over him; and as, at all events, "it was absolutely certain that some day or other she would govern the kingdom, it was of the very greatest consequence to the success of the great and brilliant career which she had before her that she should previously accustom herself to regard affairs with such principles and views as were suitable to the position which she must occupy."



CHAPTER VII.

Marie Antoinette is anxious for the Maintenance of the Alliance between France and Austria.—She, with the Dauphin, makes a State Entry into Paris.—The "Dames de la Halle."—She praises the Courtesy of the Dauphin.—Her Delight at the Enthusiasm of the Citizens.—She, with the Dauphin, goes to the Theatre, and to the Fair of St. Ovide, and to St. Cloud.—Is enthusiastically received everywhere.—She learns to drive.— She makes some Relaxations in Etiquette.—Marriage of the Comte d'Artois. —The King's Health grows Bad.—Visit of Marshal Lacy to Versailles.—The King catches the Small-pox.—Madame du Barri quits Versailles.—The King dies.

Politics were, indeed, taking such a hold over Marie Antoinette that they begin to furnish some topics for her letters to her mother, one of which shows that she had already formed that opinion of French fickleness which she had afterward too abundant cause to maintain. "I do hope," she says, "that the good intelligence between our two nations will last. One good thing in this country is, that if ill-natured feelings are quick to arise, they disappear with equal rapidity. The King of Prussia is innately a bad neighbor, but the English will also always be bad neighbors to France, and the sea has never prevented them from doing her great mischief." We might, firstly, demur to any actions of our statesmen being classed with the treacherous aggressions of Frederick of Prussia, nor did many years of her husband's reign pass over before the greatest of English ministers proposed and concluded a treaty between the two countries, which he fondly and wisely hoped would lay the foundations of a better understanding, if not of a lasting peace, between the two countries. But even before that treaty was framed, and before Pitt's voice had become predominant in the State, Marie Antoinette's complaint that the sea had never disarmed us of power to injure France had received the strongest exemplification that as yet the history of the two nations afforded in Rodney's great victory. However, she soon turns to more agreeable subject, and proceeds to speak of a pleasure to which she was looking forward, and which, as we have already seen, had been unaccountably deferred till this time, in defiance of all propriety and of all precedent. "I hope that the dauphin and I shall make our entry into Paris next month, which will be a great delight to me. I do not venture to speak of it yet, though I have the king's promise: it would not be the first time that they had made him change his mind."

The most elaborate exposure of the cabals and intrigues which ever since her marriage had been persistently directed against Marie Antoinette could not paint them so forcibly as the simple fact that three years had now elapsed since her marriage; and that, though the state entrance of the heir of the crown and his bride into the metropolis of the kingdom ought to have been a prominent part of the marriage festivities, it had never yet taken place. Nor, though Louis had at last given his formal promise that it should be no longer delayed, did the young pair even yet feel sure that an influence superior to theirs might not induce him to recall it. However, at last the intrigues were baffled, and, on the 8th of June, the visit, which had been expected by the Parisians with an eagerness exceeding that of the dauphiness herself, was made. It was in every respect successful; and it is due to Marie Antoinette to let the outline of the proceeding be described by herself.

"Versailles, June 14th.

"MY DEAREST MOTHER,—I absolutely blush for your kindness to me. The day before yesterday Mercy sent me your precious letter, and yesterday I received a second. That is indeed passing one's fete day happily. On Tuesday I had a fete which I shall never forget all my life. We made our entrance into Paris. As for honors, we received all that we could possibly imagine; but they, though very well in their way, were not what touched me most. What was really affecting was the tenderness and earnestness of the poor people, who, in spite of the taxes with which they are overwhelmed, were transported with joy at seeing us. When we went to walk in the Tuileries, there was so vast a crowd that we were three-quarters of an hour without being able to move either forward or backward. The dauphin and I gave repeated orders to the Guards not to beat any one, which had a very good effect. Such excellent order was kept the whole day that, in spite of the enormous crowd which followed us everywhere, not a person was hurt. When we returned from our walk we went up to an open terrace, and staid there half an hour. I can not describe to you, my dear mamma, the transports of joy and affection which every one exhibited toward us. Before we withdrew we kissed our hands to the people, which gave them great pleasure. What a happy, thing it is for persons in our rank to gain the love of a whole nation so cheaply! Yet there is nothing so precious; I felt it thoroughly, and shall never forget it.

"Another circumstance which gave great pleasure on that glorious day was the behavior of the dauphin. He made admirable replies to every address, and remarked every thing that was done in his honor, and especially the earnestness and delight of the people, to whom he showed great kindness. Of all the copies of verses which were given me on this occasion, these are the prettiest which I inclose to you.[1] Tomorrow we are going to Paris to the opera, There is great anxiety for us to do so; and I believe that we shall go on two other days also to visit the French and the Italian comedy. I feel more and more, every day of my life, how much my dear mamma has done for my establishment. I was the youngest of all her daughters, and she has treated me as if I were the eldest; so that my whole soul is filled with the most tender gratitude.

"The king has had the kindness to procure the release of three hundred and twenty prisoners, for debts due to nurses who have brought up their children. Their release took place two days after our entrance. I wished to attend Divine service on my fete day; but the evening before, my sister, the Countess of Provence, had a party for me, a proverb with songs and fire-works, and this distraction forced me to put off going to church till the next day.

"I am very glad to hear that you have such good hope of the continuance of peace. While the intriguers of this country are devouring one another, they will not harass their neighbors nor their allies."

She does not enter into details; the pomp and ceremony of their reception by nobles and magistrates had been in her eyes as nothing in comparison with the cordial welcome given to them by the poorer citizens. While they, on their part, must have been equally gratified at perceiving the sincere pleasure with which she and the dauphin accepted their salutations; a feeling how different from that which had animated any of their princes for many years, we may judge from the order given to the guards to forbear beating the crowd which gathered round them, as no doubt, without such an order, the soldiers would have thought it usual and natural to do.

Not that the proceedings of the day had not been magnificent and imposing enough to attract the admiration of any who thought less of the hearts of the citizens than of pomp and splendor. The royal train, conveyed from Versailles in six state carriages, was received at the city gate by the governor, the Marshal Duc de Brissac, accompanied by the head of the police, the provost of the merchants, and all the other municipal authorities. The marshal himself was the heir of the Comte de Brissac who, nearly two centuries before, being also Governor of Paris, had tendered to the victorious Henry IV. the submission of the city. But Henry was as yet only the chief of a party, not the accepted sovereign of the whole nation; and the enthusiasm with which half the citizens rained their shouts of exultation in his honor had its drawback in the sullen silence of the other half, who regarded the great Bourbon as their conqueror rather than their king, and his triumphant entrance as their defeat and humiliation.

To-day all the citizens were but one party. As but one voice was heard, so but one heart gave utterance to it. The joy was as unanimous as it was loud. From the city gates the royal party passed on to the great national cathedral of Notre Dame, and from thence to the church dedicated by Clovis, the first Christian king, to St. Genevieve, whose recent restoration was the most creditable work of the present reign, and which subsequently, under the new name of the Pantheon, was destined to become the resting-place of many of the worthies whose memory the nation cherishes with enduring pride. At last they reached the Tuileries, their progress having been arrested at different points by deputations of all kinds with loyal and congratulatory addresses; at the Hotel-Dieu by the prioress with a company of nuns; on the Quai Conti by the Provost of the Mint with his officers; before the college bearing the name of its founder, Louis le Grand, the Rector of the University, at the head of his students, greeted them in a Latin speech, at the close of which he secured the re-doubling of the acclamations of the pupils by promising them a holiday. Not that the cheers required any increase. The citizens in their ecstasy did not even think their voices sufficient. As the royal couple moved slowly through the gardens of the Tuileries arm-in-arm, every hand was employed in clapping, hats were thrown up, and every token of joy which enthusiasm ever devised was displayed to the equally delighted visitors. "Good heavens, what a crowd!" said Marie Antoinette to De Brissac, who had some difficulty in keeping his place at her side. "Madame," said the old warrior, as courtly as he was valiant, "if I may say so without offending my lord the dauphin, they are all so many lovers." When they had made the circuit of the garden and returned to the palace, the most curious part of the day's ceremonies awaited them. A banqueting-table was arranged for six hundred guests, and those guests were not the nobles of the nation, nor the clergy, nor the must renowned warriors, nor the municipal officers, but the fish-women of the city market. A custom so old that its origin can not be traced had established the right of these dames to bear an especial part in such festivities. In the course of the morning they had made their future queen free of their market, with an offering of fruits and flowers. And now, as, according to a singular usage of the court, no male subject was ever allowed to sit at table with a queen or dauphiness of France, the dinner party over which the youthful pair, sitting side by side, presided, consisted wholly of these dames whose profession is not generally considered as imparting any great refinement to the manners, and who, before the close of the entertainment, showed, in more cases than one, that they had imported some of the notions and fashions of their more ordinary places of resort into the royal palace.

It was characteristic of Marie Antoinette that, in her description of the day to her mother, she had dwelt with special emphasis on the gracious deportment of her husband. It was equally natural for Mercy to assure the empress[2] that it had been the grace and elegance of the dauphiness herself which had attracted general admiration, and that it was to her example and instruction that every one attributed the courteous demeanor which, as he did not deny, the young prince had unquestionably exhibited. It was she whom the king, as he affirmed, had complimented on the result of the day; a success which she had gracefully attributed to himself, saying that he must be greatly beloved by the Parisians to induce them to give his children so splendid a reception[3]. To whomsoever it was owing, the embassador certainly did not exaggerate the opinion of the world around him when he affirmed that, in the memory of man, no one recollected any ceremony which had made so great a sensation, and had been attended by so complete a success.

And it was followed up, as she expected, by several visits to the different Parisian theatres, which, in compliance with the king's express direction, were made in all the state which would have been observed had he himself been present. Salutes were fired from the Bastile and the Hotel des Invalides; companies of Royal Guards lined the vestibule and the passage of the theatre; sentinels stood even on the stage; but, fond as the French are of martial finery and parade, the spectators paid little attention to the soldiers, or even to the actors. All eyes were fixed on the dauphiness alone. At Mercy's suggestion, the dauphin and she had previously obtained the king's permission to allow the violation of the rule which forbade any clapping of hands in the presence of royalty. This relaxation of etiquette was hailed as a great condescension by the play-goers, and throughout the evening of their appearance at the Italian comedy the spectators had already made abundant use of their new privilege, when the enthusiasm was brought to a height by a chorus which ended with the loyal burden of "Vive le roi!" Clerval, the performer of the principal part, added, "Et ses chers enfants;" and the compliment was re-echoed from every part of the house with continued clapping and cheering, till it reminded Marie Antoinette of a somewhat similar scene which, as a child, she had witnessed in the theatre of Vienna,[4] when the empress, from her box, had announced to the audience that a son (the heir to the empire) had just been born to the Archduke Leopold.

The ice being, thus, as it were, once broken, the dauphin and dauphiness took many opportunities of appearing in public during the following months, visiting the great Paris fair of St. Ovide, as it was called, walking up and down the alleys, and making purchases at the stalls the whole Place Louis XV., to which the fair had recently been removed, being illuminated, and the crowd greeting them with repeated and enthusiastic cheers. They also went in state to the exhibition of pictures at the Louvre, and drove to St. Cloud to walk about the park attached to that palace, which was one of the most favorite places of resort for the Parisians on the fine summer evenings; so that, while the court was at Versailles, scarcely a week elapsed without her giving them an opportunity of seeing her, in which it was evident that she fully shared their pleasure. To be loved was with her a necessity of her very nature; and, as she was constantly referring with pride to the attachment felt by the Austrians for her mother, she fixed her own chief wishes on inspiring with a similar feeling those who were to become her and her husband's subjects. She was, at least for the time, rewarded as she desired. This is, indeed, said they, the best of innovations, the best of revolutions,[5] to see the princes mingling with the people, and interesting themselves in their amusements. This was really to unite all classes; to attach the country to the palace and the palace to the country; and it was to the dauphiness that the credit of this new state of things was universally attributed.

She was looking forward to a greater pleasure in a visit from her. brother, the emperor, which the empress hoped might be attended with consequences more important than those of passing pleasure; since she trusted to his influence, and, if opportunity should occur, to his remonstrances, to induce the dauphin to break through the unaccountable coldness with which, in some respects, he still treated his beautiful wife. But Joseph was forced to postpone his visit, and the fulfillment of the empress's anticipations was also postponed for some years.

However, Marie Antoinette never allowed disappointments to dwell in her mind longer than she could help. She rather strove to dispel the recollection of them by such amusements as were within her reach. She learned to drive, and found great diversion in being her own charioteer through the glades of the forest. She began to make further inroads in the court etiquette, giving balls in which she broke through the custom which prescribed that special places should be marked out for the royal family, and directed that the princes and princesses should sit with the rest of the company during the intervals between the dances; an arrangement which enabled her to talk to every one, and which gained her general good-will from the graciousness of her manner. She did not greatly trouble herself at the jealousy of her popularity openly displayed by her aunts and her sister-in-law, who could not bear to hear her called "La bellissima.[6]" Nor was her influence weakened when, in November, a fresh princess, the sister of Madame de Provence, arrived from Italy, to be married to the Comte d'Artois, for the bride was even less attractive than her sister. According to Mercy, she was pale and thin, had a long nose and a wide mouth, danced badly, and was very awkward in manner. So that Louis himself, though usually very punctilious in his courtesies to those in her position, could not forbear showing how little he admired her.

An incident occurred on the evening of the marriage which is worth remarking, from the change which subsequently took place in the taste of the dauphiness, who a few years afterward provoked unfavorable comments by the ardor with which she surrendered herself to the excitement of the gaming-table. As a matter of course, a grand party was invited to the palace to celebrate the event of the morning; and, as an invariable part of such entertainments, a table was set out for the then fashionable game of lansquenet, at which the king himself played, with the royal family and all the principal persons of the court. In the course of the evening Marie Antoinette won more than seven hundred pounds; but she was rather embarrassed than gratified by her good fortune. She had tried to lose the money back; but, as she had been unable to succeed, the next morning she sent the greater part of it to the curates of Versailles to be distributed among the poor, and gave the rest to some of her own attendants who seemed to her to need it, being determined, as she said, to keep none of it for herself.

The winter revived the apprehensions concerning the king's health; he was manifestly sinking into the grave, while

"That which should accompany old age, As love, obedience, honor, troops of friends, He might not look to have."

His very mistress began with great zeal than ever, though with no better taste, to seek to conciliate the dauphiness. She tried to purchase her good-will by a bribe. She was aware that the princess greatly admired diamonds, and, learning that a jeweler of Paris had a pair of ear-rings of a size and brilliancy so extraordinary that the price which he asked for them was 700,000 francs, she persuaded the Comte de Noailles to carry them to Marie Antoinette to show them, with a message from herself that if the dauphiness liked to keep them, she would induce the king to make her a present of them.[7] Whether Marie Antoinette admired them or not, she had far too proper a sense of dignity to allow herself to be entrapped into the acceptance of an obligation by one whom she so deservedly despised. She replied coldly that she had jewels enough, and did not desire to increase the number. But the overture thus made by Madame du Barri could not be kept secret, and more than one of her partisans followed the hint afforded by her example, and showed a desire to make their peace with their future queen. The Duc d'Aiguillon himself was among the foremost of her courtiers, and entreated the mediation of Mercy in his favor, making the ambassador his messenger to assure her that "he should impose it upon himself as a law to comply with her wishes in every thing;" and only desired that he might be allowed to know which of the requests that she might make were dictated by her own judgment, and which merely proceeded from her indulgent favor to the importunities of others. For Marie Antoinette had of late often broken through the rule which, in compliance with her mother's advice, she had at first laid down for herself, to abstain from recommending persons for preferment; and had pressed many a petition on the minister's notice as to which it was self-evident that she could know nothing of their merits, nor feel any personal interest in their success.

In the spring of 1774 she had an opportunity of convincing her mother that any imputation of neglect of her countrymen when visiting the court was unfounded, by the marked honors which she paid to Marshal Lacy, one of the most honored veterans of the Seven Years' War. Knowing how highly he was esteemed by her mother, she took care to be informed beforehand of the day of his arrival. She gave orders that he should find invitations to her parties awaiting him. She made arrangements to give him a private audience even before he saw the king, where her reception of him showed how deep and ineffaceable was her love for her family and her old home, even while fairly recognizing the fact that her first duties and her first affections now belonged to France. The old warrior avowed that he had been greatly moved by the touching affection with which she spoke to him of her love and veneration for her mother; and by the tears which he saw in her eyes when she said that the one thing wanting to her happiness was the hope of being allowed one day to see that dear mother once more. She showed him some of the last presents which the empress had sent her, and dwelt with fond minuteness of observation on some views of Schoenbrunn and other spots in the neighborhood of Vienna which were endeared to her by her early recollections.

The return of mild weather seemed to be bringing with it same return of strength to the king, when, on the 28th of April, he was suddenly seized with illness, which was presently pronounced by the physicians to be the small-pox. All was consternation at Versailles, for it was soon perceived to be a severe if not a malignant attack; and at the same time all was perplexity. Thirty years before, when Louis had been supposed to be on his deathbed at Metz, bishops, peers, and ministers had found in the loss of royal favor reason to repent the precipitation with which they had insisted on the withdrawal of Madame de Chateauroux; and now, should he again recover, it was likely that Madame du Barri would he equally resentful, and that the confessor who should make her removal a necessary condition of his administering the sacraments of the Church to the king, and the courtiers who should support or act upon their requisition, would surely find reason to repent it. Accordingly, for the first few days of Louis's illness, she remained at Versailles; but he grew visibly worse. His daughters, who, though they had not had the disease themselves, tended his sick-bed with the most devoted and fearless affection, consulted the physicians, who declared it dangerous to admit of any further delay in the ministration of the rites of the Church. He himself gave his sanction to the ladies' departure, and then the royal confessor administered the sacraments, and drew up a declaration to be published in the royal name, that, "though he owed no account of his conduct to any but God alone, he nevertheless declared that he repented having given rise to scandal among his subjects, and only desired to live for the support of religion and the welfare of his people."

Even this avowal the Cardinal de Roche-Aymer promised Madame du Barri to suppress; but the royal confessor, the Abbe Mandoux, overruled him, and compelled its publication, in spite of the Duc de Richelieu, the chief confidant of the mistress, and long the chief minister and promoter of the king's debaucheries, who insulted the cardinal with the grossest abuse for his breach of promise.[8] It may be doubted whether such a compromise with profligacy, and such a profanation of the most solemn rites of the Church by its ministers, were not the greatest scandal of all; but it was in too complete harmony with their conduct throughout the whole of the reign. And, as it was impossible but that religion itself should suffer in the estimation of worldly men from such an open disregard of all but its mere outward forms, it can hardly be denied that the French cardinals and prelates about the court had almost as great a share in bringing about that general feeling of contempt for all religion which led to that formal disavowal of God himself which was witnessed twenty years later, as the scoffers who were now uniting against it, or the professed infidels who then, renounced it. Such as it was, the king's act of penitence was not performed too soon. At the end of the first week of May all prospect of his recovery vanished. Mortification set in, and on the 10th of May he died.



CHAPTER VIII.

The Court leaves Versailles for La Muette.—Feelings of the New Sovereigns.—Madame du Barri is sent to a Convent.—Marie Antoinette writes to Maria Teresa.—The Good Intentions of the New Sovereigns.— Madame Adelaide has the Small-pox.—Anxieties of Maria Teresa.— Mischievous Influence of the Aunts.—Position and Influence of the Count de Mercy.—Louis consults the Queen on Matters of Policy.—Her Prudence.— She begins to Purify the Court, and to relax the Rules of Etiquette.—Her Care of her Pages.—The King and the renounce the Gifts of Le Joyeux Avenement and La Ceinture de la Reine.—-She procures the Pardon of the Due de Choiseul.

Throughout the morning of the 10th of May there was great confusion and agitation at Versailles. The physicians declared that the king could not live out the day; and the dauphin had decided on removing his household to the smaller palace of La Muette at Choisy, to spend in that comparative retirement the first week or two after his grandfather's death, during which it would hardly be decorous for the royal family to be seen in public. But, as it was not thought seemly to appear to anticipate the event by quitting Versailles while Louis was still alive, a lighted candle was placed in the window of the sick-room, which, the moment that the king had expired, was to be extinguished, as a signal to the equerries to prepare the carriages. The dauphin and dauphiness were in an adjoining room awaiting the intelligence, when, at about three o'clock in the afternoon, a sudden trampling of feet was heard, and Madame de Noailles entered the apartment to entreat them to advance into the saloon to receive the homage of the princes and principal officers of the court, who were waiting to pay their respects to their new sovereigns. They came forward arm-in-arm; and in tears, in which sincere sorrow was mingled with not unnatural nervousness, received the salutations of the courtiers, and immediately afterward left Versailles with all the family.

Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette had now reached the pinnacle of human greatness, as sovereigns of one of the noblest empires in the world. Yet the first feelings which their elevation had excited in both, and especially in the queen, were rather those of dismay and perplexity than of exultation. In the preceding autumn, Mercy[1] had remarked to the empress, with surprise and vexation, that, though the dauphiness exhibited singular readiness and acuteness in comprehending political questions, she was very unwilling, and, as it seemed to him, afraid of dealing with them, and that she shrunk from the thought that the day would come when she must possess power and authority. And the continuance of this feeling is visible in her first letter to her mother, some passages of which show a sobriety of mind under such a change of circumstances, which, almost as much as the benevolence which the letter also displays, augured well for the happiness of the people over whom she was to reign, so far at least as that happiness depended on the virtues of the sovereign.

"Choisy, May 14th.

"My Dearest Mother,—Mercy will have informed you of the circumstances of our misfortune. Happily his cruel disease left the king in possession of his senses till the last moment, and his end was very edifying. The new king seems to have the affection of his people. Two days before the death of his grandfather, he sent two hundred thousand[2] francs to the poor, which has produced a great effect. Since he has been here, he has been working unceasingly, answering with his own hand the letters of the ministers, whom as yet he can not see, and many others likewise. One thing is certain, and that is that he has a taste for economy, and the greatest desire possible to make his people happy. In every thing he has as great a desire to be rightly instructed as he has need to be. I trust that God will bless his good intentions.

"The public expected great changes in a moment. The king has limited himself to sending away the creature[3] to a convent, and to driving from the court every thing which is connected with that scandal. The king even owed this example to the people of Versailles, who, at the very moment of his grandfather's death, insulted Madame do Mazarin,[4] one of the humblest servants of the favorite. I am earnestly entreated to exhort the king to mercy toward a number of corrupt souls who had done much mischief for many years; and I am strongly inclined to comply with the request.

* * * * *

"A messenger has just arrived to forbid my going to see my Aunt Adelaide, who has a great deal of fever. They are afraid of the small-pox for her. I am horrified, and can not bring myself to think of the consequences. It is a terrible thing for her to pay so immediately for the sacrifice which she made.

"I am very glad that Marshal Lacy was pleased with me. I confess, my dear mamma, that I was greatly affected when he took leave of me, at thinking how rarely it happens to me to see any of my countrymen, and especially of those who have the happiness to approach you. A little time back I saw Madame de Marmier, which was a great pleasure to me, since I know how highly you value her.

"The king has allowed me myself to name the ladies who are to have places in my household, now that I am queen; and I have had the satisfaction of giving the Lorrainers[5] a proof of my regard, in taking for my chief almoner the Abbe de Sabran, a man of excellent character, of noble birth, and already named for the bishopric about to be established at Nancy.

"Although it pleased God that I should be born in the rank which I this day occupy, still I can not forbear admiring the bounty of Providence in choosing me, the youngest of your daughters, for the noblest kingdom in Europe. I feel more than ever what I owe to the tenderness of my august mother, who expended such pains and labor in procuring for me this splendid establishment. I have never so greatly longed to throw myself at her feet, to embrace her, to lay open my whole soul to her, and to show her how entirely it is filled with respect and tenderness and gratitude."

It is impossible to read these glowing words, so full of the joy and hope of youth, and breathing a confidence of happiness apparently so well-founded, since it was built on a resolution to use the power placed in the writer's hands for the welfare of the people over whom it was to be exerted, without reflecting how painful a contrast to the hopes now expressed is presented by the reality of the destiny in store for her and her husband. At the moment he was as little disturbed by forebodings of evil as his queen, and willingly yielded to her request to add a few lines with his own hand to the empress, that, on so momentous an occasion as his accession she might not be left to gather his feelings solely from her report of them. The postscript of the letter is accordingly their joint performance, he evidently desiring to gratify Maria Teresa by praise of her daughter; and she, while pleased at his acquiescence, not concealing her amusement at the clumsiness, or, to say the least, the rusticity, of some of his expressions.