own sex were, Mesdames Adelaide and Louise, two of the king’s aunts,
the former of whom had for a while exercised a control over her nephew,
and was now jealous and irritated beyond measure at the influence which
the young queen had acquired over her husband. Since their exile to
Lorraine, however, these old ladies had been comparatively powerless
for mischief. The partiality which Marie-Antoinette displayed for
the society of the Countess Jules de Polignac, had had the effect of
estranging her sisters-in-law from her. Count d’Artois, wishing to bring
about a reconciliation, said one day to the queen, on kissing her
hand, “My little sister, for a very long time you have slighted your
sisters-in-law, who are much attached to you, and who feel much afflicted
at your behaviour. I beg you to bestow on them your warmest friendship,
for they are worthy of it.” The queen replied somewhat petulantly, “These
ladies do not render me the deference which is my due; they ought to
remember that I am queen, and, moreover, that I belong to the House of
Austria, which takes precedence of all.” The Count d’Artois could not
help smiling, and, pressing the queen’s hand, said, “My little sister,
since you jest about the affair, I am enchanted, as it proves to me
that, whatever rancour may exist at present, will not last long.”[222]
The count, however, did not prove himself a true prophet, for the
ladies never became completely reconciled, and showed merely a distant
regard for each other. Perhaps the most dangerous enemy the queen had
was the stiff old Countess de Marsan—herself a Rohan, and cousin of
the cardinal, for whom in past years she had secured the post of grand
almoner—who during the late reign had been governess to the king’s
grandchildren, and who had been from the very first greatly scandalized
at Marie-Antoinette’s freedom of manners: the dauphiness’s most innocent
acts being magnified by this old prude into crimes. If she glanced at any
one, it was set down to coquetry; if she chanced to laugh, it was either
unbecoming, or else her gaiety was all forced; if she wore her hair
loose, she was compared to a bacchante; and even her simple white muslin
dresses were pronounced to be stage costumes, worn solely to create an
effect. The Duchess de Noailles, who had been Marie-Antoinette’s chief
lady of honour from the moment of her arrival in France, and Madame de
Cossé, her lady of the bedchamber, threw up their posts on the Princess
de Lamballe being appointed mistress of the queen’s household, and both
enlisted themselves among the malcontents, which comprised, in addition
to those we have already mentioned, the powerful families of Conti,
Montmorency, Clermont-Tonnerre, La Rochefoucauld, and Crillon.
XXVI.
LITTLE TRIANON, AND THE QUEEN’S SOCIETY THERE.
The enemies of the queen at the moment the Necklace scandal burst upon
the public were many and formidable; the real friends that she had
capable of defending her were but few. The Baron de Breteuil was well
enough disposed towards her, still it was not so much the shielding of
the queen’s reputation as compassing the downfall of his enemy, the
Cardinal de Rohan, that he had at heart. The Abbé de Vermond, who had
been Marie-Antoinette’s instructor, and was now a sort of secretary to
her, had only his fidelity to recommend him. He could influence the
queen, but wanted the head to direct her wisely. Specious M. de Calonne
was too busy raising new loans to supply a continually emptying royal
exchequer to trouble himself about necklaces or cardinals; besides, no
particular friendship existed now between the queen and him. He no longer
gallantly told her that if what she required was simply difficult it
was already done, and that if it was impossible, it should be done. The
Duke de Choiseul had been dead these several months past. Those intimate
friends of Marie-Antoinette’s with whom her daily life was chiefly spent,
and who formed what was styled her society, shared her unpopularity
to some extent, for it was the favours heaped upon certain members of
the Trianon set which had estranged so many of the old nobility from
her. Moreover, with the exception of the Count d’Artois and the Duke de
Coigny, there was not a man of influence among them who could do her real
service in the hour of need.
The _habitués_ of the Little Trianon—“the queen’s society,” as they were
styled—comprised, first, her youngest brother-in-law, the Count d’Artois,
who danced with her, hunted with her, acted with her, and entered
generally into the spirit of her amusements; then there was his wife, the
countess, exceedingly short of stature, with a complexion as fresh as a
rose, and a prepossessing if not a pretty face, yet with a nose which,
as Marie-Antoinette wickedly remarked, had never been finished; at one
time, too, there were the Count and Countess de Provence, the latter an
elder sister of the Countess d’Artois, and the reverse of good-looking.
Louis XVI. in his blunt way once told his brother that his wife was by no
means handsome, to which the Count de Provence quietly replied, “Sire,
I find her to my taste, and that is quite sufficient.”[223] Then there
was the queen’s sister-in-law, Madame Elisabeth, her true and loving
friend until death; next there were the Polignacs, foremost among whom
was the Countess Jules, the queen’s most particular favourite, who was
very handsome, with expressive blue eyes, a ravishing mouth, beautiful
small white teeth, a nose just a trifle _retroussé_, a forehead perhaps
a little too high, magnificent brown hair, a skin almost as white as
alabaster, low shoulders and a well set neck which seemed to give height
to her small figure. A touching sweetness formed the foundation of her
physiognomy—looks, features, smiles, everything with her partook of
the angelic. She had, moreover, wit and grace, and a natural ease and
_abandon_ which were positively charming. Negligence was her coquetry,
dishabille her full dress. It has been said of her that she never looked
better than when in a loose morning gown, and with a simple rose,
perhaps, in her hair. When the queen first took notice of her, she
and her husband, with their two young children, were living in a very
humble style (we have heard what Madame de la Motte had to say of her
poverty)[224] on a miserable income of three hundred and twenty pounds
a year. A pension of six thousand livres was immediately granted her,
and ere long she was appointed governess of the royal children, with a
salary of fifty thousand livres and her husband named postmaster-general,
and master of the horse to the queen, with a salary of eighty thousand
livres; in addition to which a joint pension of eighty thousand livres
was conferred upon them, besides other considerable emoluments which
brought their income almost up to three hundred thousand livres.[225]
The count, who through the influence of the queen had been raised to
the dignity of a duke, seems to have been an amiable sort of man,
very generally liked, for he had not allowed his good fortune to spoil
him. His sister, the Countess Diane, one of Madame Elisabeth’s ladies
of honour, was given, we are told, to gallantry and intrigue; her son
by the Marquis d’Autichamp—the same wicked rake who was so anxious to
escort Madame de la Motte from Lunéville to Paris—entered the Russian
service, and was killed at the battle of Austerlitz.[226] Her personal
appearance was the very reverse of engaging. She was compared to a brown
owl (she was a southern brunette), with all its feathers in disorder,
and to a paroquet, with a crooked beak and round eyes surrounded by dark
circles.[227] Nevertheless, she had only to open her mouth to have face,
form, toilette, the little she had received from nature, and the little
that she herself did to render herself pretty, entirely forgotten. It
was impossible to know her and not to be prepossessed in her favour. Her
arch way of looking at a subject, her piquant turn of thought, which was
almost epigrammatic, her sudden changes from gaiety to sadness, from
irony to sensibility, her audacity, which nothing could intimidate, her
daring and contagious recklessness, made her a general favourite in the
society over which she to some extent dominated. A woman like her was
invaluable to a court already depressed with melancholy, to put life into
the conversation, to dissipate dull thoughts, to defy alarm, to prophesy
fine weather, and display a perfect disregard for the future.
The young Princess de Lamballe, one of the earliest friends
Marie-Antoinette made in France, ranked next to the Countess Jules
de Polignac in her favour. She was a trifle jealous at having been
supplanted by her rival, and rather held aloof from the Trianon
_coterie_. Extremely beautiful, as amiable as she was handsome, and
left a widow when she was only eighteen—her husband, son of the old
Duke de Penthièvre, who received Madame de la Motte so courteously at
Château-Villain, having fallen a victim to early debauchery—a peculiar
interest attached to her. A native of the sunny south, she nevertheless
possessed all the northern graces. The sweet serenity of her countenance
was its great charm: there was tranquillity even in the flash of her
eye. On her beautiful forehead, shaded by her long fair hair, not a
cloud, not a trace existed of the early grief she had been called upon
to suffer. Her mind had all the serene beauty of her face. She was
gentle, affectionate, full of caresses, always just, always ready to make
sacrifices, devoted even in trifles, and disinterested above everything.
Who has not felt pity for her subsequent unhappy fate?
No one occupied a more prominent position in the queen’s society at the
Little Trianon than the Baron de Besenval, a handsome-looking man past
middle age, tall and well proportioned, with sharply-defined profile
and large well-formed nose, quick, intelligent eye, and a small mouth
curled up in a mocking and disdainful pout. Of cultivated tastes, full of
insolent grace, perfectly content with himself and ever ready to laugh
at others, pleasure was the sole pursuit of his life until the death
of Louis XV. brought him into closer contact with the Count d’Artois,
colonel-general of the Swiss guards, in which corps Besenval, himself
a Swiss, held a command. Of the count he made a friend, got presented
through his influence to the queen, whose confidence he secured and
whom he almost directed; was appointed lieutenant-general of the army,
grand cross commander of St.-Louis, and inspector-general of the Swiss
guards, without seeming at all astonished at his good fortune. In the
hour of danger, however, he was found singularly wanting, and it was soon
evident that he was not the man to save the monarchy or stem the tide of
revolution. His conduct while in command of the army of Paris has been
very generally and deservedly condemned.
M. de Vaudreuil was another prominent member of the Trianon _coterie_,
who, entering early in life the highest and most exclusive society of
Versailles, had come to the conclusion that human nature, as it was to
be found in courts, was neither so very beautiful nor so very great as
was commonly represented. Intellect charmed him, and above all that
intellect which sparkled with wit. He was the friend of all clever men,
spoke but rarely himself, but would lie in wait behind the hubbub of the
talkers and suddenly discharge his arrow right at the mark. What made him
a favourite with the queen was the fact of his being the best private
actor of his day. When young he had been remarkably handsome, but the
small-pox had destroyed his good looks. Suffering from disease of the
lungs, and subject to nervous twitchings of the body and to frequent fits
of depression, he had all the immunities of a sick person accorded him.
The good nature of the Duchess de Polignac and the indulgence of his
friends caused them to tolerate his caprices and whims. His disposition
changed daily according to his bodily ailments; still he was not without
certain vigorous virtues, for he was noble, generous, frank, loyal, and a
devoted and constant friend.
Next on the list of the queen’s favourites comes M. d’Adhémar, whose
musical skill and admirable voice had procured him the applause of the
master of the king’s music. He wrote verses and songs, acted well, and
accompanied himself on the harpsichord. His was but a little mind;
nevertheless, under a guise of modesty and humility he nourished grand
schemes of ambition, and eventually succeeded in securing for himself the
English embassy, in connection with which we shall hear of him again.
His complaisance was proverbial; he courted every one, offended no one,
made innocent jokes in an undertone of voice, and never lost his temper.
It will be understood what manner of man he was when we remark, that the
women spoke to him when they had nothing to say, the men when they had
nothing to do. Harmless as he appears to have been, he did not escape the
notice of the lampooners of the time, who characterized him as—
“Un marquis de hasard, ha, ha, ha, ha!
Chevalier d’industrie,
Major d’infanterie,
Colin de comédie,
C’est Monsieur d’Adhémar, a, a, a, a.”[228]
The remaining _habitués_ of the Little Trianon were the three Coignys:
the Duke de Coigny, the queen’s most constant friend, whom the Trianon
set desired to make her lover, which the Duke d’Orléans maintained
he already was—styling the young dauphin “_Le fils de Coigny_;”[229]
the Count de Coigny, a big, good-tempered man; and the Chevalier de
Coigny, an agreeable flatterer, whom all the women strove to secure to
themselves, and who was a favourite wherever he went; the Duke de Guines,
the “Versailles Journal,” as he was styled, who knew and repeated all the
scandal of the court, ridiculed everybody, and was consequently disliked
by everybody, who was an excellent musician, and prided himself immensely
on having played the flute with the great Frederick; the Prince d’Henin,
a philanthropist at court like a fish out of water; the Bailli du
Crussol, who made jokes with a most serious air; the Count de Polastron,
who played the violin in a ravishing style, and his pale and languishing
wife—the amiable “Goddess of Melancholy,” as she was called; the Count
and Countess de Châlons; the Count and Countess d’Andlau; the sensible,
witty, and good-natured Madame de Coigny; the Duke de Guiche, captain
of the king’s guards, and his young and lovely duchess, daughter of the
Duchess Jules de Polignac.[230] Besides the foregoing, there were a few
distinguished foreigners, such as Prince Esterhazy, the Prince de Ligne,
the Count de Fersen, a prominent member of the Swedish aristocracy, who
was styled by the women the “Beau Fersen,” and who in subsequent years
drove the _berline_ in which the royal family sought to escape from
France, and eventually lost his life in an _émeute_ at Stockholm in the
year 1810; and the Baron de Stedingk, the intimate friend of Fersen and
a great favourite with Marie-Antoinette, who said to him, on parting
with him in 1787: “Remember, M. de Stedingk, that under no circumstances
can any harm happen to you;”[231] implying that her influence, which
she believed to be paramount, would be exercised for his protection in
whatever quarter of the world he might chance to be, and little dreaming
that in a very few years there would not be another woman in all France
so powerless as she.
Having made acquaintance with the queen’s society at the Trianon, let us
now see what the Trianon itself was like; that Little Trianon to which
Marie-Antoinette retired to escape the splendours, the restraints, the
intrigues, and, most of all, the slanders of the court, and enjoy the
society of friends of her own choosing; a retirement which unhappily gave
rise to new calumnies—calumnies which it does not seem in nature for one
woman to invent or propagate of another, but which Madame de la Motte
more than insinuates in her lying “Mémoires Justificatifs,” and which
have outlived the other hideous slanders of which Marie-Antoinette was
the victim; that Little Trianon, where Madame de la Motte asserts most
of her pretended interviews with the queen took place, and where she
affirms Marie-Antoinette was accustomed to receive the Cardinal de Rohan,
who, according to the countess’s statements, would come late at night
disguised as a valet, and spend hour after hour with the queen in a small
pavilion in the gardens while she remained outside on the watch.[232]
On one occasion the Cardinal de Rohan certainly did go to the Little
Trianon, and in a partial disguise, but it was by bribing the gatekeeper
that he gained admission to the grounds. It was at the time when both
building and gardens were brilliantly illuminated in honour of the visit
of the Grand Duke Paul of Russia—afterwards the mad and luckless Emperor
Paul—and his Grand Duchess, who were travelling about Europe under the
titles of Count and Countess du Nord. The cardinal, who professed great
anxiety to see these illuminations, promised the gatekeeper to remain
in his lodge until all the company had left for Versailles; instead of
which, when the man’s back was turned, he slunk into the gardens, and,
with his cardinal’s red stockings showing below his overcoat, took up the
most prominent position he could select, where he waited for the royal
family and its suite to pass. The queen saw him and recognised him, and
next day gave orders for the instant dismissal of the gatekeeper; but
Madame Campan, who had been informed of all the circumstances, appealed
to Marie-Antoinette in the man’s behalf, and succeeded in getting him
retained in his post.[233]
To console Marie-Antoinette for not having appointed her favourite, the
Duke de Choiseul, prime minister, Louis XVI. is said to have given her
the Little Trianon, which skirts the park of Versailles and adjoins
the gardens of the Great Trianon, to do as she pleased with. “You love
flowers,” said he: “ah! well, I have a bouquet for you—the Little
Trianon.”
The repairing and embellishing of this miniature palace, the alteration
and enlargement of its grounds, with a host of artists and gardeners
subject to her sway, was for the next year or two Marie-Antoinette’s
greatest delight. The building, erected by the architect Gabriel, for
Louis XV., is of a square form, and each of its sides has a frontage
of only seventy feet. It is in the Italian style, and its different
façades are ornamented with Corinthian columns or pilasters and enriched
friezes and cornices. The depraved old king in the last years of his
life was enamoured with this “little corner of his grand Versailles.” It
was to his taste, for here he could live in retirement and at his ease.
In addition to its flower garden, laid out in the formal French style,
there was a botanical garden, which Louis XIV., at the time he lived at
the Great Trianon, caused to be planted with exotic trees and shrubs of
multifarious tints and perfumes then almost unknown in France.
The principal entrance to the Little Trianon leads immediately to the
grand staircase with its handsome gilded balustrade, in the interlacings
of which the initials M. A. are prominently displayed. Facing the
landing, as if in menace, is a head of the Medusa, which proved
powerless however to keep out scandal. After a small antechamber comes
the _salle-à-manger_, decorated with paintings of the four seasons by
Dejeune, and bathing and fishing subjects by Pater, and the re-joined
_parquet_ of which shows traces of the opening through which Loriot’s
flying table was accustomed to ascend at the orgies of Louis XV. In this
apartment commence the ornaments upon the panelling—crossed quivers
surmounted by wreaths of roses and garlands of flowers—executed by
order of Marie-Antoinette. The little _salon_ near the _salle-à-manger_
displays in relief upon its sides emblems of the vintage and the
attributes of the genius of comedy. Hanging from festoons of grapes
are bunches and baskets of fruit, masks and tambourines, flutes and
guitars, and beneath the marble beards of the goats that support the
mantelpiece more bunches of grapes are entwined. At the four corners of
the cornice of the grand _salon_ are groups of cupids at play. Each
panel, surmounted by the emblems of literature and the arts, springs from
a stalk of triple flowering lilies, garlanded with laurel and with a
wreath of full-blown roses by way of crest. Four paintings by Watteau—of
those graceful Decameron-like subjects in which he excelled—are on the
walls of this apartment. In the little cabinet which precedes the queen’s
bedchamber the finest arabesques run over the woodwork; here are cupids
bearing cornucopias overflowing with flowers, cooing doves, smoking
tripods, and crossed bows and arrows hanging to ribbons. Bouquets of
poppies intermingled with thousands of small flowers, all most delicately
rendered, are scattered over the panels of the bedroom; the bed with its
light blue silk hangings, the chairs and couches _en suite_, and the
console tables, looking-glasses, clock and chandeliers being, it is said,
much as they were in the days of Marie-Antoinette.
The most elegant façade of the little palace, with its four fluted
Corinthian columns and its four flights of steps in the form of an
Italian terrace, looks over the French garden, with its flower beds of
geometric form and the flowers themselves planted in straight lines. In
the centre of this garden, which is bordered by cool green arcades formed
of trees clipped into shape, is a small pavilion with groups of cupids
surmounting each of its four entrances. This was the summer dining-room
of both Louis XV. and Marie-Antoinette. At the end of one of these leafy
arcades is the theatre, where the queen and her friends performed alike
comedies and operas. Sculptured in high relief above the principal
entrance is a cupid grasping a lyre and a crown of laurel, with torches,
trumpets, and rolls of music lying at his feet. The interior decorations
of the theatre are white and gold; the orchestra stalls and fronts of
the boxes are covered with blue velvet, the panels being decorated with
cupids suspending garlands of flowers. On either side of the stage two
gilded nymphs gracefully twist themselves into candelabra, and above the
curtain two other nymphs support the escutcheon of Marie-Antoinette.
At the back and to the right of the little palace is the queen’s
production, the English garden as it is called, laid out with an absence
of formality which almost rivals the productions of Nature’s self. The
waters apparently wind according to their own fancy, the trees and
shrubs seem to have been sown at the will of the wind. Nearly a thousand
varieties of trees, some among them being most rare, join their shade and
mingle the different tints of their leaves, which vary from the lightest
and deepest greens to dark purple and cherry red. The flowers appear to
have been planted at hazard; the ground rises and falls at its will;
paths wind and go out of the way with provoking pertinacity; stones have
been converted into rocks, and small patches of grass made to resemble
meadows.
From a hillock in the midst of a thicket of roses, jasmine, and myrtle,
rises a belvidere, from whence the queen was accustomed to take in a
view of the whole of her domain. This octangular pavilion, with its four
windows and its four doors, and its eight sphinxes crouching upon the
steps, has repeated eight times over, in figures upon its skirtings and
in emblems over its entrances, the allegory of the four seasons, carved
by perhaps the cleverest chisel of the century. The interior is paved
with coloured marbles, and coloured arabesques run along its walls, with
more bows and arrows and quivers, more bouquets and garlands of flowers
and musical instruments, together with cameos and cages hanging from
ribbons, and little monkeys and squirrels that scratch the sides of a
crystal vase or play with the fishes. In the centre of the pavilion,
a table, from which hang three rings, rests upon three claws of gilt
bronze; this is the table at which Marie-Antoinette breakfasted, for this
belvidere was her morning _salle-à-manger_.