MARIA ANTOINETTE ENTHRONED.
1774-1775
Louis XV. seized with small-pox.--Flight of the courtiers.--The
Marchioness du Pompadour.--Her dissolute character.--Debauchery
of Louis XV.--He squanders the public revenue.--Remorse of the
king.--The lamp at the window.--Death of Louis XV.--Indecent haste
of the courtiers.--Emotions of the young king and queen.--Homage
of the courtiers.--Burial of Louis XV.--The king and queen leave
Versailles.--The coronation.--Enthusiasm of the people.--Maria's
grief.--The king's estrangement.--The little peasant boy.--Becomes
a monster of ingratitude.--The queen's traducers.--The Heron's
Plume.--Vile slanders.--Profligate character of De Lauzun.--Execution
of De Lauzun.--A life of pleasure.--Maria's imprudence.--Night
adventure in a hackney-coach.--The gardens of Marly.--Their unrivaled
splendor.--Maria's visits to Marly.--Heartless gayety.--Sunrise at
Marly.--More food for slander.--Simple habits of the queen.--Horror
of the courtiers and dowagers.--Sleigh riding.--Blind man's buff
and other games.--Dramatic entertainments.--Increasing affection of
the king.--Efforts to alienate the king's affections.--Agitation
of the queen.--Maria's children.--Royal visitors.--Extravagant
expenditures.--Rising discontents.--La Fayette and Franklin.--The
people begin to count the costs.--Letter from the Empress
Catharine.--The clouds thicken.
In the year 1774, about four years after the marriage of Maria
Antoinette and Louis, the dissolute old king, Louis XV., in his palace
at Versailles, surrounded by his courtiers and his lawless pleasures,
was taken sick. The disease soon developed itself as the small-pox in
its most virulent form. The physicians, knowing the terror with which
the conscience-smitten monarch regarded death, feared to inform him of
the nature of his disease.
"What are these pimples," inquired the king, "which are breaking out all
over my body?"
"They are little pustules," was the reply, "which require three days in
forming, three in suppurating, and three in drying."
The dreadful malady which had seized upon the king was soon, however,
known throughout the court, and all fled from the infection. The
miserable monarch, hated by his subjects, despised by his courtiers, and
writhing under the scorpion lash of his own conscience, was left to
groan and die alone. It was a horrible termination of a most loathsome
life.
The vices of Louis XV. sowed the seeds of the French Revolution. Two
dissolute women, notorious on the page of history, each, in their turn,
governed him and France. The Marchioness du Pompadour was his first
favorite. Ambitious, shrewd, unprincipled, and avaricious, she held the
weak-minded king entirely under her control, and spread throughout the
court an influence so contaminating that the whole empire was infected
with the demoralization. Upon this woman he squandered almost the
revenues of the kingdom. The celebrated Parc au Cerf, the scene of
almost unparalleled voluptuousness, was reared for her at an expense of
twenty millions of dollars. After her charms had faded, she still
contrived to retain her political influence over the pliant monarch,
until she died, at the age of forty-four, universally detested.
Madame du Barri, of whom we have before spoken, succeeded the
Marchioness du Pompadour in this post of infamy. The king lavished upon
her, in the short space of eight years, more than ten millions of
dollars. For her he erected the Little Trianon, with its gardens, parks,
and fountains, a temple of pleasure dedicated to lawless passion. The
king had totally neglected the interests of his majestic empire,
consecrating every moment of time to his own sensual gratification. The
revenues of the realm were squandered in the profligacy and carousings
of his court. The people were regarded merely as servants who were to
toil to minister to the voluptuous indulgence of their masters. They
lived in penury, that kings, and queens, and courtiers might revel in
all imaginable magnificence and luxury. This was the ultimate cause of
that terrible outbreak which eventually crushed Maria Antoinette beneath
the ruins of the French monarchy. Louis XV., in his shameless
debaucheries, not only expended every dollar upon which he could lay his
hands, but at his death left the kingdom involved in a debt of four
hundred millions of dollars, which was to be paid from the scanty
earnings of peasants and artisans whose condition was hardly superior to
that of the enslaved laborers on the plantations of Carolina and
Louisiana. But I am wandering from my story.
In a chamber of the palace of the Little Trianon we left the king dying
of the confluent small-pox. The courtiers have fled in consternation.
It is the hour of midnight, the 10th of May, 1774. The monarch of
France is alone as he struggles with the king of terrors. No attendants
linger around him. Two old women, in an adjoining apartment,
occasionally look in upon the mass of corruption upon the royal couch,
which had already lost every semblance of humanity. The eye is blinded.
The swollen tongue can not articulate. What thought of remorse or terror
may be rioting through the soul of the dying king, no one knows, and--no
one cares. A lamp flickers at the window, which is a signal to those at
a safe distance that the king still lives. Its feeble flame is to be
extinguished the moment life departs. The courtiers, from the windows of
the distant palace, watch with the most intense solicitude the
glimmering of that midnight taper. Should the king recover, they dreaded
the reproach of having deserted him in the hour of his extremity. They
hope, so earnestly, that he may not live. Should he die, they are
anxious to be the first in their congratulations to the new king and
queen. The hours of the night linger wearily away as expectant courtiers
gaze impatiently through the gloom upon that dim torch. The horses are
harnessed in the carriages, and waiting at the doors, that the
courtiers, without the loss of a moment, may rush to do homage to the
new sovereign.
The clock was tolling the hour of twelve at night when the lamp was
extinguished. The miserable king had ceased to breathe. The ensuing
scene no pen can delineate or pencil paint. The courtiers, totally
forgetful of French etiquette, rushed down the stairs, crowded into
their carriages, and the silence of night was disturbed by the
clattering of the horses' hoofs, as they were urged, at their utmost
speed, to the apartments of the dauphin.
There Maria Antoinette and Louis, with a few family friends, were
awaiting the anticipated intelligence of the death of their grandfather
the king. Though neither of them could have cherished any feelings of
affection for the dissolute old monarch, it was an hour to awaken in the
soul emotions of the deepest melancholy. Death had approached, in the
most frightful form, the spot on earth where, probably, of all others,
he was most dreaded. Suddenly a noise was heard, as of thunder, in the
ante-chamber of the dauphin. It was the rush of the courtiers from the
dead monarch to bow at the shrine of the new dispensors of wealth and
power. This extraordinary tumult, in the silence of midnight, conveyed
to Maria and Louis the first intelligence that the crown of France had
fallen upon their brows. Louis was then twenty-four years of age,
modest, timid, and conscientious. Maria was twenty, mirthful,
thoughtless, and shrinking from responsibility. They were both
overwhelmed, and, falling upon their knees, exclaimed, with gushing
tears, "O God! guide us, protect us; we are too young to govern."
The Countess de Noailles was the first to salute Maria Antoinette as
Queen of France. She entered the private saloon in which they were
sitting, and requested their majesties to enter the grand audience hall,
where the princes and all the great officers of state were anxious to do
homage to their new sovereigns. Maria Antoinette, leaning upon her
husband's arm, and with her handkerchief held to her eyes, which were
bathed in tears, received these first expressions of loyalty. There was,
however, not an individual found to mourn for the departed king. No one
was willing to endanger his safety by any act of respect toward his
remains. The laws of France required that the chief surgeon should open
the body of the departed monarch and embalm it, and that the first
gentleman of the bed-chamber should hold the head while the operation
was performed.
"You will see the body properly embalmed?" said the gentleman of the
bed-chamber to the surgeon.
"Certainly," was the reply; "and you will hold the head?"
Each bowed politely to the other, without the exchange of another word.
The body, unopened and unembalmed, was placed by a few under servants in
a coffin, which was filled with the spirits of wine, and hurried,
without an attendant mourner, to the tomb. Such was the earthly end of
Louis XV. In an hour he was forgotten, or remembered but to be despised.
At four o'clock of that same morning, the young king and queen, with the
whole court in retinue, left Versailles, in their carriages, for Choisy.
The morning was cold, dark, and cheerless. The awful death of the king,
and the succeeding excitements, had impressed the company with gloom.
Maria Antoinette rode in the carriage with her husband, and with one or
two other members of the royal family. For some time they rode in
silence, Maria, a child of impulse, weeping profusely from the emotions
which moved her soul. But, ere long, the morning dawned. The sun rose
bright and clear over the hills of France, and the whole beautiful
landscape glittered in the light of the most lovely of spring mornings.
Insensibly the gloom of the mind departed with the gloom of night.
Conversation commenced. The mournful past was forgotten in anticipation
of the bright future. Some jocular remark of the young king's sister
elicited a general burst of laughter, when, by common consent, they
wiped away their tears, banished all funereal looks, and, a merry party,
rode merrily along, over hill and dale, to a crown and a throne. Little
did they dream that these sunny hours and this flowery path but
conducted them to a dungeon and the guillotine.
The coronation soon took place at Rheims, with the greatest display of
festive magnificence. The novelty of a new reign, with a youthful king
and queen, elated the versatile French, and loud and enthusiastic were
the acclamations with which Louis and Maria Antoinette were greeted
whenever they appeared. They were both, for a time, very popular with
the nation at large, though there was in the court a party hostile to
the queen, who took advantage of every act of indiscretion to traduce
her character and to expose her to ignominy. In these efforts they
succeeded so effectually as to overwhelm themselves in the same ruin
which they had brought upon their victim. A deep-seated but secret grief
still preyed upon the heart of Maria. Though four years since her
marriage had now passed away, she was still comparatively a stranger to
her husband. He treated her with respect, with politeness, but with cold
reserve, never approaching her as his wife. The queen, possessing
naturally a very affectionate disposition, was extremely fond of
children. Despairing of ever becoming a mother herself, she thought of
adopting some pleasant child to be her playmate and friend. One day, as
she was riding in her carriage, a beautiful little peasant boy, about
five years of age, with large blue eyes and flaxen hair, got under the
feet of the horses, though he was extricated without having received any
injury. As the grandmother rushed from the cottage door to take the
child, the queen, standing up in her carriage, extended her arms to the
old woman, and said,
"The child is mine. God has given it to me to rear and to cherish. Is
his mother alive?"
"No, madame!" was the reply of the old woman. "My daughter died last
winter, and left five small children upon my hands."
"I will take this one," said the queen, "and will also provide for all
the rest. Will you consent?"
"Indeed, madame," exclaimed the cottager, "they are too fortunate. But I
fear Jemmie will not stay with you. He is very wayward."
The postillion handed Jemmie to the queen in the carriage, and she,
taking him upon her knee, ordered the coachman to drive immediately to
the palace. The ride, however, was any thing but a pleasant one, for the
ungoverned boy screamed and kicked with the utmost violence during the
whole of the way. The queen was quite elated with her treasure; for the
boy was extremely beautiful, and he was soon seen frolicking around her
in a white frock trimmed with lace, a rose-colored sash, with silver
fringe, and a hat decorated with feathers. I may here mention that the
petted favorite grew up into a monster of ingratitude, and became one of
the most sanguinary actors in the scenes of terror which subsequently
ensued.
One would think that the enemies of Maria Antoinette could hardly take
advantage of this circumstance to her injury; but they atrociously
affirmed that this child was her own unacknowledged offspring, whose
ignominious birth she had concealed. They represented the whole
adventure but a piece of trickery on her part, to obtain, without
suspicion, possession of her own child. Such accusations were borne upon
the wings of every wind throughout Europe, and the deeply-injured queen
could only submit in silence.
Another little incident, equally trivial, was magnified into the
grossest of crimes. The Duke de Lauzun appeared one evening at an
entertainment with a very magnificent plume of white heron's feathers.
The queen casually expressed her admiration of its beauty. A lady
immediately reported to the duke the remarks of the queen, and assured
him that it would be a great gratification to her majesty to receive a
present of the plume. He, the next morning, sent the plume to the queen.
She was quite embarrassed, being unwilling to accept the plume, and yet
fearing to wound the feelings of the duke by refusing the present. She,
on the whole, however, concluded to retain it, and wore it _once_, that
she might not seem to scorn the present, and then laid it aside. It
is difficult to conceive how the queen could have conducted more
discreetly in the affair. Such was the story of "The Heron's Plume." It
was, however, maliciously reported through Paris that the queen was
indecently receiving presents from gentlemen as her lovers. "The Heron's
Plume" figured conspicuously in many a satire in prose and verse. These
shafts, thrown from a thousand unseen hands, pierced Maria Antoinette
to the heart. This same Duke de Lauzun, a man of noted profligacy,
subsequently became one of the most unrelenting foes of the queen. He
followed La Fayette to America, and then returned to Paris, to plunge,
with the most reckless gayety, into the whirlpool of human passions
boiling and whirling there. In the conflict of parties he became a
victim. Condemned to death, he was imprisoned in the Conciergerie.
Imbruted by atheism, he entered his cell with a merry song and a joke.
He furnished a sumptuous repast for the prisoners at the hour appointed
for his execution, and invited the jailers for his guests. When the
executioners arrived, he smilingly accosted them. "Gentlemen, I am very
happy to see you; just allow me to finish these nice oysters." Then,
very politely taking a decanter of wine, he said, "Your duties will be
quite arduous to-day, gentlemen; allow me the pleasure of taking a
glass of wine with you." Thus merrily he ascended the cart, and beguiled
the ride from the prison to the guillotine with the most careless
pleasantries. Gayly tripping up the steps, he placed himself in the
fatal instrument, and a smile was upon his lips, and mirthful words were
falling upon the ears of the executioners, when the slide fell, and he
was silent in death. That soul must indeed be ignoble which can thus
enter the dread unseen of futurity.
There is no end to these acts of injustice inflicted upon the queen.
The influences which had ever surrounded her had made her very fond of
dress and gayety. She was devoted to a life of pleasure, and was hardly
conscious that there was any thing else to live for. In fetes, balls,
theaters, operas, and masquerades, she passed night after night. Such
was the only occupation of her life. The king, on the contrary, had no
taste for any of these amusements. Uncompanionable and retiring, he
lived with his books, and in his workshop making trinkets for children.
Always retiring to rest at the early hour of eleven o'clock precisely,
he left the queen to pursue her pleasures until the dawn of the morning,
unattended by him. It was very imprudent in Maria Antoinette thus to
expose herself to the whispers of calumny. She was young, inexperienced,
and had no judicious advisers.
One evening, she had been out in her carriage, and was returning at
rather a late hour, the lady of the palace being with her, when her
carriage broke down at her entrance into Paris. The queen and the
duchess were both masked and, stepping into an adjoining shop, as they
were unknown, the queen ordered one of the footmen to call a common
hackney-coach, and they, both entering, drove to the opera-house, with
very much the same sense of the ludicrous in being found in so plebeian
a vehicle, as a New York lady would feel on passing through Broadway
in a hand-cart or on a wheel-barrow. The fun-loving queen was so
entertained with the whimsical adventure, that she could not refrain
from exclaiming, as soon as she entered the opera-house, to the intimate
friends she met there, "Only think! I came to the opera in a
hackney-coach! Was it not droll? was it not droll?" The news of the
indiscretion spread. All Paris was full of the adventure. Rumor, with
her thousand tongues, added innumerable embellishments. Neither the
delicacy nor the dignity of the queen would allow her seriously to
attempt the refutation of the calumny that, neglected by her husband,
she had been out in disguise to meet a nobleman renowned for his
gallantries.
Nothing can be more irksome than the frivolities of fashionable life. To
spend night after night, of months and years, in an incessant round of
the same trivial gayeties, so exhausts all the susceptibilities of
enjoyment that life itself becomes a burden. Louis XIV. had created for
himself a sort of elysium of voluptuousness in the celebrated gardens of
Marly. Spread out upon the gentle declivity of an extended hill were
grounds embellished in the highest style of art, and intended to rival
the garden of Eden itself in every conceivable attraction. Pavilions of
gorgeous architecture crowned the summit of the hill. Flowers, groves,
enchanting walks, and statues of most voluptuous beauty, fountains,
lakes, cascades foaming over channels of whitest marble--all the
attractions of nature and art were combined to realize the most fanciful
dreams of splendor and luxury. Pleasure was the only god here adored;
but, like all false gods, he but rewarded his votaries with satiety and
disgust.
[Illustration: GARDENS OF MARLY.]
The queen, with her brilliant retinue, made a monthly visit to these
palaces and pleasure-grounds, and with music, illumination, and dances,
endeavored to beguile life of its cares. A noisy concourse, glittering
with diamonds and all the embellishments of wealth, thronged the
embowered avenues and the sumptuous halls. And while the young, in the
mazes of the dance, and in the uneasy witchery of winning and losing
hearts, were all engrossed, the old, in the still deeper but ignoble
passion of desperate gaming, forgot gliding time and approaching
eternity. But the spirit of Maria was soon weary of this heartless
gayety. Each succeeding visit became more irksome, and at last,
in inexpressible disgust with the weary monotony of fashionable
dissipation, she declared that she would never enter the gardens of
Marly again. But she must have some occupation. What shall she do to
give wings to the lagging hours?
"Has your majesty," timidly suggests a lady of the court, "ever seen the
sun rise?"
"The sun rise!" exclaimed the queen; "no, never! What a beautiful sight
it must be! What a romantic adventure! we will go to-morrow morning."
The plan was immediately arranged. The prosaic king would take no part
in it. He preferred quietly to slumber upon his pillow. A few hours
after midnight, the queen, with several gentlemen, and her attendant
ladies, all in high glee, left the palace in their carriages to ascend
the lofty eminence of the gardens of Marly to witness the sublime
spectacle. Thousands of the humbler classes had already left their beds
and commenced their daily toil, as the brilliant cavalcade swept by
them on this novel excursion. It was, however, a freak so strange, so
unaccountable, so contrary to any thing ever known before, that this
nocturnal party became the theme of universal conversation. It was
whispered that there must have been some mysterious wickedness connected
with an adventure so marvelous. Groups upon the Boulevards inquired,
"Why is the queen thus frolicking at midnight without her husband?" In
a few days a ballad appeared, which was sung by the vilest lips in the
warehouses of infamy, full of the most malignant charges against the
queen. Maria Antoinette was imprudent, very imprudent, and that was her
only crime.
Still, the young queen must have amusements. She is weary of parade and
splendor and seeks in simplicity the novelty of enjoyment. Dressed in
white muslin, with a plain straw hat, and a little switch in her hand,
she might often be seen walking on foot, followed by a single servant,
through the embowered paths which surrounded the Petit Trianon. Through
lanes and by-ways she would chase the butterfly, and pick flowers free
as a peasant girl, and lean over the fences to chat with the country
maids as they milked the cows. This entire freedom from restraint was
etiquette in the court of Vienna; it was regarded as barbarism in the
court of Versailles. The courtiers were amazed at conduct so unqueenly.
The ceremony-stricken dowagers were shocked. Paris, France, Europe, were
filled with stories of the waywardness, and eccentricities, and
improprieties of the young queen. The loud complaints were poured so
incessantly in the ear of Maria Theresa, that at last she sent a special
embassador to Versailles, in disguise, as a spy upon her daughter. He
reported, "The queen is imprudent, that is all."
There happened, in a winter of unusual inclemency, a heavy fall of snow.
It was a rare sight at Versailles. Maria Antoinette, reminded of the
merry sleigh rides she had enjoyed in the more northern home of her
childhood, was eager to renew the pleasure. Some antiquated sledges
were found in the stables. New ones, gay and graceful, were constructed.
The horses, with nodding plumes, and gorgeous caparisons, and tinkling
bells, dazzled the eyes of the Parisians as they swept through the
Champs Elysees, drawing their loads of lords and ladies enveloped in
furs. It was a new amusement--an innovation. Envious and angry lips
declared that "the Austrian, with an Austrian heart, was intruding the
customs of Vienna upon Paris." These ungenerous complaints reached the
ear of the queen, and she instantly relinquished the amusement.
Still the queen is weary. Time hangs heavily upon her hands. All the
pleasures of the court have palled upon her appetite, and she seeks
novelty. She introduces into the retired apartments of the Little
Trianon, "blind man's buff," "fox and geese," and other similar games,
and joins heartily in the fun and the frolic. "A queen playing blind
man's buff!" Simpletons--and the world is full of simpletons--raised
their hands and eyes in affected horror. Private dramatic entertainments
were got up to relieve the tedium of unemployed time. The queen learns
her part, and appears in the character and costume of a peasant girl.
Her genius excites much admiration, and, intoxicated with this new
pleasure, she repeats the entertainment, and alike excels in all
characters, whether comic or tragic. The number of spectators is
gradually increased. Louis is not exactly pleased to see his queen
transformed into an actress, even in the presence only of the most
intimate friends of the court. Half jocosely, half seriously, amid the
rounds of applause with which the royal actress is greeted, he hisses.
It was deemed extremely derogatory to the dignity of the queen that she
should indulge in such amusements, and every gossiping tongue in Paris
was soon magnifying her indiscretions.
Eight years had now passed away since the marriage of Maria Antoinette,
and still she was in name only, the wife of Louis. She was still a young
lady, for he had never yet approached her with any familiarity with
which he would not approach any young lady of his court. But about this
time the king gradually manifested more tenderness toward her. He began
really and tenderly to love her. With tears of joy, she confided to her
friends the great change which had taken place in his conduct. The
various troubles and embarrassments which began now to lower about the
throne and to darken their path, bound their sympathies more strongly
together. Strenuous efforts were made to alienate the king from the
queen by exciting his jealousy. Maria was accused of the grossest
immoralities, and insinuations to her injury were ever whispered in to
the ear of the king.
One morning Madame Campan entered the queen's chamber when she was in
bed. Several letters were lying upon the bed by her side, and she was
weeping as though her heart would break. She immediately exclaimed,
covering her swollen eyes with her hands, "Oh! I wish that I were dead!
I wish that I were dead! The wretches! the monsters! what have I done
that they should treat me thus! it would be better to kill me at once."
Then, throwing her arms around the neck of Madame Campan, she burst more
passionately into tears. All attempts to console her were unavailing.
Neither was she willing to confide the cause of her heart-rending grief.
After some time she regained her usual serenity, and said, with an
attempted smile, "I know that I have made you very uncomfortable this
morning, and I must set your poor heart at ease. You must have seen, on
some fine summer's day, a black cloud suddenly appear, and threaten to
pour down upon the country and lay it in waste. The lightest wind drives
it away, and the blue sky and serene weather are restored. This is just
the image of what has happened to me this morning."
Notwithstanding, however, these efforts of the malignant, the king
became daily more and more strongly attached to the queen. In the
embarrassments which were gathering around him, he felt the support
of her energetic mind, and looked to her counsel with continually
increasing confidence. It was about nine years after their marriage when
their first child was born. Three others were subsequently added to
their family. Two, however, of the children, a son and a daughter, died
in early childhood, leaving two others, Maria Theresa and Louis Charles,
to share and to magnify those woes which subsequently overwhelmed the
whole royal family.
During all these early years of their reign, Versailles was their
favorite and almost constant abode. They were visited occasionally by
monarchs from the other courts of Europe, whom they entertained with the
utmost display of royal grandeur. Bonfires and illuminations turned
night into day in the groves and gardens of those gorgeous palaces.
Thousands were feasted in boundless profusion. Millions of money were
expended in the costly amusements of kings, and queens, and haughty
nobles. The people, by whose toil the revenues of the kingdom were
furnished, looked from a humble distance upon the glittering throng,
gliding through the avenues, charioted in splendor, and now and then
a deep thinker, struggling against poverty and want, would thus
soliloquize: "Why do we thus toil to minister to the useless luxury of
these our imperious masters? Why must I eat black bread, and be clothed
in the coarsest garments, that these lords and ladies may glitter in
jewelry and revel in luxury? Why must my children toil like bond slaves
through life, that the children of these nobles may be clothed in purple
and fine linen, and fare sumptuously every day?" The multitude were
bewildered by the glare of royalty. But here and there a sullen
fish-woman, leading her ragged, half-starved children, would mumble and
mutter, and curse the "Austrian," as the beautiful queen swept by in
her gorgeous equipage. These discontents and portentous murmurs were
spreading rapidly, when neither king, queen, nor courtiers dreamed of
their existence.
A few had heard of America, its freedom, its equality, its fame even for
the poorest, its competence. La Fayette had gone to help the Republicans
crush the crown and the throne. Franklin was in Paris, the embassador
from America, in garb and demeanor as simple and frugal as the humblest
citizen, and all Paris gazed upon him with wonder and admiration. A few
bold spirits began to whisper, "Let us also have no king." The fires of
a volcano were kindling under the whole structure of French society. It
was time that the mighty fabric of corruption should be tumbled into the
dust. The splendor and the extravagance of these royal festivities added
but fuel to the flame. The people began to compute the expense of
bonfires, palaces, equipages, crown jewels, and courtiers. It is
extremely impertinent, Maria thought and said, for the people to meddle
in matters with which they have no concern. Slaves have no right to
question the conduct of their masters. It was the misfortune of her
education, and of the influences which ever surrounded her, that she
never imagined that kings and queens were created for any other purpose
than to live in luxury. The Empress Catharine II. of Russia, as these
discontents were loud and threatening wrote to Maria Antoinette a
letter, in which she says, "Kings and queens ought to proceed in their
career undisturbed by the cries of the people, as the moon pursues her
course unimpeded by the howling of dogs." This was then the spirit of
the throne.
And now the days of calamity began to grow darker. Intrigues were
multiplied, involving Maria in interminable difficulties. There were
instinctive presentiments of an approaching storm. Death came into the
royal palace, and distorted the form of her eldest son, and by lingering
tortures dragged him to the grave. And then her little daughter was
taken from her. Maria watched at the couch of suffering and death with
maternal anguish. The glowing heart of a mother throbbed within the
bosom of Maria. The heartlessness and emptiness of all other pursuits
had but given intensity to the fervor of a mother's love. Though but
twenty-three years of age, she had drained every cup of pleasure to its
dregs. And now she began to enter upon a path every year more dark,
dreary, and desolate.