DAME TILLERY TEACHES THE COURT AN ACCOMPLISHMENT.
Marguerite sprang from her place at the window, and taking a long
porcelain dish from the table, brought it to the churn, and kneeling on
the door, held it up to be filled.
Dame Tillery arose, slipped the lid of the churn over the handle of the
dasher, and gave the whole group a view of the golden treasure floating
within. Then she gave the dasher a dexterous twirl, and drew it up
gently, laden with fragrant butter, from which a white rain of milk
dripped back in showers. Easily and daintily she deposited this first
relay upon the dish, and dropped the dasher for another deposit. But
here the queen broke in,
“No, no! I must gather it with my own hands. I promised the ki—— that
is, my good man, that he should breakfast on butter of my own making,
and so he shall. This is the way you separate it from the milk?”
She gave the dasher a vigorous twirl, which produced a tumult in the
churn, but accomplished nothing.
“Softly, softly,” urged Dame Tillery, rubbing her fat hands together.
“There, sink the dasher so, give it one turn under the milk, then lift
it daintily. Oh! what butter! it makes my mouth water! Oh! you are an
apt scholar. If the people could only teach you other things as easily.”
“Hush, woman! You will offend the queen!”
Dame Tillery lifted her eyes to the haughty woman who gave her this
warning, and answered gravely,
“Be careful, madame, that you and your mates do not offend the people.”
The lady’s eyes flashed, and her red lip curved ominously, still there
was no real dignity in her resentment; that small commonplace figure had
nothing imposing in it, and a low, heavy forehead spoiled the otherwise
beautiful face. She turned to the queen.
“Madame, do you know whom we have here?”
“A kind woman, who has taught me how to make the most beautiful butter,”
answered Marie Antoinette, laughing gleefully. “Why, Polignac, I am
delighted! It is a triumph over the—over my good man, who disputed my
power to accomplish anything of the kind. You shall all see my success
astonish him. It will be delicious! Now what are we to do next, dame?
This is to be made into little pats, somehow, with pretty devices on the
top.”
“But first, the milk must be worked out.”
“Ah, I see; but how?”
Dame Tillery placed a hand on each knee, and lifted herself slowly from
the stool. Taking the dish of butter from Marguerite, with a deep, long
breath, she carried it to the table, where a butter-stick had been lying
all the morning, with its uses quite unknown. With this in one hand, the
dame tilted the dish a little that the milk might drain off, and began
patting, pressing and moulding the butter with a dexterity that excited
even the queen to rival her in a work so delightfully pleasant. Directly
her own white fingers closed on the butter-stick, and with much laughter
and infinite grace, she managed to press out the few drops of milk Dame
Tillery had left, and sent them rolling out of the dish like waste
pearls, that broke as they fell.
When the fragrant mass lay on the dish, pure and golden, the queen was
at a loss once more. How were the delicate little pats and balls, which
sometimes graced her table, produced? In order to make her triumph
complete, the precious contents of that dish must take this last
artistic form.
Again Dame Tillery chuckled, and this time her hand plunged deeply into
her pocket, and brought forth a little wooden mould carved daintily in
the inside. This she dipped into water and thrust into the butter,
closing it like a pair of scissors. When it was drawn forth, a large
golden strawberry dropped from its clasp, which so delighted and
surprised the group of ladies looking on, that their soft murmurs of
wonderment filled the room.
“Oh! the enchantress! the beautiful, beautiful, golden strawberry. I
shall not only supply delicious butter to my friend over yonder, but it
will come to him as from the hands of an artist. Isn’t the idea
charming?”
“Beautiful!”
“Charming!”
“Exquisite!”
Each cherry lip had some epithet of praise to bestow on Dame Tillery’s
pretty device, except that of the Duchess de Polignac. She swept
discontentedly toward the window, jealous even of this woman of the
people, as she had been for years of any one who approached the queen.
“Shall we never be admitted to take our share in the work?” cried one of
the young men who had been making a vain attempt to cut grass.
“In the folly, you mean,” answered the duchess, angrily; “for my part,
this practice, which brings one on a level with women of the city,
becomes repelling.”
“Ah! that is because you have no taste for simple pleasures like her
majesty, who evidently finds them charming.”
“And you?” questioned the duchess.
“I,” answered the young man, with a thrill of deep feeling in his voice,
“I shall never have the audacity to condemn anything that gives relief
to the existence our royal lady must find so full of care.”
The duchess gave him a keen look, which brought the blood to his face;
but that moment Marie Antoinette lifted up the wooden mould, and bade
them all look on while her first strawberry was forming. When it fell,
round and perfect, into the silver dish, a little shout rang up from the
crowd. With a group of admirers watching each graceful movement, she
proceeded to fill her dish, and thus accomplished what seemed to her a
great triumph.
By this time the day was drawing to a close; a tinge of gold melted into
the atmosphere from the coming sunset, and gleams of crimson shot in and
out through the great elms in the Park. The cows, which had been driven
up to the cottage ready for milking, began to low, as if they were
getting weary of standing there, hoof deep, in the velvet grass. While
others, still wandering in the Park, answered back with something like
general dissatisfaction.
“Now for the milking,” cried the queen, taking a pail from one of the
brackets. “Each one find a stool for herself, and this good dame shall
teach us how to be less awkward.”
Obeying this suggestion, each lady took her pail in one hand, with a
stool in the other, and went forth into the soft grass, where a dozen
cows were waiting to be milked. Here the gentlemen came into active
service, and made laughable attempts at milking in company with the
ladies. Dame Tillery had placed her ample proportions on the broadest
stool she could find, and was sending double streams of liquid whiteness
into the pail lodged against her knees, while the queen and Elizabeth
looked on, when a shout started the animal she was milking. It made a
leap, struck the pail with its foot, and overturned that and Dame
Tillery into the grass, where she lay clutching at her stool, and crying
lustily for help.
No help came. The cause of alarm was too serious. Some newly-purchased
cow, selected for the wildness of her beauty, suddenly darted from its
covert in the Park, and careering like a mad creature across the lawn,
bore furiously down upon the group of fancy workers. With her eyes on
fire, and her head tossing savagely, she plunged through the group of
milkers, scattering them as she went—turned suddenly, leveled her sharp
horns, and made a leap at the queen, whose shrieks of terror increased
the animal’s fury.