Chapter VIII: Introduction: By C.-A. Sainte-Beuve (7)

For many years a rumour has spread about Saint-Cloud that the ghost of the late Madame appeared about a fountain where she used to sit in very warm weather, because the place was cool. One evening a lacquey of the Maréchale de Clérembault, going to draw water at the well, saw something white without a face; the phantom, which was sitting down, rose to double its height. The poor lacquey, seized with fright, ran away; on reaching the house he insisted that he had seen Madame, fell ill and died. The officer who was then captain of the château, imagining that there must be something under it all, went to the fountain himself, saw the ghost, and threatened to give it a hundred blows with his stick if it did not own who it was. Whereupon the ghost said: "Oh! Monsieur de Lastéra, don't hurt me, I am only poor Philippinette." She was an old woman in the village, about seventy-seven years old, with only one tooth in her mouth, weak eyes rimmed with red, a huge mouth, a thick nose,--in short, hideous. They wanted to put her in prison, but I interceded for her. When she came to thank me for that I said to her: "What mania possessed you to play the ghost instead of staying in your bed?" She answered, laughing: "I don't regret what I have done; at my age one sleeps little, and one must have something or other to keep one's spirits up. All I ever did in my youth did not give me as much enjoyment as playing the ghost. Those who were not afraid of my white sheet were afraid of my face. The cowards made such faces I nearly died of laughing. That pleasure at night paid me for the pain of carrying faggots by day."

SAINT-CLOUD, 1720.

I feel a bitter grief whenever I think of all M. Louvois burned in the Palatinate, and I believe he is burning terribly in the other world, for he died so suddenly he had no time to repent. He was poisoned by his doctor, who was afterwards poisoned himself, but confessed his crime before he died, with all details and circumstances, so that there could be no doubt about it. As he was a friend of the old woman, it was given out that he died in a spasm of hot fever. Thus we see, if we examine things well, the justice of God; people are usually punished in this world by their own sins.

The longer I live the more reason I have to regret my aunt, the Electress, and to respect her memory. You are very right in saying that in many centuries we shall not see her like again. Unhappily, I lack a great deal of having her judgment and her energy. What may be praised in me is frankness and good-will; and, thank God, I am not licentious, as is now the fashion among the princely people of the royal house of France.

Rhine wine was _never_ put into the great tun at Heidelberg; only Neckar wine. The present Elector is said not to hate it. As for me, Rhine wine is what I prefer. I cannot endure Burgundy; the taste seems to me disagreeable, and besides, it gives me a stomach-ache. I am delighted that Heidelberg is being rebuilt, and that they are working on the château; but what vexes me is that they are putting up a Jesuit convent instead of the commissariat. Jesuits are out of place at Heidelberg, and so are the Franciscans. I am told they live now near to the upper gate; my God! how often I have eaten cherries on that mountain, with a good bit of bread, at five in the morning! I was gayer then than I am now.

You know how the pope had Lord Peterborough arrested at Bologna, nobody knows why. He went about disguised as a woman; with great talents he behaves like a madman. He says he will not come out of prison till he obtains reparation for the affront put upon him. For my part, if I were in prison and they gave me leave to get out, I should depart as fast as possible and say what I had to say later,--first of all, I should recover my liberty. This lord is the queerest eccentric. I think he would rather die than deprive himself of saying what comes into his head and of doing malicious things to the persons he dislikes.

SAINT-CLOUD, 1720.

For forty years no October has ever passed without my son being ill, one way or another, about the 22nd of the month. Though he is regent he never appears before me or leaves me without kissing my hand before I embrace him. He never takes a chair in my presence; but in other respects he stands on no ceremony and gabbles as he likes; we laugh and joke together like cronies. Between him and his mistresses everything goes on to beat of drum without the least gallantry; it reminds me of those old patriarchs who had so many women. The Duc de Saint-Simon was impatient one day with some of my son's easy-going ways and said to him, angrily: "Oh! you are so _debonnaire_! since the days of Louis le Debonnaire there has never been any one so easy-going as you." My son nearly died of laughter.

My son believes in predestination as much as if he had belonged, like me, for nineteen years to the Reformed religion. What seems to me strange is that he does not hate his brother-in-law, the lamester, who would like to see him dead. I think there never was his like; there is no gall in him; I never knew him to hate any one.

Mme. la Duchesse is very amusing and says the most diverting things. She is fond of good eating; and that was just what suited the dauphin [Monseigneur]; he went to her every morning for a good breakfast, and at night for a collation. Her daughters had the same tastes, so that Monseigneur spent the whole day in a society that amused him. At first he was attached to his daughter-in-law [the Duchesse de Bourgogne], but after she quarrelled with Mme. la Duchesse he completely changed; and what irritated him still more was that the Duchesse de Bourgogne brought about the marriage of his son, the Duc de Berry, a marriage he did not like. He was not wrong in that, and they did not treat him well in the matter, I must allow, though the marriage was greatly to our advantage.

The Queen of Spain [Marie-Louise de Savoie] remained much longer with her mother than our dauphine, her sister; consequently, she was very much better educated. The Maintenon knew nothing about education; to win the young dauphine's affection and keep it for herself alone, she let her do just what she liked. The young girl had been brought up by her virtuous mother, and was very winning and droll; merriness became her; she was not ugly when she had a fine colour. I could not tell you what foolish heads were allowed to surround the young princess; for example, the Maréchale d'Estrées. The Maintenon was well paid for giving her such senseless animals, for the result was that she ceased to care for her society. But the Maintenon, determined to know the cause, tormented the princess to admit it. Finally the dauphine told her that the Maréchale d'Estrées was daily saying to her, "Why do you stay with the old woman, and not with those who can amuse you much better than that old carcass?"--saying also other evil things of her. The Maintenon told me this herself after the dauphine's death, to prove it was solely the fault of that hussy that the dauphine did not live on good terms with me. That might be half true, but it is none the less certain that the old _vilaine_ had set her against me. Nearly all the giddy young women who surrounded the dauphine were relations or allies of the old woman; it was by her orders that they tried to amuse and divert the princess,--in order that she might have no other society than what she gave her, and be bored elsewhere.

But when the dauphine reached years of discretion she corrected herself in a wonderful manner, and repented heartily of her childish follies; which showed she had judgment. What corrected her was the marriage of Mme. de Berry. She saw that that young woman made others dislike her, and that all went wrong; she then desired to adopt another behaviour than that of her cousin, and to make herself respected. Accordingly she changed her conduct completely; retired within herself, and became as sensible as she had previously been too little so. She had much judgment; she knew her faults perfectly well, and she knew also how to correct them in a wonderful way. She changed her way of life, and in one month she brought back to her side all those whom she had caused to dislike her. Thus she continued until her death. She said frankly how much she regretted to have been so giddy; but excused herself on the ground of her extreme youth, and she blamed the young women who had set her such a bad example and given her such bad advice. She gave them public marks of her displeasure; and managed matters so that the king did not take them any longer to Marly. In this way she brought every one back to her.

She was delicate in health and even sickly. But Doctor Chirac assured us until the last that she would recover. And it is true that if they had not let her get up whilst she had the measles, and had not bled her in the foot, she would now be living. Immediately after the bleeding, from being red as fire she became pale as death and felt extremely ill. When they took her out of her bed I cried out that they ought to let the sweating subside before they bled her. Chirac and Fagon were obstinate and only scoffed at me. The old _guenipe_ came up to me and said: "Do you think yourself cleverer than all the doctors who are here?" I replied, "No, madame, but it does not take much cleverness to know that we ought to follow nature, and if nature inclines to sweating it would be better to follow that indication than to take a sick person up in a perspiration to bleed her." She shrugged her shoulders and smiled ironically. I went to the other side of the room and never said another word.

The Maintenon always retained the fire of her eyes; but she pinched her lips and contracted her nostrils, which gave her the very disagreeable air she put on when she saw any one who displeased her, my Excellency for instance; at such times she would raise the corners of her mouth and drop her under lip. I have often heard her say in a jesting way, "I have been too far from, and too near grandeur to know what it is."

PARIS, February 1, 1721.

I grow weaker and can hardly hold my pen, but there is nothing to be done. I place myself in the hands of God and refer all things to His will. I think I shall end by drying up, like that tortoise I kept at Heidelberg in my bedroom. But as long as I live be sure, dear Louise, that my heart will cherish you.

There is not in all the world a better air than that of Heidelberg, especially that about the château near my bedroom; nothing finer can be found. No one understands better than I, dear Louise, what you must have felt at Heidelberg; I cannot think of it without deep emotion; but I must not speak of it to-night; it makes me too sad and hinders me from sleeping.

My son lives very well with me; he shows me great affection and will be miserable at losing me. His visits do me more good than quinine--they rejoice my heart and do not give me pains in my stomach. He always has something droll to tell me which makes me laugh; he has wit and expresses himself charmingly. I should be a most unnatural mother if I did not love him from the bottom of my heart; if you knew him you would see that he has no ambition and no malignity. Ah! my God, he is only too kind; he pardons all that is done against him and laughs about it. If he would only show his teeth to his wicked relations they would learn to fear him and cease their horrible machinations. You cannot imagine the wickedness and the ambition of the third prince of the blood. As long as M. le Duc hoped to get money out of my son he overwhelmed him with protestations of attachment and devotion; now that there is nothing more to get from him he has turned completely against him and has joined my son's inhuman enemy, the Prince de Conti.

PARIS, 1720.

I am coming to the close of my seventieth year, and I feel that if I have another shock like that which struck me so severely last year I shall soon know how things go on in the other world. My constitution continues sound, as may be seen by the fact that I have resisted all attacks, but, as the French proverb says, "the pitcher may go once too often to the well;" and that is what will happen to me in the end. But these thoughts do not trouble me, for we know that we come into this world only to die. I do not think that extreme old age is a pleasant thing; there is too much to suffer; and with regard to physical suffering I am a great coward.

Saint François de Sales, who founded the Order of the Filles de Sainte-Marie, was in his youth a friend of the Maréchal de Villeroy, father of the present marshal. The marshal never could bring himself to give him his name as a saint, and when they spoke to him of his friend he used to say: "I was delighted when I heard that M. de Sales was a saint; he liked smutty stories and cheated at cards; the best man in the world in other respects, but a fool."

I follow the fashions at a distance, and some of them I put aside entirely, such as paniers, which I do not wear, and loose gowns, which I cannot abide and will not permit in my presence. I think them indecent; women look as if they had just got out of their beds. There is no rule here now about the fashions. Tailors, dressmakers, and hairdressers invent what they please. I have never followed to excess the fashion of tall head-dresses.

I do not know what you mean about your neighbours the storks never failing to come back every year. We have none in France, and I wish you would tell me if you see them in England; for it is said they never stay in any kingdom.

PARIS, 1721.

All that we read in the Bible about the excesses which were punished by the Deluge, and about the lewdness of Sodom and Gomorrah does not approach the life now led in Paris. Out of nine young men of rank who dined the other day with my grandson, the Duc de Chartres, seven had the French disease. Is it not horrible? The majority of the people here are occupied solely with their pleasures and debauchery; outside of that they know nothing and care for nothing; they do not believe in a future life; they imagine that they will end in death.

The Abbé Dubois sends me word he has nothing now to do with the post, which concerns exclusively M. de Torcy; they are rotten eggs and rancid butter, the pair of them; one is no better than the other, and both would be more in their place on a gibbet than at Court, for they are not worth the devil and are more treacherous than gallows-wood, as Lenore would say. If they have the curiosity to read this letter they will see the eulogy I make upon them, and they will recognize the truth of our German proverb, "Listeners never hear any good of themselves."

I know very well that we pay the postage on letters we receive, but as to paying for those we put in the post, that is something new; I never heard of it before in all my life.

PARIS, 1721.

The Archbishop of Cambrai [Dubois] is coming here to-day to tell me of his elevation to the cardinalate; so Alberoni has got a comrade. He is one I cannot love; he poisoned my whole life; at the same time I would not do him any harm. May God forgive him, but he may suffer for it in this world.

We are all in full dress for the ceremony of his reception at three o'clock; I shall be obliged to bow to him, and make him sit down, and talk to him a few moments. It will not be without pain; but pain and vexation are one's daily bread--but here comes the cardinal, and I must pause.

The cardinal has begged me to forget the past; he has made me the finest harangue that was ever listened to. He has great capacities,--that is undeniable; and if he were only as honest as he is capable, he would leave nothing to be desired.

SAINT-CLOUD, October, 1721.

I can only write you a few words and in all haste this morning, my dear Louise, for I am going to Paris to compliment my son and his wife on the good news they have just received and transmitted to me instantly. The King of Spain has asked their daughter in marriage for his son the Prince of the Asturias. Mlle. de Montpensier has no name as yet, but before she goes to Spain the ceremony will be performed; the king and I are to name her; she will then make her first communion and be confirmed; that is what may be called receiving the three sacraments together.

PARIS, 1721.

They leave me no peace; visitors at every moment; I am obliged to get up and make conversation. First came the Comte de Clermont, third brother of M. le Duc; after him the Duchesse de Ventadour and her sister the Duchesse de La Ferté; then the Duc de Chartres, his three sisters and their governess, my two ladies, and Mme. de Ségur, my son's daughter by the left side and not legitimatized. That made twelve at table. Then came the Maréchale de Clérembault and Cardinal de Gèsvres; I had to rise to receive him and talk to him. But all that is not comparable to what awaited me after dinner from two o'clock to half-past six. I found in my salon Mme. la Princesse, with our Duchess of Hanover, the tall Princesse de Conti, and Mlle. de Clermont, with all their ladies; and when they went away the little Princesse de Conti came with her daughter; then the Duchesse du Maine, Mme. la Duchesse and her daughter, and all their ladies. Also a great many other ladies not of the royal family, such as the Princesse d'Espinoy, the Duchesse de Valentinois, the Princesse de Montauban, and I don't know who else, innumerable duchesses, the Maréchales de Noailles and de Boufflers, the Duchesses de Lesdiguières, de Nevers, d'Humières, de Grammont, de Roquelaire, de Villars; the Duchesse d'Orléans came too; as for the ladies who did not sit, they were innumerable, and I am quite sure I have forgotten some of the _tabouret_ ones. It was so hot in my room that I should have fainted if I had not gone, now and then, into my dressing-room to get a breath of air. But what made me suffer most was my knees; by dint of rising and bowing I really thought I should faint away.

I have an abbé (whom I often call a scamp) sitting by me now; he is dinning his chatter into my ears so that I really do not know what I write; from that, you will know very well that I mean my Abbé de Saint Albin, who will soon be Bishop of Laon, duke and peer of France. That will give me great pleasure, because I have felt more attachment for that poor boy from his earliest childhood than for all his brothers and sisters; I feel that of all my son's children, legitimate and illegitimate, he is the one that I love best.

My son cannot and will not believe that the Duc du Maine is the king's son. That man has always been treacherous; he did ill-turns to everybody; he was always hated as an arch-spy and informer. His wife, the little frog, is much more violent than he; for he is cowardly, and fear restrains him; but the wife mingles the heroic with her capers. I think myself that the Comte de Toulouse is really the king's son; but I have always believed that the Duc du Maine was the son of Terme, who was a treacherous scoundrel and the worst spy at Court. The old _guenipe_ had persuaded the king that the Duc du Maine was all virtue and piety; and when he reported harm of any one, she said it was for that person's good, so that the king might correct him. Thus the king considered everything that came from du Maine admirable; he regarded him as a saint. To this that confessor, Père Tellier, contributed much in order to please the old woman. The late chancellor Voysin also talked about the duke to the king by order of the Maintenon.

PARIS, 1721.

It cannot be said that Mlle. de Montpensier is ugly; she has pretty eyes, a delicate white skin, a well-formed nose, though rather too slim, and a very small mouth; and yet with all that she is the most disagreeable person I ever saw in my life; in all her actions, speaking, eating, drinking, she is intolerable; she did not shed a tear in leaving us; in fact, she scarcely said farewell.[14] I have seen successively two of my relatives and now my grand-daughter become Queens of Spain. The one I loved best was my step-daughter [wife of Charles II.]; for her I had a most sincere affection as if she were my sister; she could not have been my daughter because I was only nine years older than she. I was still very childish when I came to France, and we used to play together with Charles-Louis and the little Prince d'Eisenach, and make such a racket you could not have heard a thunderbolt fall.

PARIS, March, 1722.

I do not believe that in the whole world you could find a more amiable and sweeter child than our pretty infanta.[15] She makes reflections that are worthy of a woman of thirty; for instance: "They say that those who die at my age are saved and go straight to paradise; I should therefore be very glad if the good God would take me." I fear she has too much mind, and will not live. She has the prettiest ways in the world; she has taken a great liking to me, and runs to me in her antechamber with her arms wide open, and kisses me with affection. I am not on bad terms with the little king.

May, 1722.

I thank you heartily for praying for me; I have nothing now to ask for my own happiness in this world; provided God protects my children, I am content; but I have great need of intercession for my happiness in the other life, and also for that of my son. May God convert him; that is the only blessing that I ask of Him. I think there is not in all Paris, whether among the priests or the world's people, one hundred persons who have the true Christian faith and believe in our Saviour; and the thought makes me shudder.

September 29, 1722.

I do what my doctor orders, so as not to be tormented, and I await from the hand of God Almighty whatsoever he decides on my account; I am entirely resigned to his will.

October 3, 1722.

Since I last wrote to you no change has occurred in respect to me; matters will go as God wills. I am preparing for my journey to Reims [to the coronation of Louis XV.]; time will show the result.

PARIS, November 5, 1722.

I returned here the day before yesterday; but in a sad state.

During my journey I received five of your good letters, dear Louise, and I thank you most sincerely, for they gave me great pleasure. I could not answer them, as much on account of my weakness as from the perpetual bustle in which I was. My time was all taken up by the ceremonies, by my children whom I had constantly about me, and by a crowd of distinguished persons, princes, dukes, cardinals, archbishops, and bishops who came to see me. I think that in the whole world nothing more magnificent could be imagined than the coronation of the king; if God allows me a little health I will write you a description of it. My daughter was much moved at seeing me. She scarcely believed in my illness, and fancied it was only a little over-fatigue. But when she saw me at Reims she was so shocked that the tears came into her eyes, and that pained me very much.

I wish I could talk with you longer, but I feel too weak.

November 12, 1722.

I hope to send you to-morrow a grand account of the coronation. I know nothing new, except that I have been told one thing which causes me the greatest joy. My son has broken from his mistresses, thinking that he ought not to continue a style of life which would be a bad example to the king and draw down upon him just condemnation. May God maintain him in these good intentions and order all things for his happiness; that is the only thing about which I am solicitous; I have no anxiety as to what God may do with me.

November 21, 1722.

I grow worse hour by hour, and I suffer day and night; nothing that they do for me relieves me. I have great need that God should inspire me with patience; He would do me a great mercy if He delivered me from my sufferings; therefore do not be distressed if you lose me; it will be a great blessing for me.

In addition to my own illness I have another thing that goes to my heart; my poor old Maréchale de Clérembault is very ill.

November 29, 1722.

You will receive to-day but a very short letter; I am worse than I have ever been, and have not closed my eyes all night. Yesterday morning we lost our poor maréchale; she had no attack, but life appeared to abandon her. It gives me sincere pain; she was a lady of great capacity and much merit; she was highly educated, though she did not make it apparent. They tell me she has chosen as her heir the son of her eldest brother. It is not surprising that a person eighty-eight years of age should go; but, even so, it is painful to lose a friend with whom one has passed fifty-one years of one's life. But I must stop, my dear Louise; I suffer too much to say more to-day. If you could see the state in which I am you would understand how much I wish that it might end.

* * * * *

[Madame died nine days after this letter was written.]

VI.

LETTERS OF THE DUCHESSE DE BOURGOGNE.

PRECEDED BY REMARKS OF

C.-A. SAINTE-BEUVE.

Marie-Adélaïde de Savoie, Duchesse de Bourgogne, who was married to the grandson of Louis XIV. and was the mother of Louis XV., has left a very gracious memory behind her. She flitted through the world like one of those bright, rapid apparitions which the imagination of contemporaries delights to embellish. Born in 1685, daughter of the Duc de Savoie, who transmitted to her his ability and possibly his craft, grand-daughter by her mother of that amiable Henrietta of England (first wife of Monsieur, Louis XIV.'s brother), whose death Bossuet immortalized, and whose charm she resuscitated, Marie-Adélaïde came to France when eleven years old to marry the Duc de Bourgogne, who was then thirteen. The marriage took place the following year, but in form only; and for several years the education of the young princess was the occupation of her life. Mme. de Maintenon applied herself to that purpose with all the care and consistency of which she was so capable. It was not her fault if the Duchesse de Bourgogne did not become the most exemplary of the pupils of Saint-Cyr. The vivacity and lively spirits of the princess disconcerted at times the well-laid schemes of prudence, and she constantly broke from the frame in which it was designed to hold her. Nevertheless, she profited through it all; serious thoughts slipped in among her pleasures. It was for her that sacred plays, some by Duché, but especially Racine's "Athalie," were acted in Mme. de Maintenon's apartment. In "Athalie," the Duchesse de Bourgogne played a part.

The princess had already received in Savoie a certain education, especially in that so necessary to princes and which nature itself gives to women, namely, the desire and the effort to please. She arrived at Montargis on Sunday, November 4, 1696. Louis XIV. had left Fontainebleau after dinner and gone to Montargis with his son [Monseigneur], his brother [Monsieur, the little Adélaïde's grandfather], and all the principal seigneurs of his Court, in order to receive her. Before going to bed that night the king concludes an important letter to Mme. de Maintenon in which he gives her an account in the fullest detail of the person and slightest action of the little princess; it was the affair of State of the moment. The original of this letter of Louis XIV. exists in the library of the Louvre, and it is here given textually. Let us now read Louis XIV. undisguised, or rather, let us listen to the great monarch conversing and relating; language excellent, phrases neat, exact, and perfect, terms appropriate, good taste supreme in all that concerns externals and visible appearance; whatever, in short, contributes to regal presentation. As for the moral basis, that is slim and mediocre enough, we must allow, or rather, it is absent. But let us read the letter:--

"I arrived here [Montargis] before five o'clock," writes
the king; "the princess did not come till nearly six. I went
to receive her at the carriage; she let me speak first, and
afterwards she replied extremely well, but with a little
embarrassment that would have pleased you. I led her to her
room through the crowd, letting her be seen from time to time
by making the torches come nearer to her face. She bore that
march and the lights with grace and modesty. At last we reached
her room, where there was a crowd, and heat enough to kill
us. I showed her now and then to those who approached us, and
I considered her in every way in order to write you what I
think of her. She has the best grace and the prettiest figure
I have ever seen; dressed to paint, and hair the same; eyes
very bright and very beautiful, the lashes black and admirable;
complexion very even, white and red, all that one could
wish; the finest blond hair that was ever seen, and in great
quantity. She is thin, but that belongs to her years; her mouth
is rosy, the lips full, the teeth white, long, and ill-placed;
the hands well shaped, but the colour of her age. She speaks
little, so far as I have seen; is not embarrassed when looked
at, like a person who has seen the world. She curtseys badly,
with a rather Italian air. She has also something of an Italian
in her face; but she pleases; I saw that in the eyes of those
present. As for me, I am wholly satisfied. She resembles her
first portrait, not the second. To speak to you as I always do,
I must tell you that I find her all that could be wished; I
should be sorry if she were handsomer.

"I say it again: everything is pleasing except the
curtsey. I will tell you more after supper, for there I shall
observe many things which I have not been able to see as yet. I
forgot to tell you that she is short rather than tall for her
age. Up to this time I have done marvels; I hope I can sustain
a certain easy air I have taken until we reach Fontainebleau,
where I greatly desire to find myself."

At ten o'clock that night, before going to bed, the king added the following postscript:--

"The more I see of the princess, the more satisfied I am.
We had a public conversation, in which she said nothing, and
that is saying all. Her waist is very beautiful, one might
say perfect, and her modesty would please you. We supped and
she did not fail in anything, and has a charming politeness
to every one; but to me and my son she fails in nothing, and
behaves as you might have done. She was much looked at and
observed; and all present seemed in good faith to be satisfied.
Her air is noble, her manners polished and agreeable; I have
pleasure in telling you such good of her, for I find that,
without prepossession or flattery, I can do so and that
everything obliges me to do so."

Now, shall I venture to express my thought? There is certainly a mention of modesty in one or two places in the letter; but it is of the modest _air_, the good effect produced, the grace that depended on it. For all the rest it is impossible to find on these pages anything other than a charming physical, external, and mundane description, without the slightest concern as to inward and moral qualities. Evidently the king is as little concerned about those as he is deeply anxious about externals. Let the princess succeed and please, let her charm and amuse, let her adorn the Court and enliven it, give her a good confessor, a sound Jesuit, and for all the rest let her be and do what pleases her; the king asks nothing else: that is the impression left upon me by that letter.

If there had entered into this letter written from Montargis even a flash of moral solicitude in the midst of the record of those external graces and perfect proprieties, Louis XIV. would not have been, after twelve years' hourly intimacy, the odious and hard grandfather of the scene at Marly near the carp basin, to the mother of his expected heir. I send the reader for the details and the accessories of that singular scene to Saint-Simon, who in this instance is our Tacitus, the Tacitus of a king not naturally cruel, but who was so that day by force of egotism and selfishness. That first letter from Montargis, so elegant, so smiling on the outward surface, covered in its depths the vanity and egotism of a master, solicitude solely for decorum and curtseying--the scene at the basin of carp concludes it.

I shall not reproduce here the divers portraits of the Duchesse de Bourgogne; I should have to take them from many sources, but above all from Saint-Simon. She was neither handsome nor pretty, she was better than either. Each feature of her face taken separately might seem defective, even ugly, but from all these uglinesses, these defects, these irregularities arranged by the hand of the Graces, came a nameless harmony of her person, a delightful _ensemble_, the movement and airy whirl of which enchanted both eyes and soul. In moral qualities it was the same.

She played a part in "Athalie;" why should I not tell what she thought of that play, capricious child that she was? Apropos of its representation at Saint-Cyr, Mme. de Maintenon writes: "Here is 'Athalie' again breaking down. Ill-luck pursues all that I protect and care for. Mme. la Duchesse de Bourgogne tells me it can never succeed, that the piece is cold, that Racine regretted it, that I am the only person who likes it, and a number of other things which enable me to perceive, through the knowledge I have of this Court, that her part displeases her. She wants to play Josabeth, which she cannot play as well as the Comtesse d'Ayen."[16] As soon as they gave her the rôle she liked, the point of view was changed in a moment; such were the coulisses of Saint-Cyr! "She is delighted," continues Mme. de Maintenon, "and now thinks 'Athalie' marvellous. Let us play it, then, inasmuch as we have agreed to do so; but, in truth, it is not agreeable to mix in the pleasures of the great." The Duchesse de Bourgogne came of that race of _the great_ which will soon be a race departed. She deserves to remain in the vista as a true representative in her transitory life of its lightest and most seductive charm.

The letters of the duchess which have been published up to this time are mere notes, adding nothing to the idea that we form of her mind. La Fare, in his memoirs written about the year 1699, has very well remarked that after the death of Madame, Henrietta of England (grandmother of Marie-Adélaïde) in 1670, the taste for things of intellect was greatly lowered in that brilliant Court of Louis XIV. "It is certain," he says, "that in losing that princess the Court lost the only person of her rank who was capable of liking and distinguishing real merit; since her death, nothing is seen but gambling, confusion, and impoliteness." Towards the close of the reign of Louis XIV. a taste for matters of mind and even for the refinements of wit reappeared no doubt and found favour in the little circles of Saint-Maur and Sceaux, but the body of the Court during that period was a victim to _bassette_, _lansquenet_, and other excesses, in which wine bore its fair share. The Duchesse de Berry, daughter of the future regent, was not the only young woman to whom it happened to be drunk. The Duchesse de Bourgogne herself, entering such society, found it difficult sometimes not to fall into the vices of the day, into those nets of which _lansquenet_ was the best known and the most ruinous. More than once the king or Mme. de Maintenon paid her debts. But she asked for pardon with such good grace and submission by letter, and by word of mouth with such pretty and coaxing ways that she was sure to obtain it.

Those who judged her with the most severity are all agreed that she corrected herself with age, and that her will, her rare spirit, her sense of the rank she was about to hold, triumphed in the end over her first impetuosity and petulance. "Three years before her death," writes Madame, mother of the regent, honest and terrible woman who says all things bluntly, "the dauphine had entirely changed, to her great advantage; she no longer made escapades or drank too much. Instead of behaving like an intractable being, she became sensible and polite, behaved according to her rank, and no longer allowed her young ladies to be familiar with her, and put their fingers in her dish." Uncomfortable praises, perhaps, with which we could dispense. But at this distance of time we can hear all without scruple, and, while doing homage to a person who had the gift of charm, we may dare to look on manners and customs as they were.[17] We must resolve, whatever it costs us, to leave the chamber of Mme. de Maintenon and the twilight of its sanctuary. The Duchesse de Bourgogne has been pictured to us in the garb of Saint-Cyr; it is not in that habit that she is, to my thinking, most natural or truest.

A delicate question presents itself,--more delicate than that of _lansquenet_: did the Duchesse de Bourgogne have weaknesses of the heart? Adored by her young husband, and knowing how to take in hand his interests under all attacks, it does not seem that she had for his person a very warm or tender liking. Hence one does not see what there was to guarantee her from some other penchant. Saint-Simon, who is in no way malevolent to the Duchesse de Bourgogne, relates with great detail and as if receiving the confidences of well-informed persons, the slight weaknesses of the princess for M. de Nangis, M. de Maulévrier, and the Abbé de Polignac. "At Marly," he says, "the dauphine would run about the gardens with other young people till three and four o'clock in the morning. The king never knew of these nocturnal expeditions." Nevertheless, I do not desire to do otherwise than agree with Mme. de Caylus, who, while admitting the liking of the princess for M. de Nangis, makes haste to add: "The only thing I doubt is whether the affair ever went so far as people thought; I am convinced that the whole intrigue took place in looks, and, at most, in a few letters."

In the midst of all her levity and childish frivolity the Duchesse de Bourgogne had serious good qualities, which increased as the years went on. She said very sweetly one day to Mme. de Maintenon: "Aunt, I am under infinite obligations to you; you have had the patience to wait for my reason." She would no doubt have proved capable of State business and politics. The manner in which she knew how to defend the prince, her husband, against the cabal of the Duc de Vendôme, the striking revenge she took upon the latter at Marly, and the back-handed stroke by which she ousted him, show us plainly what she could do that was able and persistent when a matter came close to her heart. The few letters which she wrote to the Duc de Noailles, in which she says she knows nothing of politics, go to prove, on the contrary, that, if she could have talked about them instead of writing, she would have liked very well to take part in them. There is a more serious matter, which I see no reason for disguising. According to Duclos [author of "The Secret Memoirs of the reign of Louis XIV.," etc.], this fascinating child, so dear to the king, did, nevertheless, betray France by informing her father, the Duc de Savoie, then become our enemy, of military plans which she was able to discover when, with playful familiarity and the liberty of entering the king's cabinet at all hours, she had the opportunity to read and learn those plans at their source. The king, adds the historian, found the proofs of this treachery, after the death of the princess, in her desk. "The little rogue," he is reported to have said to Mme. de Maintenon, "deceived us after all."

In spite of all, we find ourselves regretting that this princess, taken from us at the age of twenty-six, whose natural fairy-like presence bewitched all hearts, did not live to reign beside the virtuous pupil of Fénelon. The reign of their son, that Louis XV. who was only a pretty child at their deaths and became the most contemptible of kings, would at least have been postponed. But what good is there in re-making history and in setting up a mere idea of what _might have been_?

* * * * *

[Sainte-Beuve does not show his usual justice and careful discrimination in his foregoing semi-acceptance of Duclos' tale of "perfidy." The whole story of Marie-Adélaïde's position at the French Court should have been more clearly sifted. The two daughters of Vittorio Amadeo, Duke of Savoie, were, in a sense, hostages given by him to Louis XIV. in 1696 and 1701 as an earnest of faithful alliance. Circumstances, however, forced the duke in 1703 (during the war of the Spanish Succession) into the coalition against France.

From the tenth century the princes of the ancient house of Savoie had been, for various reasons geographical and political, the upholders of Italian unity, or, as one might better say, of Italian existence. France had felt this under all her attempts to master Italy, until finally her wisest statesmen, Henri IV., Richelieu, and Mazarin, saw that their true policy was to use Piedmont against the extension of the two branches of the House of Austria. The whole history of the Princes of Savoie is a romance, hitherto neglected, which ought to be traced out and written by a sympathetic hand.

The alliance of France and Piedmont, so useful to the former by enabling her to maintain her conquests on the northern frontier, was converted by Louis XIV. into a species of vassalage, to which the indolent nature of Carlo Emmanuele submitted. The latter died in 1675, leaving one son, Vittorio Amadeo, aged nine, under the regency of his mother, Jeanne de Nemours, an ambitious and powerful woman. It is impossible to give here even a brief sketch of the House of Savoie, an heroic history, which should be rescued from the archives of Turin and elsewhere--in it will be found, we may add parenthetically, the story of the Waldenses and the secret of the Iron Mask.

Vittorio Amadeo married Anne, daughter of Monsieur, Louis XIV.'s brother, by his first wife, Henrietta, daughter of Charles I., King of England. The grandmother to whom the following letters are chiefly addressed was the father's mother, Jeanne de Nemours.

These letters, which seem to us very short, were laborious undertakings to the princess, who was never able to write easily. The first, in a childish round text hand, filling a sheet of paper twenty-three centimetres long by sixteen centimetres wide, is better written than those of her after life. The grammar and the spelling improved somewhat in later years, though never keeping pace with the improvement in the diction. They are signed with a sort of hieroglyphic, seldom with her name, and tied by a silken thread, the seal being a lozenge with the arms of Savoie, or sometimes the impression of a little dog.

Returning to the charge of Duclos (an historian of gossip rather than of history), it seems enough to say: (1) that his story has never been supported in any way; (2) that the tone of the princess's letters refutes it; (3) that what we know from Madame about the opening of letters makes it certain that the little duchess, surrounded as she was, could not have sent documents and plans undetected; (4) that Madame, that lynx for evil tales, and who did not like the dauphine, though she did her justice, makes no allusion to this story; and (5) that Saint-Simon, in a position to know everything, states the contrary.

The little princess arrived in France, and was met by the king at Montargis, November 4, 1696. The following is her first letter to her grandmother, Jeanne de Nemours, dowager Duchess of Savoie. This letter and one written two years later are here given in the French as amusing specimens of her spelling and punctuation.]

DE VERSAIE ce 13 Novembre [1696]

Vous me pardonere Madame si ie ne uous est pas ecrit la peur de uous anuier me la fait fair ie fini Madame uous embrasan.

Tres humble tres obeisantes petite fille
M. ADÉLÄIDE DE SAUOIE.

VERSAILLES, November 13 [1696].

You will pardon me, Madame, if I have not written you, the fear of ennuying you made me do it. I end, Madame, embracing you.

Very humble, very obedient grand-daughter,
M. ADÉLAÏDE DE SAVOIE.

[1696].

The trip to Marly prevented me from writing to you by the last courier as I had planned, my dear grandmamma. It is not to be believed how little time I have. I do what you ordered me about Madame de Maintenon. I have much affection for her, and confidence in her advice. Believe, my dear grandmamma, all that she writes you about me, though I do not deserve it; but I would like you to have the pleasure of it, for I count on your love [_amitié_], and I never forget all the marks you have given me of it.

VERSAILLES, August, 1697.

I have had great joy in the taking of Barcelona, my dear grandmamma, for I am a good Frenchwoman, and I feel for all that pleases the king, to whom I am attached as much as you can wish. Though I do not enter much into affairs of State, I understand that we shall soon have peace, and that will be another joy to me, for I have many in this country, my dear grandmamma, and I am very certain you share my happiness because of all your goodness to me.

December 3 [three days before the marriage ceremony].

I am well assured, my dear grandmamma, that you take part in the accomplishment of my happiness; do me the same justice on the feelings that I have for you, which will always be full of tenderness and respect. I assure you in my change of state I shall be always the same through life.

VERSAILLES, February 28, 1698.

I hope to repair, when I know how to write, the faults that I make now, and to let you see, my dear grandmamma, that I write to you rarely because I write so badly; but I love you tenderly, none the less. I am going to a ball.

VERSAILLES, March 25, 1698.

I hope I write pretty well, my dear grandmamma; I have a master who takes such pains I should do very wrong not to profit by the care they take of everything concerning me.

The Duchesse du Lude has come to me; which delights me, and it is true that Mme. de Maintenon sees me as often as she can. I think I can assure you that those two ladies love me. Never doubt, my dear grandmamma, that I love you as much as I should.

VERSAILE ce 25 Mars. 1698

Iespere que iescrire assez bien, ma chere grandmaman jai un maitre qui se donne beaucoup de paine iaurois grans tort de ne pas profitter des soins qu'on prend de tout ce que me regarde la D du Lude estre venue auprais de moy dont je suis ravie et il est vrai que Mme. de Mentenon me voit le plus souvent qui lui est possible ie croye pouvoir vous assurer sans saut [trop?] me flatter que ces deux dames maimen. Ne douttes iamais ma chere gran maman que ie ne vous aime tous jours autan que ie le dois.

May 26, 1698.

It is time, my dear grandmamma, that I knew how to write; they often reproach me here for the shame of a married woman [æt. 13] who has a master for such a common thing.

July 2, 1698.

They are working on my menagerie. The king has ordered Mansart to spare nothing. Imagine, my dear grandmamma, what it will be. But I shall only see it on my return from Fontainebleau. It is true that the king's kindnesses to me are wonderful; but also, I love him well.

COMPIÈGNE, September 13, 1698.[18]

I never thought, my dear grandmamma, that I should find myself in a besieged town, and be waked by the sound of cannon as I was this morning. I hope we shall soon get out of this state. It is true that I have great pleasures here. I shall be delighted to go back to Versailles and to the menagerie at Saint-Cyr. Certainly one has no leisure to be bored. I am convinced that you share my happiness, because of the love you have for me.

FONTAINEBLEAU, October 31, 1698.

The stay at Fontainebleau is very agreeable to me, especially as it is the second place where I had the honour of seeing the king; and I hope, my dear grandmamma, that I shall be happy not only at Fontainebleau but everywhere, being resolved to do all that depends on me to be so.

Those who love me have every reason to be glad with me in the king's kindness, for he gives me every day fresh marks of it. I have reason to think it will increase; at any rate I shall forget nothing on my part to deserve it. I am going to try a new pleasure,--that of travelling. But I shall love you everywhere, my dear grandmamma.

VERSAILLES, December, 1698.