Love affairs of the Courts of Europe by Thornton Hall

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But the young couple had a purse as short as their descent was long; and
the early years of their wedded life were spent in Comte Jules'
dilapidated chateau, on an income less than the equivalent of a pound a
day--in a rustic retirement which was varied by an occasional jaunt to
Paris to "see the sights," and enjoy a little cheap gaiety.

Comte Jules, however, had a sister, Diane, a clever-tongued, ambitious
young woman, who had found a footing at Court as lady-in-waiting to the
Comtesse d'Artois, and whom her brother and his wife were proud to visit
on their rare journeys to the capital. And it was during one of these
visits that Marie Antoinette, who had struck up an informal friendship
with the sprightly, laughter-loving Diane, first met the woman who was
to play such an important and dangerous part in her life.

It was, perhaps, little wonder that the French Queen, craving for
friendship and sympathy, fell under the charm of Yolande de Polignac--a
girl still, but a few years older than herself, with a singular
sweetness and winsomeness, and "beautiful as a dream." The beauty of the
young Comtesse was, indeed, a revelation even in a Court of fair women.
In the extravagant words of chroniclers of the time, "she had the most
heavenly face that was ever seen. Her glance, her smile, every feature
was angelic." No picture could, it was said, do any justice to this
lovely creature of the glorious brown hair and blue eyes, who seemed so
utterly unconscious of her beauty.

Such was the woman who came into the life of Marie Antoinette, and at
once took possession of her heart. At last the Queen of France, in her
isolation, had found the ideal friend she had sought so long in vain; a
woman young and beautiful like herself, with kindred tastes, eager as
she was to enjoy life, and with all the qualities to make a charming
and sympathetic companion. It was a case of love at first sight, on
Marie Antoinette's part at least; and each subsequent meeting only
served to strengthen the link that bound these two women so strangely
brought together.

The Comtesse must come oftener to Court, the Queen pleaded, so that they
might have more opportunities of meeting and of learning to know each
other; and when the Comtesse pleaded poverty, Marie Antoinette brushed
the difficulty aside. That could easily be arranged; the Queen had a
vacancy in the ranks of her equerries. M. le Comte would accept the
post, and then Madame would have her apartments at the Court itself.

Thus it was that Comte Jules' wife was transported from her poor country
chateau to the splendours of Versailles, installed as _chere amie_ of
the Queen in place of the Princesse de Lamballe, and with the ball of
fortune at her pretty feet. And never did woman adapt herself more
easily to such a change of environment. It was, indeed, a great part of
the charm of this remarkable woman that, amid success which would have
turned the head of almost any other of her sex, she remained to her last
day as simple and unaffected as when she won the Queen's heart in Diane
de Polignac's apartment.

So absolutely indifferent did she seem to her new splendours, that, when
jealousy sought to undermine the Queen's friendship, she implored Marie
Antoinette to allow her to go back to her old, obscure life; and it was
only when the Queen begged her to stay, with arms around her neck and
with streaming tears, that she consented to remain by her side.

If the Queen ever had any doubt that she had at last found a friend who
loved her for herself, the doubt was now finally dissipated. Such an
unselfish love as this was a treasure to be prized; and from this moment
Queen and waiting-woman were inseparable. When they were not strolling
arm-in-arm in the corridors or gardens of Versailles, Her Majesty was
spending her days in Madame's apartments, where, as she said, "We are no
longer Queen and subject, but just dear friends."

So unhappy was Marie Antoinette apart from her new friend that, when
Madame de Polignac gave birth to a child at Passy, the Court itself was
moved to La Muette, so that the Queen could play the part of nurse by
her friend's bedside.

Such, now, was the Queen's devotion that there was no favour she would
not have gladly showered on the Comtesse; but to all such offers Madame
turned a deaf ear. She wanted nothing but Marie Antoinette's love and
friendship for herself; but if the Queen, in her goodness, chose to
extend her favour to Madame's relatives--well, that was another matter.

Thus it was that Comte Jules soon blossomed into a Duke, and Madame
perforce became a Duchess, with a coveted tabouret at Court. But they
were still poor, in spite of an equerry's pay, and heavily in debt, a
matter which must be seen to. The Queen's purse satisfied every
creditor, to the tune of four hundred thousand livres, and Duc Jules
found himself lord of an estate which added seventy thousand livres
yearly to his exchequer, with another annual eighty thousand livres as
revenue for his office of Director-General of Posts.

Of course, if the Queen _would_ be so foolishly generous, it was not the
Duchesse's fault, and when Marie Antoinette next proposed to give a
dowry of eight hundred thousand livres to the Duchesse's daughter on her
marriage to the Comte de Guiche, and to raise the bridegroom to a
dukedom--well, it was "very sweet of Her Majesty," and it was not for
her to oppose such a lavish autocrat.

Thus the shower of Royal favours grew; and it is perhaps little wonder
that each new evidence of the Queen's prodigality was greeted with
curses by the mob clamouring for bread outside the palace gates; while
even her father's minister, Kaunitz, in far Vienna, brutally dubbed the
Duchesse and her family, "a gang of thieves."

Diane de Polignac, the Duchesse's sister-in-law, had long been made a
Countess and placed in charge of a Royal household; and the grateful
shower fell on all who had any connection with the favourite. Her
father-in-law, Cardinal de Polignac's nephew, was rescued from his
rustic poverty to play the exalted role of ambassador; an uncle was
raised _per saltum_ from _cure_ to bishop. The Duchesse's widowed aunt
was made happy by a pension of six thousand livres a year; and her
son-in-law, de Guiche, in addition to his dukedom, was rewarded further
for his fortunate nuptials by valuable sinecure offices at Court.

So the tide of benefactions flowed until it was calculated that the
Polignac family were drawing half a million livres every year as the
fruits of the Queen's partiality for her favourite. Little wonder that,
at a time when France was groaning under dire poverty, the volume of
curses should swell against the "Austrian panther," who could thus
squander gold while her subjects were starving; or that the Court should
be inflamed by jealousy at such favours shown to a family so obscure as
the Polignacs.

To the warnings of her own family Marie Antoinette was deaf. What cared
she for such exhibitions of spite and jealousy? She was Queen; and if
she wished to be generous to her favourite's family, none should say her
nay. And thus, with a smile half-careless, half-defiant, she went to
meet the doom which, though she little dreamt it, awaited her.

The Duchesse was now promoted to the office of governess of the Queen's
children, a position which was the prerogative of Royalty itself, or, at
least, of the very highest nobility. With her usual modesty, she had
fought long against the promotion; but the Queen's will was law, and she
had to submit to the inevitable as gracefully as she could. And now we
see her installed in the most splendid apartments at Versailles, holding
a _salon_ almost as regal as that of Marie Antoinette herself.

She was surrounded by sycophants and place-seekers, eager to capture the
Queen's favour through her. And such was her influence that a word from
her was powerful enough to make or mar a minister. She held, in fact,
the reins of power and was now more potent than the weak-kneed King
himself.

It was at this stage in her brilliant career that the Duchesse came
under the spell of the Comte de Vaudreuil--handsome, courtly, an
intriguer to his finger-tips, a man of many accomplishments, of a supple
tongue, and with great wealth to lend a glamour to his gifts. A man of
rare fascination, and as dangerous as he was fascinating.

The woman who had carried a level head through so much unaccustomed
splendour and power became the veriest slave of this handsome,
honey-tongued Comte, who ruled her, as she in turn ruled the Queen. At
his bidding she made and unmade ministers; she obtained for him pensions
and high offices, and robbed the treasury of nearly two million livres
to fill his pockets. When Marie Antoinette at last ventured to thwart
the Comte in his ambition to become the Dauphin's Governor, he
retaliated by poisoning the Duchesse's mind against her, and bringing
about the first estrangement between the friends.

Torn between her infatuation for Vaudreuil and her love of the Queen,
the Duchesse was in an awkward dilemma. It became necessary to choose
between the two rivals; and that Vaudreuil's spell proved the stronger,
her increasing coldness to Marie Antoinette soon proved. It was the
"rift within the lute" which was to make the music of their friendship
mute. The Queen gradually withdrew herself from the Duchesse's _salon_,
where she was sure to meet the insolent Vaudreuil; and thus the gulf
gradually widened until the severance was complete.

* * * * *

Evil days were now coming for Marie Antoinette. The affair of the
diamond necklace had made powerful enemies; the Polignac family, taking
the side of Vaudreuil and their protectress, were arrayed against her;
France was rising on the tide of hate to sweep the Austrian and her
husband from the throne. The horrors of the Revolution were being
loosed, and all who could were flying for safety to other lands.

At this terrible crisis the Queen's thoughts were less for herself than
for her friend of happier days. She sought the Duchesse and begged her
to fly while there was still time. Then it was that, touched by such
unselfish love, the Duchesse's pride broke down, and all her old love
for her sovereign lady returned in full flood. Bursting into tears, she
flung herself at Marie Antoinette's feet, and begged forgiveness from
the woman whose friendship she had spurned, and whose life she had,
however innocently, done so much to ruin.

A few hours later the Duchesse, disguised as a chambermaid and sitting
by the coachman's side, was making her escape from France in company
with her husband and other members of her family, while the Queen who
had loved her so well was left to take the last tragic steps that had
the guillotine for goal.

Just before the carriage started on its long and perilous journey, a
note was thrust into the "chambermaid's" hand--"Adieu, most tender of
friends. How terrible is this word! But it is necessary. Adieu! I have
only strength left to embrace you. Your heart-broken Marie."

Then ensued for the Duchesse a time of perilous journeying to safety.
At Sens her carriage was surrounded by a fierce mob, clamouring for the
blood of the "aristos." "Are the Polignacs still with the Queen?"
demanded one man, thrusting his head into the carriage. "The Polignacs?"
answered the Abbe de Baliviere, with marvellous presence of mind. "Oh!
they have left Versailles long ago. Those vile persons have been got rid
of." And with a howl of baffled rage the mob allowed the carriage to
continue its journey, taking with it the most hated of all the
Polignacs, the chambermaid, whose heart, we may be sure, was in her
mouth!

Thus the Duchesse made her way through Switzerland, to Turin, and to
Rome, and to Venice, where news came to her of the fall ot the monarchy
and Louis' execution. By the time she reached Vienna on her restless
wanderings, her health, shattered by hardships and by her anxiety for
her friend, broke down completely. She was a dying woman; and when, a
few months later, she learned that Marie Antoinette was also dead--"a
natural death," they mercifully told her--"Thank God!" she exclaimed;
"now, at last, she is free from those bloodthirsty monsters! Now I can
die in peace."

Seven weeks later the Duchesse drew her last breath, with the name she
still loved best in all the world on her lips. In death she and her
beloved Queen were not divided.

CHAPTER XXV

THE RIVAL SISTERS

It was an unkind fate that linked the lives of the fifteenth Louis of
France and Marie Leczinska, Princess of Lorraine, and daughter of
Stanislas, the dethroned King of Poland; for there was probably no
Princess in Europe less equipped by nature to hold the fickle allegiance
of the young French King, and no Royal husband less likely to bring
happiness into the life of such a consort.

When Princess Marie was called to the throne of France, she found
herself transported from one of the most penurious and obscure to the
most splendid of the Courts of Europe--"frightened and overwhelmed," as
de Goncourt tells us, "by the grandeur of the King, bringing to her
husband nothing but obedience, to marriage only duty; trembling and
faltering in her queenly role like some escaped nun lost in Versailles."
Although by no means devoid of good-looks, as Nattier's portrait of her
at this time proves, her attractions were shy ones, as her virtues were
modest, almost ashamed.

She shrank alike from the embraces of her husband and the gaieties of
his Court, finding her chief pleasure in music and painting, in long
talks with the most serious-minded of her ladies, in Masses and
prayers--spending gloomy hours in her oratory with its death's head,
which she always carried with her on her journeys. Such was the nun-like
wife whom Louis XV. led to the altar shortly after he had entered his
sixteenth year, and had already had his initiation into that career of
vice which he pursued with few intervals to the end of his life.

Already, at fifteen, the King, who has been mockingly dubbed "_le bien
aime_" was breaking away from the austere hands of his boyhood's mentor,
Cardinal Fleury, and was beginning to snatch a few "fearful joys" in the
company of his mignons, such as the Duc de La Tremouille, and the Duc de
Gesvres, and a few gay women of whom the sprightly and beautiful
Princesse de Charolois was the ringleader. But he was still nothing more
than "a big and gloomy child," whose ill-balanced nature gravitated
between fits of profound gloom and the wild abandonment of debauch; one
hour, torn and shaken by religious terrors, fears of hell and of death;
the next, the very soul of hysterical gaiety, with words of blasphemy on
his lips, the gayest member of a band of Bacchanals in some midnight
orgy.

To such a youth, feverishly seeking distraction from his own black
moods, the demure, devout Princess, ignorant of the caresses and
coquetry of her sex, moving like a spectre among the brilliant,
light-hearted ladies of his Court, was the most unsuitable, the most
impossible of brides. He quickly wearied of her company, and fled from
her sighs and her homilies to seek forgetfulness of her and of himself
in the society of such sirens of the Court as Mademoiselle de
Beaujolais, Madame de Lauraguais, and Mademoiselle de Charolois, whose
coquetries and high spirits never failed to charm away his gloomy
humours.

But although one lady after another, from that most bewitching of
madcaps, Mademoiselle de Charolois, to the dark-eyed, buxom Comtesse de
Toulouse, practised on him all their allurements, strove to awake his
senses "by a thousand coquetries, a thousand assaults, the King's
timidity eluded these advances, which amused and alarmed, but did not
tempt his heart; that young monarch's heart was still so full of the
aged Fleury's terrifying tales of the women of the Regency."

Such coyness, however, was not long to stand in the way of the King's
appetite for pleasure which every day strengthened. One day it began to
be whispered that at last Louis had been vanquished--that, at a supper
at La Muette, he had proposed the health of an "Unknown Fair," which had
been drunk with acclamation by his boon-companions; and the Court was
full of excited speculation as to who his mysterious charmer could be.
That some new and powerful influence had come into the young sovereign's
life was abundantly clear, from the new light that shone in his eyes,
the laughter that was now always on his lips. He had said "good-bye" to
melancholy; he astonished all by his new vivacity, and became the leader
in one dissipation after another, "whose noisy merriment he led and
prolonged far into the night."

It was not long before the identity of the worker of this miracle was
revealed to the world. She had been recognised more than once when
making her stealthy way to the King's apartments; she was his chosen
companion on his journey to Compiegne; and it was soon public knowledge
that Madame de Mailly was the woman who had captured the King's elusive
heart. And indeed there was little occasion for surprise; for Madame de
Mailly, although she would never see her thirtieth birthday again, was
one of the most seductive women in all France.

Black-eyed, crimson-lipped, oval-faced, Madame de Mailly was one of
those women who "with cheeks on fire, and blood astir, eyes large and
lustrous as the eyes of Juno, with bold carriage and in free toilettes,
step forward out of the past with the proud and insolent graces of the
divinities of some Bacchanalia." With the provocative and sensual charm
which is so powerful in its appeal, she had a rare skill in displaying
her beauty to its fullest advantage. Her cult of the toilette, the Duc
de Luynes tells us, went with her even by night. She never went to bed
without decking herself with all her diamonds; and her most seductive
hour was in the morning, when, in her bed, with her glorious dishevelled
hair veiling her pillow, a-glitter with her jewels, she gave audience to
her friends.

Such was the ravishing, ardent, passionate woman who was the first of
many to carry Louis' heart by storm, and to be established in his palace
as his mistress--to inaugurate for him a new life of pleasure, and to
estrange him still more from his unhappy Queen, shut up with her
prayers and her tears in her own room, with her tapestry, her books of
history, and her music for sole relaxation. "The most innocent
pleasures," Queen Marie wrote sadly at this time, "are not for me."

Under Madame de Mailly's rule the Court of Versailles awoke to a new
life. "The little apartments grow animated, gay to the point of licence.
Noise, merriment, an even gayer and livelier clash of glasses, madder
nights." Fete succeeded fete in brilliant sequence. Each night saw its
Royal debauch, with the King and his mistress for arch-spirits of the
revels. There were nightly banquets, with the rarest wines and the most
costly viands, supplemented by salads prepared by the dainty hands of
Mademoiselle de Charolois, and ragouts cooked by Louis himself in silver
saucepans. And these were followed by orgies which left the celebrants,
in the last excesses of intoxication, to be gathered up at break of day
and carried helpless to bed.

Such wild excesses could not fail sooner or later to bring satiety to a
lover so unstable as Louis; and it was not long before he grew a little
weary of his mistress, who, too assured of her conquest, began to
exhibit sudden whims and caprices, and fits of obstinacy. Her jealous
eyes followed him everywhere, her reproaches, if he so much as smiled on
a rival beauty, provoked daily quarrels. He was drawn, much against his
will, into her family disputes, and into the disgraceful affairs of her
father, the dissolute Marquis de Nesle.

Meanwhile Madame de Mailly's supremacy was being threatened in a most
unexpected quarter. Among the pupils of the convent school at Port Royal
was a young girl, in whose ambitious brain the project was forming of
supplanting the King's favourite, and of ruling France and Louis at the
same time. The idle dream of a schoolgirl, of course! But to Felicite de
Nesle it was no vain dream, but the ambition of a lifetime, which
dominated her more and more as the months passed in her convent
seclusion. If her sister, Madame de Mailly, had so easily made a
conquest of the King, why should she, with less beauty, it is true, but
with a much cleverer brain, despair? And thus it was that every letter
Madame received from her "little sister" pleaded for an invitation to
Court, until at last Mademoiselle de Nesle found herself the guest of
Louis' mistress in his palace.

Thus the first important step was taken. The rest would be easy; for
Mademoiselle never doubted for a moment her ability to carry out her
programme to its splendid climax. It was certainly a bold, almost
impudent design; for the girl of the convent had few attractions to
appeal to a monarch so surrounded by beauty as the King of France. What
the courtiers saw, says the Duc de Richelieu, was "a long neck clumsily
set on the shoulders, a masculine figure and carriage, features not
unlike those of Madame de Mailly, but thinner and harder, which
exhibited none of her flashes of kindness, her tenderness of passion."

Even her manners seemed calculated to repel, rather than attract the man
she meant to conquer; for she treated him, from the first, with a
familiarity amounting almost to rudeness, and a wilfulness to which he
was by no means accustomed. There was, at any rate, something novel and
piquant in an attitude so different from that of all other Court ladies.
Resentment was soon replaced by interest, and interest by attraction;
until Louis, before he was aware of it, began to find the society of the
impish, mocking, defiant maid from the convent more to his taste than
that of the most fascinating women of his Court.

The more he saw of her, the more effectually he came under her spell.
Each day found her in some new and tantalising mood; and as she drew him
more and more into her toils, she kept him there by her ingenuity in
devising novel pleasures and entertainments for him, until, within a
month of setting eyes on her, he was telling Madame de Mailly, he "loved
her sister more than herself." One of the first evidences of his favour
was to provide her with a husband in the Comte de Vintimille, and a
dower of two hundred thousand livres. He promised her a post as
lady-in-waiting to Madame la Dauphine and gave her a sumptuous suite of
rooms at Versailles. He even conferred on her husband the honour of
handing him his shirt on the wedding-night, an evidence of high favour
such as no other bridegroom had enjoyed.

It was thus little surprise to anyone to find the Comtesse-bride not
only her sister's most formidable rival, but actually usurping her place
and privileges. Nor was it long before this place, on which she had set
her heart first within the walls of the Port Royal Convent, was
unassailably hers; and Madame de Mailly, in tears and sadness, saw an
unbridgeable gulf widen between her and the man she undoubtedly had
grown to love.

That Felicite de Nesle had not over-estimated her powers of conquest was
soon apparent. Louis became her abject slave, humouring her caprices and
submitting to her will. And this will, let it be said to her credit, she
exercised largely for his good. She weaned him from his vicious ways;
she stimulated whatever good remained in him; she tried, and in a
measure succeeded in making a man of him. Under her influence he began
to realise that he was a King, and to play his exalted part more
worthily. He asserted himself in a variety of directions, from looking
personally after the ordering of his household to taking the reins of
State into his own hands.

Nor did she curtail his pleasures. She merely gave them a saner
direction. Orgies and midnight revelry became things of the past, but
their place was taken by delightful days spent at the Chateau of Choisy,
that regal little pleasure-house between the waters of the Seine and the
Forest of Senart, with all its marvels of costly and artistic
furnishing. Here one entertainment succeeded another, from the hunting
which opened, to the card-games which closed the day. A time of innocent
delights which came sweet to the jaded palate of the King.

Thus the halcyon months passed, until, one August day in 1741, the
Comtesse was seized with a slight fever; Louis, consumed by anxiety,
spending the anxious hours by her bedside or pacing the corridor
outside. Two days later he was stooping to kiss an infant presented to
him on a cushion of cramoisi velvet. His happiness was crowned at last,
and life spread before him a prospect of many such years. But tragedy
was already brooding over this scene of pleasure, although none, least
of all the King, seemed to see the shadow of her wings.

One early day in December, Madame de Vintimille was seized with a severe
illness, as sudden as it was mysterious. Physicians were hastily
summoned from Paris, only, to Louis' despair, to declare that they could
do nothing to save the life of the Comtesse. "Tortured by excruciating
pain," says de Goncourt, "struggling against a death which was full of
terror, and which seemed to point to the violence of poison, the dying
woman sent for a confessor. She died almost instantly in his arms before
the Sacraments could be administered. And as the confessor, charged with
the dead woman's last penitent message to her sister, entered Madame de
Mailly's _salon_, he dropped dead."

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