The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, Charles Duke Yonge [e book reader android txt] 📗

cabal, intriguing for selfish objects of their own with as much malice and meanness as could be practiced by Madame du Barri herself.

Still, in spite of these drawbacks, it was almost inevitable that they should have great influence over their niece. Their experience might well be presumed by her to have given them a correct insight into the ways of the court, and the best mode of behaving to their own father; and she, a foreigner and almost a child, was not only in need of counsel and guidance, but had no one else of her own sex to whom she could so naturally look for information or advice. They were, as she explained to Mercy, her only society; and, though she was too clear-sighted not to see their faults, and not at times to be aware that she was suffering from their perverseness, she, like other people, was often compelled to tolerate what she could not mend, and to shut her eyes to disagreeable qualities when forced to live on terms of intimacy with the possessors.

On this point Maria Teresa was, perhaps, hardly inclined to make sufficient allowance for her difficulties, and insisted over and over again on the mischief which would arise to her from the habit of surrendering her judgment to these princesses. She told her that, though far from being devoid of virtues and real merit, "they had never succeeded in making themselves loved or esteemed by either their father or the public;[3]" and she added other admonitions which, as they were avowedly suggested by reports that had reached her, may be taken as indicating some errors into which her daughter's lightness of heart had occasionally betrayed her. She entreated her not to show an exclusive preference for the more youthful portion of her society, to the neglect of those who were older, and commonly of higher consideration; never to laugh at people or turn them into ridicule--no habit could be more injurious to herself, and indulgence in it would give reason to doubt her good-nature; it might gain her the applause of a few young people, but it would alienate a much greater number, and those the people of the most real weight and respectability. "This is not," said the experienced and wise empress, "a trivial matter in a princess. We live on the stage of the great world, and it is above all things essential that people should entertain a high idea of us. If you will only not allow others to lead you astray, you are sure of success; a kind Providence has endowed you so liberally with beauty, and with so many charms, that all hearts are yours if you are but prudent.[4]"

The empress would have had her exhibit this prudence in her conduct also to Madame du Barri. She pressed upon her that she was justified in appearing ignorant of that lady's real position and character; that she need only be aware that she was received at court, and that respect for the king should prevent her from suspecting him of countenancing undeserving people.

One other detail in the accounts of Marie Antoinette's conduct, which from time to time reached Vienna, had also vexed the empress, and it should be kept in mind by any one who would fairly estimate the truth of the charge brought against her, and urged with such rancor after she had become queen--of postponing the interests of France to those of her native land, of being Austrian at heart. Maria Teresa had heard, on the contrary, that she had given those Austrians who had presented themselves at Versailles but a cold reception, and she did not attempt to conceal her discontent. With a natural and becoming pride in and jealousy for her own loyal and devoted subjects, she entreated her daughter never to feel ashamed of them, or ashamed of being German herself, even if, comparatively speaking, the name should imply some deficiency in polish. "The French themselves would esteem her more if they saw in her something of German solidity and frankness.[5]"

The daughter answered the mother with some adroitness. She took no notice of the advice about her behavior to Madame du Barri. It was the one topic on which her own feelings of propriety, as well as those of the dauphin, coincided with the suggestions of the aunts, and she did not desire to vex or provoke the empress by a prolonged discussion of the question; but the charge of coldness to her own countrymen she denied earnestly. "She should always glory in being a German. Some of those nobles whom the empress had expressly named she had treated with careful distinction, and had even danced with them, though they were not men of the very highest character. She well knew that the Germans had many good qualities which she could wish that the French shared with them;" and she promised that, whenever any of her mother's subjects of such standing and merit as to be worthy of her attention came to the court, they should have no cause to complain of her reception of them. Her language on the subject is so measured and careful as to lead us almost inevitably to the inference that the reports which had excited such dissatisfaction at Vienna were not without foundation, but that the French gayety, even if often descending to frivolity, was more to her taste than the German solidity which her mother so highly esteemed, and that she had been at no great pains to hide a preference which must naturally he acceptable to those among whom her future life was to be spent.

In the middle of May, the Count de Provence was married to the Princess Josephine Louise of Savoy, and the court went to Fontainebleau to receive the bride. The necessity for leaving Madame du Barri behind threw the king more into the company of the dauphiness than he had been on any previous occasion, and her unaffected graces seemed for the moment to have made a complete conquest of him. He came in his dressing-gown to her apartments for breakfast, and spent a great portion of the day there. The courtiers again began to speculate on her breaking down the ascendency of the favorite, remarking that, though Louis was careful to pay his new relative the honors which, were her due as a stranger and a bride, he returned as speedily as he could with decency to the dauphiness as if for relief; and that, though she herself took care to put her new sister-in-law forward on all occasions, and treated her with the most marked cordiality and affection, every one else made the dauphiness the principal object of homage even in the festivities which were celebrated in honor of the countess. Indeed, it was evident from the very first that any attempt of the mistress's cabal to establish a rivalry between the two princesses must be out of the question. The Countess de Provence had no beauty, nor accomplishments, nor graciousness. Horace Walpole, who was meditating a visit to Paris, where he had some diligent correspondents, was told that he would lose his senses when he saw the dauphiness, but would be disenchanted by her sister; and the saying, though that of a blind old lady, expressed the opinion of all Frenchmen who could see.[6]

Indeed, so obvious was the king's partiality for her that even Madame du Barri more than once sought to propitiate her by speaking in praise of her to Mercy, and professing an eager desire to aid in procuring the gratification of any of her wishes. But he was too shrewd and too well-informed to place the least confidence in her sincerity, though he did not fear half as much harm to his pupil from her enmity as from the pretended affection of the aunts, who, from a mixture of folly and treachery, were unwearied in their attempts to keep her at a distance from the king, by inspiring her with a fear of him, for which his disposition, which had as much good-nature in it as was compatible with weakness, gave no ground whatever. Indeed, the mischief they did was not confined to their influence over her, if Mercy was correct in his belief that it was their disagreeable tempers and manners which at this time, and for the remainder of the reign, prevented Louis from associating more with his family, which, had all been like the dauphiness, he would have preferred to do.

It would probably have been in vain that Mercy remonstrated against her submitting as she did to the aunts, had he not been at all times able to secure the co-operation of the empress, who placed the most implicit confidence in his judgment in all matters relating to the French court, and remonstrated with her daughter energetically on the want of proper self-respect which was implied in her surrendering her own judgment to that of the aunts, as if she were a slave or a child. And Marie Antoinette replied to her mother in a tone of such mingled submissiveness and affection as showed how sincere was her desire to remove every shade of annoyance from the empress's mind; and which may, perhaps, lead to a suspicion that even her subservience to the aunts proceeded in a great degree from her anxiety to win the good-will of every one, and from the kindness which could not endure to thwart those with whom she was much associated; though at the same time she complained to the ambassador that her mother wrote without sufficient knowledge of the difficulties with which she was surrounded. But she had too deep an affection and reverence for her mother to allow her words to fall to the ground; and gradually Mercy began to see a difference in her conduct, and a greater inclination to assert her own independence, which was the feeling that above all others he thought most desirable to foster in her.

Another topic which we find constantly urged in the empress's letters would seem strangely inconsistent with Marie Antoinette's position, if we did not remember how very young she still was. For her mother writes to her in many respects as if she were still at school, and continually inculcates on her the necessity of profiting by De Vermond's instructions, and applying herself to a course of solid reading in theology and history. And here, though her natural appetite for amusement interfered with her studies somewhat more than the empress, prompted by Mercy, was willing to make allowance for, she profited much more willingly by her mother's advice, having indeed a natural inclination for the works of history and biography, and a decided distaste for novels and romances. She could not have had a better guide in such matters than De Vermond, who was a man of extensive information and of a very correct taste; and under his guidance and with his assistance she studied Sully's memoirs, Madame de Sevigne's letters, and any other books which he recommended to her, and which gave her an idea of the past history of the country as well as the masterpieces of the great French dramatists.[7]

The latter part of the year 1771 was marked by no very striking occurrences. Marie Antoinette had carried her point, and had begun to ride on horseback without either her figure or her complexion suffering from the exercise. On the contrary, she was admitted to have improved in beauty. She sent her measure to Vienna, to show Maria Teresa how much she had grown, adding that her husband had grown as much, and had become stronger and more healthy-looking, and that she had made use of her saddle-horses to accompany him in his hunting and shooting excursions. Like a true wife, she boasted to her mother of his skill as a shot: the very day that