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Madame Campan >> The Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Volume 4
MEMOIRS OF THE COURT OF MARIE ANTOINETTE,
QUEEN OF FRANCE
Being the Historic Memoirs of Madam Campan,
First Lady in Waiting to the Queen
Volume 4
CHAPTER XI.
About the close of the last century several of the Northern sovereigns
took a fancy for travelling. Christian III., King of Denmark, visited the
Court of France in 1763, during the reign of Louis XV. We have seen the
King of Sweden and Joseph II. at Versailles. The Grand Duke of Russia
(afterwards Paul I.), son of Catherine II., and the Princess of
Wurtemberg, his wife, likewise resolved to visit France. They travelled
under the titles of the Comte and Comtesse du Nord. They were presented
on the 20th of May, 1782. The Queen received them with grace and dignity.
On the day of their arrival at Versailles they dined in private with the
King and Queen.
The plain, unassuming appearance of Paul I. pleased Louis XVI. He spoke
to him with more confidence and cheerfulness than he had spoken to Joseph
II. The Comtesse du Nord was not at first so successful with the Queen.
This lady was of a fine height, very fat for her age, with all the German
stiffness, well informed, and perhaps displaying her acquirements with
rather too much confidence. When the Comte and Comtesse du Nord were
presented the Queen was exceedingly nervous. She withdrew into her closet
before she went into the room where she was to dine with the illustrious
travellers, and asked for a glass of water, confessing "she had just
experienced how much more difficult it was to play the part of a queen in
the presence of other sovereigns, or of princes born to become so, than
before courtiers." She soon recovered from her confusion, and reappeared
with ease and confidence. The dinner was tolerably cheerful, and the
conversation very animated.
Brilliant entertainments were given at Court in honour of the King of
Sweden and the Comte du Nord. They were received in private by the King
and Queen, but they were treated with much more ceremony than the Emperor,
and their Majesties always appeared to me to be very, cautious before
these personages. However, the King one day asked the Russian Grand Duke
if it were true that he could not rely on the fidelity of any one of those
who accompanied him. The Prince answered him without hesitation, and
before a considerable number of persons, that he should be very sorry to
have with him even a poodle that was much attached to him, because his
mother would take care to have it thrown into the Seine, with a stone
round its neck, before he should leave Paris. This reply, which I myself
heard, horrified me, whether it depicted the disposition of Catherine, or
only expressed the Prince's prejudice against her.
The Queen gave the Grand Duke a supper at Trianon, and had the gardens
illuminated as they had been for the Emperor. The Cardinal de Rohan very
indiscreetly ventured to introduce himself there without the Queen's
knowledge. Having been treated with the utmost coolness ever since his
return from Vienna, he had not dared to ask her himself for permission to
see the illumination; but he persuaded the porter of Trianon to admit him
as soon as the Queen should have set off for Versailles, and his Eminence
engaged to remain in the porter's lodge until all the carriages should
have left the chateau. He did not keep his word, and while the porter was
busy in the discharge of his duty, the Cardinal, who wore his red
stockings and had merely thrown on a greatcoat, went down into the garden,
and, with an air of mystery, drew up in two different places to see the
royal family and suite pass by.
Her Majesty was highly offended at this piece of boldness, and next day
ordered the porter to be discharged. There was a general feeling of
disgust at the Cardinal's conduct, and of commiseration towards the porter
for the loss of his place. Affected at the misfortune of the father of a
family, I obtained his forgiveness; and since that time I have often
regretted the feeling which induced me to interfere. The notoriety of the
discharge of the porter of Trianon, and the odium that circumstance would
have fixed upon the Cardinal, would have made the Queen's dislike to him
still more publicly known, and would probably have prevented the
scandalous and notorious intrigue of the necklace.
The Queen, who was much prejudiced against the King of Sweden, received
him very coldly.
[Gustavus III., King of Sweden, travelled in France under the title of
Comte d'Haga. Upon his accession to the throne, he managed the revolution
which prostrated the authority of the Senate with equal skill, coolness,
and courage. He was assassinated in 1792, at a masked ball, by
Auckarstrum.--NOTE BY THE EDITOR.]
All that was said of the private character of that sovereign, his
connection with the Comte de Vergennes, from the time of the Revolution of
Sweden, in 1772, the character of his favourite Armfeldt, and the
prejudices of the monarch himself against the Swedes who were well
received at the Court of Versailles, formed the grounds of this dislike.
He came one day uninvited and unexpected, and requested to dine with the
Queen. The Queen received him in the little closet, and desired me to
send for her clerk of the kitchen, that she might be informed whether
there was a proper dinner to set before Comte d'Haga, and add to it if
necessary. The King of Sweden assured her that there would be enough for
him; and I could not help smiling when I thought of the length of the menu
of the dinner of the King and Queen, not half of which would have made its
appearance had they dined in private. The Queen looked significantly at
me, and I withdrew. In the evening she asked me why I had seemed so
astonished when she ordered me to add to her dinner, saying that I ought
instantly to have seen that she was giving the King of Sweden a lesson for
his presumption. I owned to her that the scene had appeared to me so much
in the bourgeois style, that I involuntarily thought of the cutlets on the
gridiron, and the omelette, which in families in humble circumstances
serve to piece out short commons. She was highly diverted with my answer,
and repeated it to the King, who also laughed heartily at it.
The peace with England satisfied all classes of society interested in the
national honour. The departure of the English commissary from Dunkirk,
who had been fixed at that place ever since the shameful peace of 1763 as
inspector of our navy, occasioned an ecstasy of joy.
[By the Treaty of Utrecht (1713) it was stipulated that the fortifications
and port of Dunkirk should be destroyed. By the Treaty of Paris (1763) a
commissary was to reside at Dunkirk to see that no attempt was made to
break this treaty. This stipulation was revoked by the Peace of
Versailles, in 1783.--see DYER'S "Modern Europe," 1st edition, vol. i.,
pp. 205-438 and 539.]
The Government communicated to the Englishman the order for his departure
before the treaty was made public. But for that precaution the populace
would have probably committed some excess or other, in order to make the
agent of English power feel the effects of the resentment which had
constantly increased during his stay at that port. Those engaged in trade
were the only persons dissatisfied with the treaty of 1783. That article
which provided for, the free admission of English goods annihilated at one
blow the trade of Rouen and the other manufacturing towns throughout the
kingdom. The English swarmed into Paris. A considerable number of them
were presented at Court. The Queen paid them marked attention; doubtless
she wished them to distinguish between the esteem she felt for their noble
nation and the political views of the Government in the support it had
afforded to the Americans. Discontent was, however, manifested at Court
in consequence of the favour bestowed by the Queen on the English
noblemen; these attentions were called infatuations. This was illiberal;
and the Queen justly complained of such absurd jealousy.
The journey to Fontainebleau and the winter at Paris and at Court were
extremely brilliant. The spring brought back those amusements which the
Queen began to prefer to the splendour of fetes. The most perfect harmony
subsisted between the King and Queen; I never saw but one cloud between
them. It was soon dispelled, and the cause of it is perfectly unknown to
me.
My father-in-law, whose penetration and experience I respected greatly,
recommended me, when he saw me placed in the service of a young queen, to
shun all kinds of confidence. "It procures," said he, "but a very
fleeting, and at the same time dangerous sort of favour; serve with zeal
to the best of your judgment, but never do more than obey. Instead of
setting your wits to work to discover why an order or a commission which
may appear of consequence is given to you, use them to prevent the
possibility of your knowing anything of the matter." I had occasion to
act on this wise advice. One morning at Trianon I went into the Queen's
chamber; there were letters lying upon the bed, and she was weeping
bitterly. Her tears and sobs were occasionally interrupted by
exclamations of "Ah! that I were dead!--wretches! monsters! What have I
done to them?" I offered her orange-flower water and ether. "Leave me,"
said she, "if you love me; it would be better to kill me at once." At
this moment she threw her arm over my shoulder and began weeping afresh. I
saw that some weighty trouble oppressed her heart, and that she wanted a
confidant. I suggested sending for the Duchesse de Polignac; this she
strongly opposed. I renewed my arguments, and her opposition grew weaker.
I disengaged myself from her arms, and ran to the antechamber, where I
knew that an outrider always waited, ready to mount and start at a
moment's warning for Versailles. I ordered him to go full speed, and tell
the Duchesse de Polignac that the Queen was very uneasy, and desired to
see her instantly. The Duchess always had a carriage ready. In less than
ten minutes she was at the Queen's door. I was the only person there,
having been forbidden to send for the other women. Madame de Polignac
came in; the Queen held out her arms to her, the Duchess rushed towards
her. I heard her sobs renewed and withdrew.
A quarter of an hour afterwards the Queen, who had become calmer, rang to
be dressed. I sent her woman in; she put on her gown and retired to her
boudoir with the Duchess. Very soon afterwards the Comte d'Artois arrived
from Compiegne, where he had been with the King. He eagerly inquired
where the Queen was; remained half an hour with her and the Duchess; and
on coming out told me the Queen asked for me. I found her seated on the
couch by the side of her friend; her features had resumed their usual
cheerful and gracious appearance. She held out her hand to me, and said
to the Duchess, "I know I have made her so uncomfortable this morning that
I must set her poor heart at ease." She then added, "You must have seen,
on some fine summer's day, a black cloud suddenly appear and threaten to
pour down upon the country and lay it waste. The lightest wind drives it
away, and the blue sky and serene weather are restored. This is just the
image of what has happened to me this morning." She afterwards told me
that the King would return from Compiegne after hunting there, and sup
with her; that I must send for her purveyor, to select with him from his
bills of fare all such dishes as the King liked best; that she would have
no others served up in the evening at her table; and that this was a mark
of attention that she wished the King to notice. The Duchesse de Polignac
also took me by the hand, and told me how happy she was that she had been
with the Queen at a moment when she stood in need of a friend. I never
knew what could have created in the Queen so lively and so transient an
alarm; but I guessed from the particular care she took respecting the King
that attempts had been made to irritate him against her; that the malice
of her enemies had been promptly discovered and counteracted by the King's
penetration and attachment; and that the Comte d'Artois had hastened to
bring her intelligence of it.
It was, I think, in the summer of 1787, during one of the Trianon
excursions, that the Queen of Naples--[Caroline, sister of Marie
Antoinette.]--sent the Chevalier de Bressac to her Majesty on a secret
mission relative to a projected marriage between the Hereditary Prince,
her son, and Madame, the King's daughter; in the absence of the lady of
honour he addressed himself to me. Although he said a great deal to me
about the close confidence with which the Queen of Naples honoured him,
and about his letter of credit, I thought he had the air of an
adventurer.--[He afterwards spent several years shut up in the Chateau de
l'Oeuf.]--He had, indeed, private letters for the Queen, and his mission
was not feigned; he talked to me very rashly even before his admission,
and entreated me to do all that lay in my power to dispose the Queen's
mind in favour of his sovereign's wishes; I declined, assuring him that it
did not become me to meddle with State affairs. He endeavoured, but in
vain, to prove to me that the union contemplated by the Queen of Naples
ought not to be looked upon in that light.
I procured M. de Bressac the audience he desired, but without suffering
myself even to seem acquainted with the object of his mission. The Queen
told me what it was; she thought him a person ill-chosen for the occasion;
and yet she thought that the Queen, her sister, had done wisely in not
sending a man worthy to be avowed,--it being impossible that what she
solicited should take place. I had an opportunity on this occasion, as
indeed on many others, of judging to what extent the Queen valued and
loved France and the dignity of our Court. She then told me that Madame,
in marrying her cousin, the Duc d'Angouleme, would not lose her rank as
daughter of the Queen; and that her situation would be far preferable to
that of queen of any other country; and that there was nothing in Europe
to be compared to the Court of France; and that it would be necessary, in
order to avoid exposing a French Princess to feelings of deep regret, in
case she should be married to a foreign prince, to take her from the
palace of Versailles at seven years of age, and send her immediately to
the Court in which she was to dwell; and that at twelve would be too late;
for recollections and comparisons would ruin the happiness of all the rest
of her life. The Queen looked upon the destiny of her sisters as far
beneath her own; and frequently mentioned the mortifications inflicted by
the Court of Spain upon her sister, the Queen of Naples, and the necessity
she was under of imploring the mediation of the King of France.
She showed me several letters that she had received from the Queen of
Naples relative to her differences with the Court of Madrid respecting the
Minister Acton. She thought him useful to her people, inasmuch as he was
a man of considerable information and great activity. In these letters
she minutely acquainted her Majesty with the nature of the affronts she
had received, and represented Mr. Acton to her as a man whom malevolence
itself could not suppose capable of interesting her otherwise than by his
services. She had had to suffer the impertinences of a Spaniard named Las
Casas, who had been sent to her by the King, her father-in-law, to
persuade her to dismiss Mr. Acton from the business of the State, and from
her intimacy. She complained bitterly to the Queen, her sister, of the
insulting proceedings of this charge d'affaires, whom she told, in order
to convince him of the nature of the feelings which attached her to Mr.
Acton, that she would have portraits and busts of him executed by the most
eminent artists of Italy, and that she would then send them to the King of
Spain, to prove that nothing but the desire to retain a man of superior
capacity had induced her to bestow on him the favour he enjoyed. This Las
Casas dared to answer her that it would be useless trouble; that the
ugliness of a man did not always render him displeasing; and that the King
of Spain had too much experience not to know that there was no accounting
for the caprices of a woman.
This audacious reply filled the Queen of Naples with indignation, and her
emotion caused her to miscarry on the same day. In consequence of the
mediation of Louis XVI. the Queen of Naples obtained complete
satisfaction, and Mr. Acton continued Prime Minister.
Among the characteristics which denoted the goodness of the Queen, her
respect for personal liberty should have a place. I have seen her put up
with the most troublesome importunities from people whose minds were
deranged rather than have them arrested. Her patient kindness was put to
a very disagreeable trial by an ex-councillor of the Bordeaux Parliament,
named Castelnaux; this man declared himself the lover of the Queen, and
was generally known by that appellation. For ten successive years did he
follow the Court in all its excursions. Pale and wan, as people who are
out of their senses usually are, his sinister appearance occasioned the
most uncomfortable sensations. During the two hours that the Queen's
public card parties lasted, he would remain opposite her Majesty. He
placed himself in the same manner before her at chapel, and never failed
to be at the King's dinner or the dinner in public. At the theatre he
invariably seated himself as near the Queen's box as possible. He always
set off for Fontainebleau or St. Cloud the day before the Court, and when
her Majesty arrived at her various residences, the first person she met on
getting out of her carriage was this melancholy madman, who never spoke to
any one. When the Queen stayed at Petit Trianon the passion of this
unhappy man became still more annoying. He would hastily swallow a morsel
at some eating-house, and spend all the rest of the day, even when it
rained, in going round and round the garden, always walking at the edge of
the moat. The Queen frequently met him when she was either alone or with
her children; and yet she would not suffer any violence to be used to
relieve her from this intolerable annoyance. Having one day given M. de
Seze permission to enter Trianon, she sent to desire he would come to me,
and directed me to inform that celebrated advocate of M. de Castelnaux's
derangement, and then to send for him that M. de Seze might have some
conversation with him. He talked to him nearly an hour, and made
considerable impression upon his mind; and at last M. de Castelnaux
requested me to inform the Queen positively that, since his presence was
disagreeable to her, he would retire to his province. The Queen was very
much rejoiced, and desired me to express her full satisfaction to M. de
Seze. Half an hour after M. de Seze was gone the unhappy madman was
announced. He came to tell me that he withdrew his promise, that he had
not sufficient command of himself to give up seeing the Queen as often as
possible. This new determination: was a disagreeable message to take to
her Majesty but how was I affected at hearing her say, "Well, let him
annoy me! but do not let him be deprived of the blessing of freedom."
[On the arrest of the King and Queen at Varennes, this unfortunate
Castelnaux attempted to starve himself to death. The people in whose
house he lived, becoming uneasy at his absence, had the door of his room
forced open, when he was found stretched senseless on the floor. I do not
know what became of him after the 10th of August.--MADAME CAMPAN.]
The direct influence of the Queen on affairs during the earlier years of
the reign was shown only in her exertions to obtain from the King a
revision of the decrees in two celebrated causes. It was contrary to her
principles to interfere in matters of justice, and never did she avail
herself of her influence to bias the tribunals. The Duchesse de Praslin,
through a criminal caprice, carried her enmity to her husband so far as to
disinherit her children in favour of the family of M. de Guemenee. The
Duchesse de Choiseul, who, was warmly interested in this affair, one day
entreated the Queen, in my presence, at least to condescend to ask the
first president when the cause would be called on; the Queen replied that
she could not even do that, for it would manifest an interest which it was
her duty not to show.
If the King had not inspired the Queen with a lively feeling of love, it
is quite certain that she yielded him respect and affection for the
goodness of his disposition and the equity of which he gave so many proofs
throughout his reign. One evening she returned very late; she came out of
the King's closet, and said to M. de Misery and myself, drying her eyes,
which were filled with tears, "You see me weeping, but do not be uneasy at
it: these are the sweetest tears that a wife can shed; they are caused by
the impression which the justice and goodness of the King have made upon
me; he has just complied with my request for a revision of the proceedings
against Messieurs de Bellegarde and de Monthieu, victims of the Duc
d'Aiguillon's hatred to the Duc de Choiseul. He has been equally just to
the Duc de Guines in his affair with Tort. It is a happy thing for a queen
to be able to admire and esteem him who has admitted her to a
participation of his throne; and as to you, I congratulate you upon your
having to live under the sceptre of so virtuous a sovereign."
The Queen laid before the King all the memorials of the Duc de Guines,
who, during his embassy to England, was involved in difficulties by a
secretary, who speculated in the public funds in London on his own
account, but in such a manner as to throw a suspicion of it on the
ambassador. Messieurs de Vergennes and Turgot, bearing but little
good-will to the Duc de Guines, who was the friend of the Duc de Choiseul,
were not disposed to render the ambassador any service. The Queen
succeeded in fixing the King's particular attention on this affair, and
the innocence of the Duc de Guines triumphed through the equity of Louis
XVI.
An incessant underhand war was carried on between the friends and
partisans of M. de Choiseul, who were called the Austrians, and those who
sided with Messieurs d'Aiguillon, de Maurepas, and de Vergennes, who, for
the same reason, kept up the intrigues carried on at Court and in Paris
against the Queen. Marie Antoinette, on her part, supported those who had
suffered in this political quarrel, and it was this feeling which led her
to ask for a revision of the proceedings against Messieurs de Bellegarde
and de Monthieu. The first, a colonel and inspector of artillery, and the
second, proprietor of a foundry at St. Etienne, were, under the Ministry
of the Duc d'Aiguillon, condemned to imprisonment for twenty years and a
day for having withdrawn from the arsenals of France, by order of the Duc
de Choiseul, a vast number of muskets, as being of no value except as old
iron, while in point of fact the greater part of those muskets were
immediately embarked and sold to the Americans. It appears that the Duc
de Choiseul imparted to the Queen, as grounds of defence for the accused,
the political views which led him to authorise that reduction and sale in
the manner in which it had been executed. It rendered the case of
Messieurs de Bellegarde and de Monthieu more unfavourable that the
artillery officer who made the reduction in the capacity of inspector was,
through a clandestine marriage, brother-in-law of the owner of the
foundry, the purchaser of the rejected arms. The innocence of the two
prisoners was, nevertheless, made apparent; and they came to Versailles
with their wives and children to throw themselves at the feet of their
benefactress. This affecting scene took place in the grand gallery, at
the entrance to the Queen's apartment. She wished to restrain the women
from kneeling, saying that they had only had justice done them; and that
she ought to be congratulated upon the most substantial happiness
attendant upon her station, that of laying just appeals before the King.
On every occasion, when the Queen had to speak in public, she used the
most appropriate and elegant language, notwithstanding the difficulty a
foreigner might be expected to experience. She answered all addresses
herself, a custom which she learned at the Court of Maria Theresa. The
Princesses of the House of Bourbon had long ceased to take the trouble of
speaking in such cases. Madame Addlaide blamed the Queen for not doing as
they did, assuring her that it was quite sufficient to mutter a few words
that might sound like an answer, while the addressers, occupied with what
they had themselves been saying, would always take it for granted that a
proper answer had been returned. The Queen saw that idleness alone
dictated such a proceeding, and that as the practice even of muttering a
few words showed the necessity of answering in some way, it must be more
proper to reply simply but clearly, and in the best style possible.
Sometimes indeed, when apprised of the subject of the address, she would
write down her answer in the morning, not to learn it by heart, but in
order to settle the ideas or sentiments she wished to introduce.