The Life of Marie Antoinette

CHAPTER XVII. Madame de Guimenee resigns the Office of Governess of the Royal Children. -Madame de Polignac succeeds her.-Marie Antoinette's Views of Education.-Character of Madame Royale.-The Grand Duke Paul and his Grand Duchess visit the French Court.-Their Characters.-Entertainments given in their Honor.-Insolence of the Cardinal de Rohan.-His Character and previous Life.-Grand Festivities at Chantilly.-Events of the War.- Rodney defeats de Grasse.-The Siege of Gilbralter fails.-M. de Suffrein fights five Drawn Battles with Sir E. Hughes in the Indian Seas.-The Queen receives him with great Honor on his Return.

The post of governess to the royal children was one which was conferred for life, and did not even cease on the accession of a new sovereign, and the birth of a new royal family. Madame de Guimenee, therefore, having been appointed to that office on the birth of the first child of the late dauphin, the father of Louis XVI., still retained it, and on the birth of Madame Royale transferred her services to that princess. The arrangement had been far from acceptable to Marie Antoinette, who had no great liking for the lady, though, with her habitual kindness of disposition, she had accepted her attentions, and had often condescended to appear as a guest at her evening parties, taking only the precaution of ascertaining beforehand whom she was likely to meet there.[1] But, in the spring of 1782, the Prince de Guimenee became involved in pecuniary difficulties that compelled him to retire from the court, and his princess to resign her appointment, which Marie Antoinette at once bestowed on Madame de Polignac. Her attachment to that lady affords a striking exemplification of one feature in her character, a steady adherence to friendships once formed, which can never be otherwise than amiable, even when, as it may be thought was the case in this and one or two other instances, she carried it to excess; for she could hardly fail to be aware that Madame de Polignac was most unpopular with all classes, and that her unpopularity was not undeserved. She was covetous for herself, and she had a number of relations, equally rapacious, who regarded her court favor solely as a means of enriching the whole family. She had procured a valuable reversion for her husband; and subsequently the rare favor of an hereditary dukedom; and it was characteristic of her disposition that she might have attained the rank of duchess for herself at an earlier date, but that she preferred to it the chance of other favors of a more practically useful nature; nor was it till she had received such sums of money that nothing more could well be asked, that she turned her ambition to titles, and to the much-coveted dignity of a stool to sit upon in the presence of royalty.[2]

But the more people spoke ill of her, the more the queen protected her; and if she received the resignation of Madame de Guimenee with pleasure, much of her joy seemed to be owing to the opportunity which it afforded her of promoting the new duchess to the vacant place, while Madame de Polignac had even the address to persuade her that she accepted the post unwillingly, and, in undertaking it, was making a sacrifice to loyalty and friendship. But if the queen was duped on that point, she was not deceived on others. She knew that the duchess had no qualifications for the office; that she was neither clever nor accomplished. But her absence of any special qualifications was, in fact, her best recommendation in the eyes of her patroness; for Marie Antoinette had high ideas of the duty which a mother owes to her children. She thought herself bound to take upon herself the real superintendence of their education, and, having this view, she preferred a governess who would be content that her children's minds should receive their color from herself. Her own idea of education, as we shall see it hereafter described by herself,[3] was that example was more powerful than precept, and that love was a better teacher than fear; and, acting on this principle, from the moment that her little daughter was old enough to comprehend her intentions and wishes, she began to make her her companion; abandoning, or at least relaxing, her pursuit of other pleasures for that which was now her chief delight, as well as in her eyes her chief duty-the task of watching over the early promise, the opening talents and virtues of those who were destined, as she hoped, to have a predominant influence on the future welfare of the nation. Especially she made a rule of taking the little princess with her on the different errands of humanity and benevolence, which, wherever she might be, and more particularly while she was at Versailles, formed an almost habitual part of her occupations. She saw that much of the distress which now seemed to be the normal condition of the humbler classes, and much of the discontent, which was felt by all classes but the highest, were caused by the pride of the princes and nobles, who, in France, drew a far more rigorous and unbending line of demarkation between themselves and their inferiors than prevailed in other countries; and she desired from their earliest infancy to imbue her children with a different principle, and to teach them by her own example that none could be so lowly as to be beneath the notice even of a sovereign; and that, on the contrary, the greater the depression of the poor, the greater claim did it give them on the solicitude and protection of their princes and rulers.

Nor were these lessons, which even worldly policy might have dictated, the only ones which she sought to inculcate on the little princess before the more exciting pursuits of society should have rendered her less susceptible to good impressions. Unfriendly as her husband's aunts had always been to herself, and little as there was that was really amiable in their characters, there was yet one, the Princess Louise, the Nun of St. Denis, whose renunciation of the world seemed to point her out to her family as a model of holiness and devotion; and as, above all things, Marie Antoinette desired to inspire her little daughter with a deep sense of religious obligation, she soon began to take her with her in all her visits to the convent, and to encourage her to converse with the other Sisters of the house. Nor did she abandon the practice even when it was suggested to her that such an intercourse with those who were notoriously always on the watch to attract recruits of rank or consideration, might have the result of inclining the child to follow her great-aunt's example; and perhaps, by renouncing the world, to counteract plans which her parents might have preferred for her establishment in life. Marie Antoinette declared that should the princess express such a desire, far from being annoyed, "she should feel flattered by it;[4]" she would, it may be presumed, have regarded it as a convincing testimony of the soundness of her own system of education, and of the purity of the instruction which she had given.

But such was not to be the destiny of her whose life at this moment seemed to beam with prospects of happiness which it would have been cruel to allow her to exchange for the gloom of a convent, though, even before she arrived at womanhood, the most austere seclusion of such an abode would have seemed a welcome asylum from dangers yet undreamed of. Her destiny was indeed to be one of trials and afflictions even to the end; trials very different in their kind from those which the gates of the Carmelite sisterhood would have opened to her. But her mother's early lessons of humility and piety, and still more her mother's virtuous and heroic example, never ceased to bear their fruit in their influence on her character, amidst all the vicissitudes of fortune. The unhappy daughter,[5] as she was styled by the faithful and eloquent champion of her race, lived to win the respect even of its enemies,[6] supplying, at more than one critical moment, a courage and decision of which her male relatives were destitute; and, in the second and final ruin of her house, her fortitude and resignation still commanded the loyal adherence of a large party among her countrymen, and the esteem of foreign statesmen, who gladly recognized in her no small portion of the nobility of her female ancestors.

In the spring of 1782 the attention of the Parisians was occupied for a while by the arrival of two visitors from a nation which as yet had sent forth but few of its sons to mingle in society with those of other countries. The Grand Duke of Russia, who had indeed been its rightful emperor ever since the murder of his father twenty years before, but who had been compelled to postpone his claims to those of has ambitious and unscrupulous mother, Catherine II., had conceived a desire so far to imitate the example of his great ancestor, the founder of the Russian empire, Peter the Great, as to make a personal investigation of the manners of other people besides his own. To use the language in which the empress communicated to Louis XVI. her son's wish to pay him a visit, he sought, in the first instance, "to take lessons in courtesy and nobility from the most elegant court in the world." And as Louis had responded with a cordial invitation to Versailles, at the end of May he, with his grand duchess, a princess of Wuertemberg, arrived at the palace.

Paul had not as yet given any indications of the brutal and ferocious disposition which distinguished him in his later years, till it gradually developed into a savage insanity which neither his nobles nor even his sons could endure. He appeared rather a young man of frank and open temper, somewhat more unguarded in his language, especially concerning his own affairs and position, than was quite prudent or becoming; but kind in intention, sometimes even courteous in manner, shrewd in discerning what things and what persons were most worthy of his notice, and showing no deficiency of judgment in the observations which he made upon them. The grand duchess, however, was generally regarded as greatly superior to her husband in every respect. He was almost repulsive in his ugliness. She was extremely handsome in feature, though disfigured by a stoutness extraordinary in one so young. She had also a high reputation for accomplishments and general ability, though that too was disguised by a coldness or ungraciousness of manner that gave strangers a disagreeable impression of her; which, however, a more intimate acquaintance greatly removed.

Their characters had preceded them, and Marie Antoinette, for perhaps the first time in her life, felt very uneasy as to her own power of receiving them with the dignity which became both her and them. As she afterward explained her feelings to Madame de Campan, "she found the part of a queen much move difficult to play in the presence of other sovereigns, or of princes who were born to become sovereigns, than before ordinary courtiers.[7]" She even fortified her courage before dinner with a glass of water, and the medicine proved effectual. Even if it cost her an effort to preserve her habitual gayety, her difficulty was unperceived, and indeed, after the few first moments, ceased to be a difficulty. Paul himself cared but little for female attractions or graces; but the archduchess was charmed with her union of liveliness and dignity, which surpassed all her previous experiences of courts; and one of her ladies, Madame d'Oberkirch, who has left behind her some memoirs, to which all succeeding writers have been indebted for many particulars of this visit, could scarcely find words to describe the impression the queen's beauty had made upon her and all her fellow-travelers. "The queen was marvelously beautiful; she fascinated every eye. It was absolutely impossible for any one to display a greater grace and nobility of demeanor.[8]" Madame d'Oberkirch, like herself, was German by birth; and Marie Antoinette begged her to speak German to her, that she might refresh her recollection of her native language; but she found that she had almost forgotten it. "Ah," said she, "German is a fine language; but French, in the mouths of my children, seems to me the finest language in the world." And in the same spirit of entire adoption of French feelings, and even of French prejudices, she declared to the baroness that though the Rhine and the Danube were both noble rivers, the Seine was so much more beautiful that it had made her forget them both.

But her preference for every thing French did not make her neglect the duties of hospitality to her foreign visitors; she wished rather that they should carry with them as fixed an idea as she herself entertained of the superiority of France to their own country, in this as in every other particular. And she gave two magnificent entertainments in their honor at the Little Trianon, displaying the beauties of her garden by day, and also by night, by an illumination of extraordinary splendor. They were highly delighted with the beauty and the novelty of a scene such as they had never before witnessed; but her pleasure was in a great degree marred by the indecent boldness of one whose sacred profession, as well as his ancient lineage, ought to have restrained him from such misconduct, though it was but too completely in harmony with his previous life. Prince Louis de Rohan was a descendant of the great Duke de Sully, and a member of a family which, during the last reign, had possessed an influence at court which was surpassed by that of no other house among the French nobles.[9] He himself had reaped the full advantage of its interest. As we have already seen, he had been coadjutor of Strasburg when Marie Antoinette passed through that city on her way to France in 1770. He had subsequently been promoted to the rank of cardinal; and, though he was notoriously devoid of capacity, yet through the influence of his relations, and that of Madame du Barri, with whom they maintained an intimate connection, he had obtained the post of embassador to the court of Vienna, where he had made himself conspicuous for every species of disorder. His whole life in the Austrian capital had been a round of shameless profligacy and extravagance. The conduct of the inferior members of the embassy, stimulated by his example, and protected by his official character, had been equally scandalous, till at last Maria Teresa had felt herself bound, in justice to her subjects, to insist on his recall. The moment that he became aware that his position was in danger, he began to write abusive letters against the Empress-queen, and to circulate libels at Vienna against both her and Marie Antoinette, on whom he openly threatened to avenge himself, if his pleasures or his prospects should in any way be interfered with.[10]

Since his return to France he had had the address to conciliate Maurepas, who, adding the authority of his ministerial office to the solicitations of the cardinal's sister, Madame de Marsan, had succeeded in wringing from the unwilling king his appointment to the honorable and lucrative preferment of grand almoner. But even that post, though it made him one of the great officers of the court, did not weaken his desire to annoy the queen, for having, as he believed, used her influence to deprive him of his embassy, and for having by her marked coldness since his return from Vienna, showed her disapproval of his profligate character, and of his insolence to her mother.

And, unhappily, there were not wanting persons base enough to co-operate with him, generally discredited as he was, as instruments of their own secret malice. The birth of the dauphin had been a fatal blow to the hopes which had been founded on the possible succession of the king's brothers; and from this time forth the whisperers of detraction and calumny were more than ever busy, sometimes venturing to forge her handwriting, and sometimes daring, with still fouler audacity, to invent stories designed to tarnish her reputation by throwing doubts on her conjugal fidelity. At such a moment the presence of such a man as the cardinal on the stage was an evil omen. His audacity, it seemed, could hardly be purposeless, and his purpose could not be innocent.

He had been most anxious to obtain admission to one of the entertainments which the queen gave to the Russian princes; and, when he was disappointed, he had the silly audacity to bribe the porter of the Trianon to admit him into the garden, where, as the royal party passed down the different walks, he thrust himself ostentatiously at different points into their sight, professing to disguise himself by throwing a mantle over his shoulders, but taking care that his scarlet stockings should prevent any uncertainty from being felt as to his identity. That he should have presumed to intrude into the queen's presence in her own palace without permission was in itself an insult; but those behind the scenes believed that he had a deeper design, and that he wished to diffuse a belief that Marie Antoinette secretly regarded him with a favor which she was unwilling to show openly, and that he had not obtained admission to her garden without her connivance.

The princes of the blood, too, the Prince de Conde and the Duke de Bourbon, invited Paul and his archduchess to an entertainment at Chantilly, which far surpassed in splendor the display at Trianon. But the queen was willing, on such an occasion, to be eclipsed by her subjects. "The princes," she said, "might well give festivities of vast cost, because they defrayed the charges out of their private revenues; but the expenses of entertainments given by the king or by herself fell on the national treasury, of which they were bound to be the guardians in the interest of the poor tax-payers."

Not that, in all probability, Paul and his archduchess noticed the inferiority. Court festivities at St. Petersburg were as yet neither numerous nor magnificent, and they soon showed themselves so wearied with the round of gayety which had been forced upon them, that some of the diversions which had been projected at other royal palaces besides Versailles were given up to avoid distressing them.[11] The sight which pleased them most was the play, to which, at their own special request, the queen accompanied them, and where they were greatly struck by the magnificence of the theatre and every thing connected with the performance, as well as with the reception which the audience gave the queen. Much as they had admired what they had seen, it was her grace and kind solicitude for their gratification which made the greatest impression on them; and the archduchess kept up a correspondence with her during the rest of their travels, especially dwelling on the scenes which pleased her most in Germany, and on the persons she met who were known to and regarded by the queen.

Political affairs were at this time causing Marie Antoinette great anxiety. One of her most frequently expressed wishes had been that the French fleet should have an opportunity of engaging that of England in a pitched battle, when the judicious care which M. de Sartines had bestowed on the marine would be seen to bear its fruit. But when the battle did take place, the result was such as to confound instead of justifying her patriotic expectations. In April, the English Admiral Rodney inflicted on the Count de Grasse a crushing defeat off the coast of Jamaica. In September, the combined forces of France and Spain were beaten off with still heavier loss from the impregnable fortress of Gibraltar; and the only region in which a French admiral escaped disaster was the Indian Sea, where the Bailli de Suffrein, an officer of rare energy and ability, encountered the British admiral, Sir Edward Hughes, in a series of severe actions, and, except on one occasion in which he lost a few transports, never permitted his antagonist to claim any advantage over him; the single loss which he sustained in his first combat being more than counterbalanced by his success on land, where, by the aid of Hyder Ali's son, the celebrated Tippoo, be made himself master of Cuddalore; and then, dropping down to the Cingalese coast, recaptured Trincomalee, the conquest of which had been one of Hughes's most recent achievements.[12] The queen felt the reverses keenly. She even curtailed some of her own expenses in order to contribute to the building of new ships to replace those which had been lost; and she received M. de Suffrein, on his return from India at the conclusion of the war, with the most sincere and marked congratulations. She invited him to the palace, and, when he arrived, she caused Madame de Polignac to bring both her children into the room. "My children," said she, "and especially you, my son, know that this M. de Suffrein. We are all under the greatest obligations to him. Look well at him, and ever remember his name. It is one of the first that all my children must learn to pronounce, and one which they must never forgot.[13]"

She was acting up to her mother's example, than whom no sovereign had better known how to give their due honor to bravery and loyalty. Such a queen deserved to have faithful friends; and Suffrein was a man who, had his life been spared, might, like the Marquis de Bouille, have shown that even in France the feelings of chivalry and devotion to kings and ladies were not yet extinguished. But he died before either his country or his queen had again need of his services, or before he had any opportunity of proving by fresh achievements his gratitude to a sovereign who knew so well how to appreciate and to honor merit.