Part 2

Violent under an air of gentleness, insatiable for money and power beneath an exterior of careless disinterestedness, a libertine through habit rather than from passion, running after pleasure without seeking love, betraying with impunity her lover who believed what she said against the evidence of his own eyes, Madame de Prie despotically ruled both the Duke of Bourbon and France. But one thing disquieted her: the young King’s health was delicate. If he should die suddenly, the crown would revert to the Orleans branch, between which family and the Duke of Bourbon there existed a thoroughgoing enmity. In 1725 the Infanta, the betrothed of Louis XV., was only seven years old. Several years must elapse, therefore, before the marriage could be consummated. Now, there was no repose possible for the Duke and his favorite so long as the King had no direct heir. The Duke slept at Versailles in an apartment directly under that of the King. One night he thought he heard more noise and movement than usual. He rose precipitately and went up stairs in a great fright and his dressing gown. The first surgeon, Maréchal, astonished to see him appear in this guise, asked the cause of his alarm. The Duke, beside himself, could only stammer: “I heard some noise--the King is sick--what will become of me?” Somewhat reassured by Maréchal, he consented to go down again to his apartment, but he was overheard muttering to himself: “I would never get back here again. If he recovers, we must marry him.” It was resolved to send back the Infanta on account of her youth. Her father, Philip V., was indignant at such an outrage. “There is not blood enough in all Spain to avenge such an insult,” said he. At Madrid the shouting populace were allowed to drag an effigy of Louis XV. through the streets, and the shepherds of the Spanish Pyrenees came into the pasture lands of French valleys to hamstring the cattle.

Two Princesses of Orleans were then in Spain. They were both daughters of the regent, and had been sent to Madrid at the time when Marie Anne Victoire, the betrothed of Louis XV., had come to France.[5] One of them, Mademoiselle de Montpensier, born in 1709, married the Prince of the Asturias, eldest son of Philip V. The other, Mademoiselle de Beaujolais, born in 1714, was affianced to Don Carlos, brother to the Prince of the Asturias. The first was sad, cross, and whimsical; the second, on the contrary, was a delightful child, as pretty as she was intelligent. When she arrived in Spain, she was seven years old, the same age as Don Carlos, and Queen Elizabeth Farnese wrote to the Duke of Orleans: “Her little husband is in transports of joy over her, and is only too happy to have such a charming Princess.”

When Philip V. abdicated in 1724, in favor of the Prince of the Asturias (Louis I.), Mademoiselle de Montpensier became Queen. But the new King died at the end of eight months. Philip V. resumed the crown, and the widow remained without any influence at court. As soon as it was known at Madrid that Louis XV. was not to marry the Infanta, Marie Anne Victoire, it was determined by way of reprisals that the widow of King Louis and Mademoiselle de Beaujolais, the betrothed of Don Carlos, should be immediately sent back to Versailles. Spain saw the Queen, who was not at all sympathetic, depart without regret; but people were grieved at the departure of Mademoiselle de Beaujolais, who at the age of nine years was already charming, and who, appearing like a ray of light in the sombre Escurial, had made herself beloved by her little betrothed.

In France, too, the sending back of the Infanta, who was by anticipation already styled the Queen, did not occur without exciting some regret. The little Princess, now seven years old, had been confided to the care of Madame de Ventadour, the former governess of Louis XV., who loved her fondly. The great-granddaughter of Louis XIV. already knew how to nod graciously in response to the homage of the crowd, and everybody admired her pretty ways. But Louis XV., who was in his sixteenth year, and precocious, was hardly satisfied with so young a _fiancée_. He was pleased therefore with the breaking off of a marriage whose consummation he must have waited for so long, and, according to Voltaire’s expression, he was like a bird whose cage has been changed when he saw the Infanta depart. Beautiful presents, however, were made to the young Princess, and it was determined that her return should be accomplished with a respectful magnificence and ceremony. She left Versailles April 5, 1725, and on reaching the frontier, she was exchanged at Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port for the two Princesses of Orleans (the widow of King Louis and Mademoiselle de Beaujolais). Married in 1729 to Joseph Emanuel, then Prince, afterwards King of Portugal, “she gave that sovereign,” says Voltaire, “the children she was not allowed to give to Louis XV. and was not happier on account of it.” As to the two Princesses of Orleans, their destiny was unhappy: the queen dowager of Spain, who died in 1742, lived in poverty, with a barren title and the simulacrum of a court. Her two families had but one thought,--that of ridding themselves of the support of this unfortunate young woman. Spain showed excessive negligence in the payment of her pension, and after having reigned over one of the principal kingdoms of the world, she was obliged, by economical reasons, to spend three consecutive years with the Carmelites of Paris. Still living, she was treated as if already dead. Her sister, Mademoiselle de Beaujolais, so amiable, sweet, and attractive, retained a tender memory of her former betrothed, Don Carlos (the future Charles III.), who, on his side, did not forget her. Possibly a means of renewing their engagement might have been found. But the young girl died in 1734, carrying her faithful regret with her to the tomb. She was not yet twenty.

The rupture of the marriage of Louis XV. was not a fortunate event. The Prince was only fifteen years old. He might easily have waited several years longer before marrying. His studies and his energy would both have been the gainers by it. Moreover, it was an evil thing to insult a great nation like Spain. It was not alone the Spanish people that were outraged, but the glorious memory of the Infanta’s great-grandfather, the grand King who had said: “There are no more Pyrenees.” A fatal lesson was given to the young sovereign when he was thus taught to violate sworn faith, and habituated from his adolescence to those culpable caprices, those egotistic desertions of which his reign was to afford more than one example.

II

THE MARRIAGE OF MARIE LECZINSKA

In the year 1725, a poor exiled king and his family were living in a dilapidated old commandery in Wissemburg, a little town of Alsace. This king without a kingdom, this fugitive who dignified his poverty by the resignation with which he endured misfortune, was the Pole, Stanislas Leczinski, the protégé of Charles XII. of Sweden. Driven from Poland after a very short reign, Stanislas had found an asylum in France, and lived in Wissemburg in complete retirement with his mother, his wife, his daughter, and several gentlemen who had been faithful to him in misfortune. His daughter, Marie, born in Breslau, June 23, 1703, was at this time twenty-two years old. Pious, gentle, and sympathetic, she was the joy of the exiles. When they spoke to her of projected marriages, she would say to her parents: “Do not think you can make me happy by sending me away; it would be far sweeter to me to share your ill-fortune than to enjoy, at a distance, a happiness which would not be yours.” Her education had been as intelligent as it was austere. She spent the time not occupied in prayer and study in working for the poor of the city or embroidering ornaments for churches. She was a true Christian, one of those admirable young girls whose charm has in it something evangelic, and who make virtue lovable.

One day Stanislas, much moved, entered the room where his wife and daughter were. “Let us kneel down,” he exclaimed, “and return thanks to God!”--“Father,” said Marie, “have you been called back to the throne of Poland?”--“Ah! daughter,” he replied, “Heaven is far more favorable to us than that. You are Queen of France.” It was not a dream. The exile’s daughter, the poor and obscure Princess, living on alms from the French court, who, but the day before, would have been happy to marry one of those who were now to be her principal officials, ascended as if by miracle the greatest throne in the world. How had she happened to be preferred to the ninety-nine marriageable princesses, a list of whom had been drawn up at Versailles? There was but this simple remark below her name in the list: “Nothing disadvantageous is known concerning this family.” Louis XV. who had sent back the daughter of a King of Spain could choose among the wealthiest and most highly placed princesses in Europe. How did they contrive to make him marry this poor Polish girl who brought him no dot and who was seven years his senior (in an inverse sense, the same difference of age that existed between him and the Infanta, his first betrothed)? It is true that a former secretary of embassy, Lozillières, whom the Duke of Bourbon had sent to make inquiries about twenty-seven princesses, had thus drawn the portrait of Marie Leczinska: “This Princess, as simple as the daughter of Alcinoüs, who knows no cosmetics but water and snow, and, seated between her mother and her grandmother, embroiders altar-cloths, recalls to us, in the commandery of Wissemburg, the artlessness of heroic times.” Was it this mythological style which affected sceptical and depraved souls like those of the Duke of Bourbon and his mistress, Madame de Prie?

It was not this, at all events, which chiefly preoccupied them. If they selected Marie Leczinska, it was because they fancied that, owing her elevation solely to their caprice, she would esteem herself in their debt and be their tool. What pleased them in her was that she had no resources; that a price had been set upon her father’s head; that the exile, dispossessed of his throne for thirteen years, had wandered from asylum to asylum, in Turkey, in Sweden, in the principality of Deux-Ponts, and in Alsace; that the young girl was merely agreeable without being beautiful; that she was seven years older than Louis XV.; and that in calling her to the throne in the most unforeseen and inconceivable manner, the Duke and Madame de Prie would create for themselves exceptional claims upon her gratitude.

Louis XV. was at this time the most beautiful youth in the kingdom. An ideal lustre illuminated his charming visage, and when they were praising the graces of her young betrothed to Marie Leczinska: “Alas!” said she, “you redouble my alarms.”

One should read in the sympathetic work of the Countess d’Armaillé,[6] the story of the beginnings of this union which was at first to be so happy. Louis XV. made his official request for the hand of Marie Leczinska through Cardinal de Rohan, Bishop of Strasburg. She contented herself with responding: “I am penetrated with gratitude, Monsieur the Cardinal, for the honor done me by the King of France. My will belongs to my parents, and their consent will be mine.” The marriage by proxy took place at Strasburg, August 14, 1725. The King was represented by the Duke of Orleans. After having received her parents’ blessing, and distributed souvenirs to the faithful companions of her exile, Marie went to join Louis XV. She was greeted everywhere she went with extravagant laudations. “There is nothing which the good French people do not do to divert me,” she wrote at the time to Stanislas Leczinski. “They say the finest things in the world to me, but nobody says that you may be near me. Perhaps they will say so presently, for I am journeying in fairyland, and am veritably under their magical dominion. At every instant I undergo transformations, of which one is more brilliant than the other. Sometimes I am fairer than the Graces; again, I belong to the family of the Nine Sisters; here, I have the virtues of an angel; there, the sight of me makes people happy. Yesterday I was the wonder of the world; to-day I am the lucky star. Every one does his best to deify me, and doubtless I shall be placed among the immortals to-morrow. To dispel the illusion, I lay my hand on my head, and instantly find again her whom you love, and who loves you very tenderly.” The new Queen of France signed this letter with the Polish diminutive of her name: Maruchna.

At Sézanne, September 3, a page, the Prince of Conti, brought her a bouquet from Louis XV. Near Moret, the next day, she saw her husband for the first time. As soon as he appeared she threw herself on her knees on a cushion; the King raised her at once and embraced her affectionately. The royal pair made their entry at Fontainebleau September 5, and were crowned the following day. “The Queen,” wrote Voltaire, “makes a very good appearance, although her face is not at all pretty. Everybody is enchanted with her virtue and her politeness. The first thing she did was to distribute among the princesses and ladies of the palace all the magnificent trinkets composing what is called her _corbeille_, which consisted of jewels of every sort except diamonds. When she saw the casket in which they had been placed: ‘This is the first time in my life,’ said she, ‘that I have been able to make presents.’ She wore a little rouge on her wedding day, just enough to prevent her from looking pale. She fainted for an instant in the chapel, but only for form’s sake. There was a comedy performed the same day. I had prepared a little entertainment which M. de Mortemart would not execute. In place of it they gave _Amphion_ and _Le Médecin malgré lui_, which did not seem very appropriate. After supper there were fireworks with many rockets and very little invention and variety.... For the rest, there is a frightful noise, racket, crowd, and tumult here.”

The Queen pleased everybody by her extreme affability. What they admired was neither the magnificence of her costume, the Sancy that sparkled on her corsage, nor the Regent that glittered on her chaste forehead, but her modesty, her benevolence, her gentleness, the grace which is still more beautiful than beauty. Voltaire was in the front rank of the courtiers of this new star which shed so soft a lustre. But he did not find his rôle as flatterer rewarded by sufficient gratuities. Hence he wrote from Fontainebleau: “I have been very well received by the Queen. She wept over _Marianne_, she laughed over _L’Indiscret_; she often talks to me, she calls me her poor Voltaire. A blockhead would be satisfied with all this; but, unfortunately, I think soundly enough to feel that praise does not amount to much, and that the rôle of a poet at court always entails upon him something slightly ridiculous. You would not believe, my dear Thiriot, how tired I am of my life as a courtier. _Henri IV._ is very stupidly sacrificed at the court of Louis XV. I bewail the moments I rob him of. The poor child ought to have appeared already in quarto, with fine paper, fine margins, and fine type. That will surely come this winter, whatever may happen. I think you will find this work somewhat more finished than _Marianne_. The epic is my _forte_, or I am very much mistaken.... The Queen is constantly assassinated with Pindaric odes, sonnets, epistles, and epithalamiums. I fancy she takes the poets for court-fools; and in this case she is quite right, for it is great folly for a man of letters to be here. They give no pleasure and receive none.”[7]

By dint of compliments in prose and verse, Voltaire obtained a pension of 1500 livres, which made him write to _la présidente_ de Bernières, November 13, 1725: “I count on the friendliness of Madame de Prie. I no longer complain of court life, I begin to have reasonable expectations.”

Some days afterwards (December 1, 1725), Marie Leczinska left Fontainebleau and went to Versailles. She installed herself in what were called the Queen’s apartments, and slept in the chamber which had been successively occupied by Marie Thérèse, the Bavarian Dauphiness, the Duchess of Burgundy, and the Infanta Marie Anne Victoire. There she brought her ten children into the world, and it was there she was to die.

The early days of the marriage were very happy; at that time Louis XV. was a model youth. The counsels of his former preceptor, the Bishop of Fréjus; the sense of duty; religious beliefs; the timidity inseparable from adolescence,--all these contributed to keep in the paths of wisdom the young monarch who dreamed of being a good husband and father, a good king, and working out his own salvation along with the welfare of his subjects. Naturally inclined to the pleasures of the senses, he attached himself to Marie Leczinska with the ardor of an innocent young man who loves for the first time. Notwithstanding the shamelessness of many of them, the court beauties did not yet venture to raise their eyes toward this royal adolescent, who made even the most audacious respectful, by his gentleness and his reserve. Nothing, at this time, announced the disorders to which the young monarch was one day to yield himself. The _roués_ of the Regency could not console themselves for having so calm and virtuous a master; they awaited with impatience the moment when they could thrust him over the declivity of scandal, and, like real demons, they lay in wait for their prey.

III

THE DISGRACE OF THE MARQUISE DE PRIE

The Marquise de Prie congratulated herself upon having brought Marie Leczinska to the throne. It was, in fact, as D’Argenson has remarked, an excellent choice, according to the views of the Marquise: “Fecundity, piety, sweetness, humanity, and, above all, a great incapacity for affairs. This court policy required, moreover, a woman without attractions and without coquetry, who could only retain her husband through the sense of duty and the necessity of giving heirs to the crown.” The Duke and his favorite had found in the Queen all the gratitude and complaisance they had counted on. As to the King, amused by the chase, festivities, journeys to Marly, Chantilly, and Rambouillet, he occupied himself with politics very little. The prime minister could flatter himself on being a real mayor of the palace. But he had reckoned without a prelate of seventy-four years, to whom ambition had come with age, and who was about to cast down with a breath all this scaffolding of intrigues and calculations.

Fleury, Bishop of Fréjus, the preceptor of Louis XV., was of humble origin, having been the son of a tithe-collector[8] in the diocese of Fréjus. Appointed chaplain to Queen Marie Thérèse in 1680, “he was,” says Saint-Simon, “received at the ministers’ houses where, in fact, he was of as little importance as he was elsewhere, and often supplied the place of a bell before such things had been invented.” He was selected as preceptor for the little Prince, who was to be styled Louis XV., and gained his pupil’s good-will by his easy, gentle, and insinuating character, his perfect calmness, and his mingled veneration and tenderness for a child who, thinking himself always menaced, felt that this assiduous and obsequious devotion protected him. The secret of his affection for Fleury was that Fleury never opposed him. He affected, moreover, an absolute disinterestedness, and seemed to be making a sacrifice to the King by remaining at court instead of taking refuge in a convent. The Bishop was always one of the party when the young King was working, or pretending to work, with his Ministers. In appearance he guarded the most humble, most insignificant attitude; but, in reality, he exerted an influence which exasperated the Duke, and still more Madame de Prie. The Queen herself was jealous of the confidence enjoyed by this silent old man who followed the King like his shadow, and who seemed likely to monopolize everything in spite of his modest airs. The Marquise, who had constant access to the Queen in her capacity as lady of the palace, contrived a real plot with her. It was a question of getting rid of this troublesome third person who was always putting himself between the King and the Prime Minister. “In order to deliver herself from the old Bishop, Madame de Prie devised a scheme by which she might take his place, and enter almost openly into the council of State. She persuaded her lover to induce the King to work in the apartments of the Queen whom he loved, at least with that love which every young man feels for the first woman he possesses. The preceptor, having no lessons to give there, would not follow his pupil, so that, without being pushed too rudely he would slip out of his place, and, naturally, find himself on the ground. Then the Marquise, relying on the good-nature of the Queen, would introduce herself as a fourth, and from that time on would govern the State. Although the plan seemed to her an admirable one, yet its success was not equally so.”[9]

The little conspiracy, however, had been conducted with great vigor. One evening, the Queen, who happened to be with the Duke of Bourbon, sent the King a request to come to her. Louis XV. complied, and the Prime Minister handed him a letter from Cardinal de Polignac containing violent accusations against the Bishop of Fréjus. This was the first time that Fleury had not been present when the King and the Duke were together. Convinced that his exclusion was henceforth determined, he went at once to his own apartment, and after writing a very mournful but tender and respectful letter in which he took leave of his young master, he departed at once for the Sulpician convent at Issy. The Duke and Madame de Prie thought themselves sure of victory, but they were in too great haste to triumph. On reading the letter of his former preceptor the King began to weep. He dared not avow the cause of his chagrin, however, and being always timid and irresolute, he kept silence. His first gentleman, the Duke de Mortemart, at last emboldened him. “What! Sire, are you not the master?” said he. “Have the Duke told to send a messenger at once for Monseigneur de Fréjus, and you will see him again.” This was no sooner said than done. The Bishop returned, and hid his success at first under the appearance of modesty. He pretended to desire nothing for himself, and showed profound deference toward the Duke, but the Prime Minister and his favorite were doomed.

The little King, with his seventeen years, was about to show that he was master. With that dissimulation which from infancy he had been accustomed to consider a quality indispensable to princes, he silently prepared the Duke’s downfall. As he was getting into his carriage to go to Rambouillet, June 11, 1727, he said to his Prime Minister with the most gracious air in the world: “I expect you to supper this evening.” The Duke re-entered the château in perfect confidence. But what was his surprise when, three hours later, he received a royal letter in these terms:--