Chapter 11

THE COURT

A week or so later, Germain sent his mother the following letter:--

"THE PALACE, FONTAINEBLEAU, _8th September, 1786_.

"MY DEAR MOTHER,--My good fortune is inexpressible. The whole of your dreams for me are fulfilled: can you believe it, your son has--but I will not anticipate. I can scarcely trust it myself to be true. I informed you in mine of three days ago, which goes in the same mail as this, of our capture of the gentry of the cavern. It left me pretty scratched.

"The morning following, a courier in a grand livery came riding to the château to bear me a command to attend the King's hunt. This command, or invitation, is conveyed by a great card, which I have before me, engraved in a beautiful writing surrounded by a border exquisitely representing hounds, deer, and winding-horns with their straps. It begins: '_From the King_.' Above are the arms of France, the signature is that of the chamberlain. You may think into what ecstasy it threw me when my valet handed me these. (You know everybody in society must have a valet here). My limbs seemed to lose their bruises, and I hastened to the Chevalier, who was much pleased with this testimony of the credit I appeared to have brought him, for, with the greatest affection and generosity, he continues to consider me in the light of a son. He told me how to act at the ceremonies and the hunt, and to take care not to ride across the path of the King, for that is a thing which makes his Majesty very angry. We talked it over perfectly. The only point to which he took objection was that the card was addressed to "Monsieur de Répentigny."

"'I hope,' he said, 'there will be no trouble about this. There was a Répentigny in the army of Canada. We must try to get rid of this name.'

"'If I am at fault with it,' returned I, 'I will make public at once how it has come to be attached to me without my seeking. Even if an owner of it should occur, he must as a man of honour accept my explanation.'

"'True,' answered he, 'I am here to witness that. Do not change it for a day or two. It would be excessively embarrassing for you were it to be altered on this occasion, for the decrees have of late years been very strict about birth.'

"'Would these decrees exclude me from this invitation?' I asked him.

"'Unquestionably,' he replied. 'And that would be too cruel; you are as good a man as any of them.'

"'Very well,' I answered. 'Afterwards I can return to my proper station.'

"But, dear mother, you cannot think what these words meant to me, notwithstanding that I ought to have known it to be so. I left him at once and fled into the park in order to hide my suffering. Oh, it is too beautiful to lose--this sphere of honour and refinement, this world of the lovely, the ancestral, this supreme enchantment of the earth. Having tasted it, how can I return to the common and despised condition of mankind in general! Mother, you who have taught me that this is my true world, I leave it to you to answer.

"That afternoon we drove into the town of Fontainebleau, where there was a very fine haberdasher, just come from Paris, who agreed to make me the proper suit and to supply all the accessories. Two days after, I put on the uniform of a _débutant_, which cost me pretty dear but made a fine figure. When I looked at myself in the mirror, I longed for your spirit to have been in the glass only to see your son in such an array. The coat was dove-grey satin; waistcoat of dark red, finely figured, with silver buttons; small clothes of red, white silk stockings, and jewelled shoes with the red heels which are worn at Court. I also bought a new dress sword. It has an openwork silver handle and guard; the blade sheathed in a white scabbard, which is silver-mounted. I wore large frills and a small French hat finely laced with gold; and I bought besides long hunting-boots.

"I drove in our coach to the Palace. As I entered the gates the officer of the guard espied the livery of the Chevalier, and immediately caused his company to salute me, observing which all the gentlemen standing near took off their hats and bowed to me. I drove into the Court of the White Horse, a great square, one of the five around which this vast palace is built, and at the entrance door I was met by my dear friend Baron de Grancey.

"The Baron said to me, 'Did you not tell us you had never been to Court before?'

"I answered that I had not; and, indeed, my _débutant_ dress and ignorance were sufficient witness to it.

"'You must, then, have all the honours,' he said. 'He who comes up for the first time registers his genealogy and has a right to ride in the King's carriages.'

"'Then it is a great thing to ride in the King's carriages?'

"'My dear friend, it is the right of the noble,' replied he, a little surprised.

"'Ah, yes, my mother once told me so,' said I. (Dear mother, is it not true that you said it?)

"'You shall also play cards with the Queen in the evening.'

"'Oh, no,' gasped I.

"'You must,' he returned. 'This honour also is indispensable. After your _début_ is over you can be as modest as you please.'

"We arrived by that time at the end of a corridor and before a lofty chamber, the doors of which were emblazoned in colours with the arms and devices of France. Within we found the royal genealogist sitting in his robes of office with the heralds of the royal orders. Round about were large volumes, the registers of the _noblesse_, which they were consulting respecting the parchment titles produced by young gentlemen in person or through their secretaries; and I was told that before being presented one must show certificates of descent in both lines since the fourteenth century. I was so shocked at my situation that I became angry, so that, when the King's genealogist stretched out his hand for my papers, I answered proudly, 'I have none.'

"'What is my lord's name?' he asked most respectfully. Here my tongue refused to move. But the Baron interfered, replying--

"'Monsieur de Répentigny. He is far from home, and therefore cannot produce his titles; but I speak for him as a relative of the Chevalier de Bailleul.'

"'Monsieur,' replied the King's genealogist to me graciously, 'the name of Répentigny needs no parchments.'

"He ordered one of the secretaries to give me forthwith his brief of attestation (I still have it). Thus, dear mother, this Baron has won my gratitude for ever. But attend to what followed, for it is better still.

"It was in the great hall of the Palace, where the walls and the ceiling are tapestried with pictures of kings riding the chase. Baron de Grancey brought me to the Prince de Poix, who acceded to his request to present me to the Monarch. This Prince is, as I have told you, a very amiable man, and is obliged to me.

"The whole Court was there. There was the Archbishop of Paris; the King's elder brother, whom they call Monsieur; the Dukes and Peers of France, with their blue ribbons across their breasts; and a countless crowd of lords and great ladies dressed in state. Picture to yourself a garden full of the rarest flowers sparkling in the sun after a shower and bending gracefully to the wind; for such they resembled. I mentally named one my lord Violet, another my lady Rose, a third was the Eglantine, another the White Lily; so I pleased myself with distinguishing them.

"The trumpets sound, the music sweeps ravishingly into the air. In passes the King. He is attended by his guards of the sleeve and the princes of the blood. The Prince de Poix steps forward and speaks my name. I tremble. Everybody whispers and stares at us. Ah, mother, what a moment! I know not what passed. His Majesty said, 'You are the hero of the forest?' smiled, heard my incoherent whisper, and passed on with his train, smiling to others.

"Mother dear, I have seen the Sun-King! I have heard the voice to which Europe listens! I have spoken to Saint Louis and Charlemagne!

"I have not reserved enough money from the furs. Send me 3,000 livres as quickly as possible. I am writing this in my chamber here, for I am to be ready for the hunt early to-morrow morning. Every sound I hear tells of the presence of Majesty; every sight I get from the window of this dwelling of our ancient monarchs recalls a score out of the thousand legends which everybody has been telling me.

"Convey my deepest affection to my father and Angelique, and to Marie and Lacroix, and everybody in St. Elphège, and remember always that I am

"Your dear "GERMAIN.

"To Madame F. X. Lecour, "Répentigny, in Canada. "(By way of London.)

"_Post Scriptum._--The Queen's Game took place last night after I wrote the above to you. Their Majesties sat at a great round green table, surrounded by all the Court.

"There were some smaller tables, at which several great ladies and lords sat and played; but everybody's eyes were on the Queen, who is so marvellously queenly, and on the King with his stars and his blue ribbon. They two put down their gold (which was in perfectly new pieces) and dealt the cards a little. I was given a turn with her Majesty, who smiled and addressed me, at which I almost fainted. And, mother, the Count de Vaudreuil, whom you used to see as a child, was there. I took special notice of him for you. He has a very fine figure and is one of the greatest courtiers.

"After that, we went off with our friends and had supper and played nearly all night.

"At daybreak everybody went to the hunt. I and the other _débutants_ were driven to the rendezvous in the carriages of the King, drawn by white horses. There the grooms gave me a magnificent golden mare, who knew her work so well that she carried me in at the death of the stag next after his Majesty. (I tremble at what would have happened had I got there before him.) The Queen came up among the first. She enjoys the hunt.

"G. L."