Louis XIV and La Grande Mademoiselle Part 10

[Footnote 53: _Memoires de Mme. de Motteville._]

[Footnote 54: The fair of Saint-Germain was held between Saint-Sulpice and Saint-Germain-des-Pres, from February 3d to the evening before Palm Sunday. The Court and the populace elbowed each other there.]

[Footnote 55: _Journal de deux jeunes Hollandais._]

[Footnote 56: _Memoires_ of Mademoiselle.]

[Footnote 57: _Journal de deux jeunes Hollandais._]

[Footnote 58: _Journal de deux jeunes Hollandais._]

[Footnote 59: April 29th.]

[Footnote 60: To the Duc de Bouillon and to the son of the Marshal Duc de La Meilleraye, who took the t.i.tle of Duc de Mazarin.]

[Footnote 61: It must not be forgotten that Saint-Simon was presented at Court in 1692. Louis XIV. was then fifty-four, and had reigned forty-nine years. Saint-Simon only knew the end of the reign.]

[Footnote 62: Brother of the Superintendent of Finances.]

[Footnote 63: In the summer of 1657.]

[Footnote 64: _Vers d'Atys_, opera played in 1676, and _d'Astrate_, tragedy of 1663.]

[Footnote 65: The phrase is M. Jules Lemaitre's.]

[Footnote 66: See _The Youth of La Grande Mademoiselle_. For this chapter _cf._ _La misere au temps de la Fronde et Saint-Vincent de Paul_, by Feillet; _La cabale des devots_, by Raoul Allier; _Saint-Vincent de Paul_, by Emanuel Broglie; _Saint-Vincent de Paul et les Goudi_, by Chantelauze; _Port-Royal_, by Sainte-Beuve.]

[Footnote 67: Village of the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt of Provins.]

[Footnote 68: Feillet, _La misere au temps de la Fronde_.]

[Footnote 69: See the volume of Raoul Allier, _La cabale des devots_.]

[Footnote 70: Marie de Gonzague.]

[Footnote 71: En Picardie.]

[Footnote 72: M. Emanuel de Broglie.]

[Footnote 73: Saul in the _Journal des guerres civiles de Dubuisson-Aubenay_. He mentions the date of December 2, 1650, upon which "large donations" were sent into Champagne, by Mmes. de Lamoignon and de Herse, Messieurs de Bernieres, Lenain, etc.]

[Footnote 74: The Parliament of Dijon had a bad reputation with the ministers, who accused it of refusing all reform. This does not excuse such a lack of good faith.]

[Footnote 75: Dombes was a small independent princ.i.p.ality which had only been definitely united to France on March 28, 1782; its capital was Trevoux.]

[Footnote 76: _Histoire de France._ Tr. by Jacques Porchat and Miot.

Paris, 1886.]

[Footnote 77: _Memoires de Montglat; Memoires de Mme. de Motteville._]

[Footnote 78: The ball took place on the 3rd. Several days elapsed before the news of the death reached Aix.]

[Footnote 79: _Memoires_ of Mademoiselle.]

[Footnote 80: _Memoires_ of Mademoiselle.]

[Footnote 81: Anne de Gonzague.]

[Footnote 82: This appeared in 1691.]

[Footnote 83: Isle des Faisans was also called _Isle de la Conference_, since Mazarin had there discussed the treaty of the Pyrenees with Luis de Haro.]

[Footnote 84: _Memoires de Montglat._]

[Footnote 85: _Memoires de Mme. de Motteville._]

[Footnote 86: _Ibid._]

[Footnote 87: There exists in the _Archives d'Affaires etrangeres_ a fragment of the instructions of Mazarin to Louis XIV., written under the dictation of the King. M. Chantelauze, who discovered it, published it in the _Correspondant_ of August 10, 1881.]

[Footnote 88: Motteville.]

[Footnote 89: Guy Patin. Letter of January 28, 1661.]

[Footnote 90: Motteville.]

[Footnote 91: He was even twenty-four when he asked Perefixe again to give him Latin lessons.]

[Footnote 92: Letter of June 27th to the Queen of Poland (_Archives de Chantilly_). The King dined at one o'clock.]

[Footnote 93: Letter of July 15, 1661.]

CHAPTER III

Mademoiselle at the Luxembourg--Her Salon--The "Anatomies" of the Heart--Projects of Marriage, and New Exile--Louis XIV. and the Libertines--Fragility of Fortune in Land--_Fetes Galantes_.

With the approach of her thirty-fifth year, the Grande Mademoiselle perceived by diverse signs that she was no longer young. She was forced to recognise that her strength had its limitations, which fact had never before been forced upon her. On February 7, 1662, Louis XIV. danced for the first time a grand ballet ent.i.tled the "Amours of Hercules," and his cousin of Montpensier took part. She was ill from fatigue. Another kind of weariness overcame her; she became bored with fetes. She had been present at so many gala occasions since her entrance into the world, and had seen so many festivals and fireworks, garlands of flowers and allegorical chariots, that she was now quickly satiated.

The King still loved this kind of abundant pleasure; those which he offered to his Court sometimes lasted successive days and nights, without giving time to breathe, and all being expected to feel continued amus.e.m.e.nt. Mademoiselle was no longer capable of this. She was beginning to long for the repose of home. Her sick headaches contributed to this disability; age had increased them, and all women know that it is better to suffer a headache in solitude. After a lively struggle, she had returned to the palace of the Luxembourg and was lodging under the same roof as her stepmother. The old Madame would have gladly relinquished a neighbour whose presence presaged nothing good, but no one had sustained the contention as no one was in the least interested in her welfare. One reads in a fugitive leaf of the times issued on July 21, 1660: "This affair was deliberated upon in the Court, and it was found that Mademoiselle had the right to demand one of the apartments free, and that Madame could not refuse it." It is said that the King wrote to Madame in order to soften the blow; it was necessary to drain the bitter cup to the dregs, and at a time in which Madame had great need of tranquillity to install at her very door this tempestuous stepdaughter, with whom no peace was possible.

Madame had "vapours," otherwise called a nervous malady. She was afraid of noise, of movement, and of being forced to speak, and Mademoiselle insisted upon making "scenes." "I teased her often," says the Princess in her _Memoires_, "and very much despised her (in which I was wrong), and she always responded as one who feared me, and with much submission." The public did not consider it worth while to waste pity upon Madame, because she bored every one; a fault never pardoned. Anne of Austria, herself a very amiable woman, when not opposed, could never suffer her inoffensive sister-in-law. The Queen Mother said to Mademoiselle, who did not need this encouragement: "Her person, her temper, and her manners are odious to me." The public was fundamentally right in its antipathy. Madame was one of those people who render virtue hateful, and in thus doing are very injurious to humanity.

The Luxembourg was commodious and gay. Mademoiselle enjoyed it, and it pleased her to arrange for herself a grand existence as a Princess, rich and independent. Nothing could be more displeasing to the Court. As soon as Louis XIV. had a.s.sumed full power, he let it be seen that he wished no social centre in his kingdom other than his own palace. His cousin did not take this fact into account. This was not bravado. It was due to the impossibility of comprehending that "a person of her quality" could be reduced to the role of satellite.