Louis XIV and La Grande Mademoiselle Part 24

Mademoiselle thanked her cousin somewhat ironically for what he had done to render Monsieur desirable, and, realising by the questions of the King that some hints had reached his ears, she pictured in covered words the future of which she had had a glimpse. The Queen demanded her meaning, but the King remained silent. "I do hope," observed Mademoiselle in ending, "that I may be permitted to act as I wish and that the King will not force me against my desires." "No, surely,"

replied Louis, "I will leave you free and will never constrain any one"; he added an instant after, "Let us go to dinner," and they separated.

Some weeks rolled by. The favourites of Monsieur were cold about an alliance which the temper of Mademoiselle might make somewhat difficult, and which might in the end prove _not_ to their advantage.[237]

Events moved quietly enough when the Princess one evening in October supplicated the King that there should be no more said of the project.

Louis XIV. appeared to be indifferent. Monsieur was at first vexed and then dismissed the subject from his thoughts. Marie-Therese alone, interested neither in her brother-in-law nor in her cousin, "was in despair," relates Mademoiselle, "for she wishes that we should marry and have children." But no one paid much attention to the despair of Marie-Therese. Lauzun approved the course of Mademoiselle and ceased to avoid her. That was all. For an ambitious man, he was not a really clever schemer; he had too great a fear of being duped. He again a.s.sumed a sombre att.i.tude and refused to hear the name of the one chosen by Mademoiselle. On a certain Thursday evening, when she had menaced him with the threat of breathing against the mirror and of writing the name of the man she loved, midnight sounded during this contest. "Nothing more can be said," observed Mademoiselle, "for it is already Friday."

The next day, taking a sheet of paper, she wrote distinctly, "It is you," and sealed it. "That day I met him only on the way to supper. I said: 'I have the name in my pocket, but I do not wish to give it to you on Friday.' He responded: 'Give it to me! I promise that I will put it under my pillow and that I will not open the paper until midnight has pa.s.sed.'" She did not trust him, and it did not occur to him to sacrifice a race that had been arranged for the Sat.u.r.day. "Ah, well, I will wait until Sunday," said Mademoiselle with inconceivable patience, and her only vengeance was to let herself be implored a little, before giving up the paper. The couple were alone in a corner of the fireplace, in the salon of the Queen. "I drew forth the leaf, upon which only a single word was written, which, however, told much; I showed it to him, and then replaced it in my pocket, afterward in my m.u.f.f. He urged me very strongly to give it to him, saying that his heart was beating rapidly.... Before yielding I said, 'You will reply on the same leaf.'"... In the evening she did not dare to raise her eyes; he declared that she was mocking him, that "he was not sufficiently foolish to be deceived," and this was the theme of the letter which he remitted to her. At the same time, he thought of the prodigious elevation which he was beginning to realise was a possibility before him. He was at last aroused, and could not always refrain from responding seriously to Mademoiselle. She spoke of the happiness which awaited them, and of her plans to make him the greatest lord in the kingdom. He counselled her always to bow before fate, but one day he added: "In marrying, the temperament of those throwing their fates together should be known. I will disclose mine." He said that he possessed a nature bizarre and unsociable, being able to live only in the wake of the King; "thus I shall be a peculiar and not very diverting husband." Later, he amplified a little, affirming that he was cured of desire for women, and had no more ambition. "When a post was proposed to me I refused it. After all, do you really want me?"--"Yes; I wish you."--"Do you find nothing in my person which is disgusting?" This question was reasonable enough. Lauzun was decidedly "unclean"[238]--but it roused the indignation of Mademoiselle: "When you say that you are afraid of not pleasing, you are simply mocking; you have pleased too easily in your life; but now about me, do you find anything unpleasant in my face? I believe that my only exterior fault is my teeth, which are not fine. That is a defect of my race, which fact bears its own compensations." "a.s.suredly" replied he, and she could not extract the expected compliment.

In the course of these events, the Court returned to the Louvre and the Tuileries, Mademoiselle to the Luxembourg. After much hesitation Lauzun consented that Mademoiselle should write a letter in which she should supplicate the King to forget all that he had said against mixed marriages, and permit her to be happy. The contemporaneous opinion was that Lauzun had made the first move. The Spanish _Charge d'Affaires_ wrote from Paris, December 21: "It is certain, as every one says, that he has arrived at this point with the authorisation and permission of the King."[239] The public voice, whose echo has been preserved for us by the novelists of the period, added that Mme. de Montespan had been mixed up in the affair, a version which two of her letters to Lauzun confirm,[240] and that she had obtained the consent of the King by saying: "Ah, Sire, let him alone. He has merit enough for this."[241]

There was evidently some secret bond between the mistress and Lauzun which united them when any mischief was at hand. The King had responded to Mademoiselle without actually saying yes, or no; he confessed that her letter had astonished him and asked her to reflect again. He repeated the advice three days later, during a _tete-a-tete_ which took place behind closed doors at two o'clock in the morning. "I neither counsel you nor forbid you; but I pray you to consider well." He added that the affair was being discussed and that many people disliked M. de Lauzun. "Think over this fact and take your own measures."

[Ill.u.s.tration: =MADAME DE SeVIGNe= From the painting by Pietro Mignard in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence (Photograph by Alinari)]

The couple profited by the warning. On Monday, December 15, 1670, in the afternoon, the Ducs de Montausier and de Cregny, the Marechal d'Albret and the Marquis de Guitry presented themselves before Louis XIV., and demanded the hand of the Grande Mademoiselle for M. de Lauzun, "as deputies from the French n.o.bility, who would consider it a great honour and grace if the King would permit a simple gentleman to marry a Princess of the blood."[242] This proceeding was a plan of Lauzun's. It succeeded with the King, and after he had been thanked in the name of the entire n.o.bility of the kingdom, Mademoiselle, who was apparently listening to the reading of a sermon, behind the chair of the Queen, was notified that M. de Montausier was asking for her. The Duke reported the good reception which they had received and ended in these terms: "Your affair is accomplished, but I counsel you not to let things lag; if you follow my advice, you will marry this very night."

"I was convinced that he was right" adds Mademoiselle, "and I prayed him to give the same advice to M. de Lauzun if he should see him before I did."

There is no clearer fact in history than the evidence of the consternation into which France was thrown by the news that the d.u.c.h.esse de Montpensier, granddaughter of Henri IV., was to marry the Comte de Lauzun, "a simple (qualified) gentleman." To-day, an alliance of this kind, provided it does not concern the heir to the throne, is only a piece of society gossip, even in lands still profoundly loyal to monarchical sentiments. In the seventeenth century such an event touched so nearly the social hierarchy upon which all rested that Mademoiselle, in thus confusing social ranks, appeared to have failed seriously in her duty as Princess.

Louis, as King, had not considered it his duty to oppose. The criticism was more severe inasmuch as custom, encouraged by ill.u.s.trious examples, offered to lovers separated by birth easy means for completing their private happiness, sustaining at the same time public decorum.

"Marriages of conscience" had been invented for such cases; why not be content with this means of doing your duty and of satisfying at the same time conscience and pa.s.sion? Paris sought a reply to this question, and the whole city was whispering and busying itself in a manner not easily to be forgotten.

Ten years later, when the trials of the "Corrupters" disturbed the community, some one wrote to Mme. de Sevigne that "the last two days have been as agitated as during the time when the news of the projected marriage between the Grande Mademoiselle and M. de Lauzun was announced.

All were seeking news and, eager with curiosity, were running from one house to another to gather details."[243]

The princes and princesses of the blood considered themselves insulted, and rebelled, a boldness so unexpected, on account of their habitual submission, that even Louis XIV. was somewhat moved. The timid Marie-Therese gave the example. Mademoiselle came to announce formally the proposed marriage. "I entirely disapprove," said the Queen in a very sharp tone, "and the King will never sanction it." "He does approve it, Madame, that is settled." "You would do better never to marry, to keep your wealth for my son Anjou."[244] Anger gave the Queen courage to address the King, who was vexed, and the result was a scene, tears, a night of despair; but also nothing gained, and finally the Queen was forced into a public declaration that she would sign the contract.

Monsieur loudly protested. He heaped abuses on the "deputies of French n.o.bility," reproached Mademoiselle in the presence of the King for being "without heart," and said that she was a person who should be "placed in an insane asylum,"[245] and also declared that he would _not_ sign the contract. The gravest accusation made by Monsieur was a statement, repeated to all, that Mademoiselle had said that the King had himself counselled the marriage. In vain Mademoiselle a.s.serted that she had said nothing of the kind; the charge made a great impression upon Louis, and he expressed his first regret over the affair. The Prince de Conde, sometimes taunted with having become, somewhat late in life, an accomplished courtier, remonstrated respectfully but firmly with the King.

The old Madame, forgotten in her corner of the Luxembourg, never really felt the wave of disgust and protest, but she was sufficiently aroused from her apathy to sign a letter to the King, written in her name by M.

Le Pelletier, President of the Department of Inquests. Outside the Court circle, Louis XIV. felt himself blamed by all cla.s.ses of society. The n.o.bles in general refused to ratify the "Mandate" that the deputies had given in their name. Without doubt, the honour of this marriage would be great: the permission given to a princess of the blood to marry so far beneath her rank, a most unexpected favour from a monarch who had worked so systematically to undermine the power of the aristocracy; but the larger portion of the French n.o.bility was so much impressed with the danger of insulting royalty, and weakening the sentiment of the sanct.i.ty of the Heaven-sent rulers, that it joined in the criticism of the rest of the nation.

The Parliamentary world and the society of the higher middle cla.s.s were equally outraged. It was plain that the marriage could be made only with the King's consent, and the giving of this was considered a "shame." The bourgeoisie showed an inconceivable irritation; Segrais heard Guilloire, Intendant of Mademoiselle, say to his mistress in an excited tone, knowing very well that he was risking his position, "You are derided and hated by all Europe." As to the common people, their att.i.tude was touching. "They were," reports a witness,[246] "in a state of consternation." They grieved as if their Prince had deceived them.

The enemies of Lauzun increased the discontent and endeavoured to gain time. Louvois was credited with having persuaded the Archbishop of Paris to forbid the bans. The minister felt himself directly menaced, and this was also the opinion of the political world, in which many believed that the projected marriage was a stroke directed "against M. de Louvois, an avowed enemy of M. de Lauzun,"[247] by Colbert and Mme. de Montespan.

While the tempest was gathering, the friends of the two lovers pressed them to hasten the end. "In the name of G.o.d," said Rochefort, Captain of the Guards, "Marry to-day rather than to-morrow!" Montausier "scolded"

them for dallying. Mme. de Sevigne represented to Mademoiselle that they "were tempting G.o.d and the King."[248]

Nothing can be done for people who are walking in the clouds. Lauzun, "intoxicated with vanity,"[249] believed himself already safe in port, sheltered from all trouble, with the King and Mme. de Montespan on his side. Mademoiselle, "dazzled by love," permitted herself to be guided.

Her first desire had been to marry upon the evening of the deputation to the King, without saying anything about it, but Lauzun refused. "He was persuaded that Mme. de Montespan would not fail him, and that nothing could now turn the King against him, and considered everything secure, saying, "I distrust only you." To marry thus clandestinely would not satisfy his vanity. He wished that the deed should be done as "from crown to crown, openly and with all forms observed." He desired the chapel of the Tuileries, pomp, a crowd, rows of astonished and envious faces, "rich livery" that he had hastened to order for the occasion. In short, he longed for the moon and he did not succeed in seizing it.

Tuesday, December 16th, was pa.s.sed in talking, in expressing astonishment, in paying compliments. A mult.i.tude came to the Luxembourg, among whom the Archbishop of Reims, brother of Louvois, who said to Mademoiselle: "Would you do me the injury of choosing any other than myself to perform the marriage ceremony?" Another had already solicited the honour, a proof that so far a rupture had not been thought of.

Mademoiselle replied: "M. the Archbishop of Paris has said that he desired the office."

Wednesday, there was a fresh crowd, Louvois in person and all the ministers; but there was no longer the same cordiality, and Mademoiselle herself perceived the difference. "They made low bows, they conversed, but no longer about the affair." The evening of the same day, the Princess gave to Lauzun ("awaiting something better," said Mme. de Sevigne), the Comte of Eu, which represented the first peerage of France, a.s.suring the first rank, the Princ.i.p.ality of Dombes and the Duchy of Montpensier, of which last Lauzun a.s.sumed the t.i.tle and name.

It was agreed that the ceremony should take place the next day at noon.

On Thursday, the 18th, the contract was not yet prepared; the lawyers had delayed on purpose. Towards evening, Lauzun, who was losing his a.s.surance, offered to break with Mademoiselle.

She was offended and tried once more to make him declare his love, but he responded, "I will say I love you only when we issue from church."

There was no longer question of the Tuileries chapel, nor even of dazzling the Parisians, and Friday found a new delay, Mademoiselle having herself wavered.

After consideration, a rendezvous was arranged at Charenton, in the house of a friend, where the wedding was to be secretly solemnised the next evening at midnight, without even an archbishop. The Parisian offer began to inspire distrust: "The cure of the place would do well enough."

When all was settled, Mademoiselle amused herself with showing to her intimates the chamber that she had arranged for the future Duc de Montpensier. "It was magnificently furnished," relates the Abbe de Choisy. "'Do not you think,' said Mademoiselle to us, 'that a Gascony cadet will be sufficiently well lodged?'" Lauzun took leave early to pa.s.s the night in a "bath house," as was the custom before a wedding.

Mademoiselle opposed this, because he was suffering from a bad cold. He had also "trouble with his eyes." I said to him, "Your eyes are very red." He replied, "Do they make you ill?" I said, "No; for they are in no way disgusting." It may be noticed that these ill.u.s.trious lovers did not possess the light graces of conversation; their phrases were singularly heavy. "These ladies are mocking us," pursued the Princess.

"I do not know, however, what caused me to have a presentiment. I began to weep in seeing him depart; he, too, was sad; we were ridiculed. The ladies also departed, only Mme. de Nogent remaining."

This last was the sister of Lauzun, and Mademoiselle had, during the past months, been very intimate with her.

While time was thus being wasted at the Luxembourg, Louis submitted to the almost universal antagonism and withdrew his authorisation to the alliance. "The Queen and the princes of the blood redoubled their entreaties; the Marechal de Villeroy[250] threw himself upon his knees, with tears in his eyes; the ministers and all those approaching the King expressed the voice of the people. At length G.o.d touched the King's heart."[251] G.o.d? No, but a creature of flesh; Mme. de Montespan for the second time betrayed Lauzun.

La Fare affirms the statement that it was the counsel of Mme. de Maintenon (still only Mme. Scarron) painfully earning her bread in bringing up in obscurity the children of Mme. de Montespan and the King. Mme. Scarron had cleverness and prudence, and at that time was far from any thought of rivalry; the King could not suffer her. She said later that he had taken her for a "learned woman," only caring for "sublime things"[252]; and Louis distrusted Philimantes. It was, therefore, as a disinterested friend that she "pointed out to Mme. de Montespan the tempest which she would draw down upon her head in sustaining Lauzun in this affair; that the royal family and the King himself would reproach her for the steps she had urged. Mme. Scarron succeeded so well that the one who urged the marriage was responsible for preventing it."[253]

Louis XIV. yielded to the urgency of Mme. de Montespan and sent to the Luxembourg for Mademoiselle. It was eight o'clock in the evening.

Mademoiselle uttered a cry on hearing that the King commanded her presence. "I am in despair; my marriage is broken." On reaching the Tuileries, the Princess was led to the King by the back staircase, and quickly perceived that something was being concealed from her. In fact, Louis had hidden Conde behind a door, that he might listen and be witness to what pa.s.sed.

The door was closed behind me. I found the King alone, moved and sad. "I am in despair at the thought of what I must tell you. I am told that the world is saying that I am sacrificing you to make Lauzun's fortune; that this would injure me in foreign lands, and that I must not permit the affair to be consummated. You are right in complaining of me; beat me if you wish. I will bear the weight of any expression of anger in which you may indulge, and feel that I merit your indignation." "Ah!"

cried I, "Sire, what do you tell me? What cruelty!"

She mingled protestations with reproaches, sobbed out her despair on her knees, and pleaded to know the fate of Lauzun. "Where is he, Sire, M. de Lauzun?" "Do not be troubled! No harm shall come to him."

True sorrow is always eloquent, and Louis XIV. let his own emotion be visible without shame:

He threw himself on his knees and embraced me. We wept together three quarters of an hour, his cheek pressed against mine, he weeping bitterly as I did: "Ah! why have you wasted time in reflection? why did you not hasten?"--"Alas, Sire! who could have distrusted your Majesty's word? You have never failed any one before, and you now begin with me and M. de Lauzun! I shall die, and be happy in dying. I had never loved any one before in all my life; I now love, and love pa.s.sionately and in good faith, the most worthy man in your kingdom; my only joy and pleasure will be in his elevation. I hoped to pa.s.s the remainder of my days agreeably with him, and in honouring and loving you as warmly as my husband. You gave him to me; you now take him away; it is tearing out my heart."

Some one coughed behind the door. "To whom are you betraying me, Sire?

Can it be M. le Prince?" Mademoiselle grew bitter, and the King wished to end the scene; but she continued to supplicate him: "What, Sire, will you not yield to my tears?" He replied, raising his voice so that he might be heard, "Kings must satisfy the public"; and added, an instant after, "It is late; I can say no more nor differently, even if you remained longer." "He embraced me and conducted me to the door."

Such is the recital of Mademoiselle. Another account of the interview exists, dictated the same evening by Louis to his Minister of Foreign Affairs, as the following letter, written the next morning, testifies.

Before the King had risen, M. de Lyonne wrote in haste to M. de Pomponne, the French Amba.s.sador to Holland:

I am overwhelmed with business, and have no time for details, but I do not doubt that every letter from Paris has brought news of the projected marriage of the Grande Mademoiselle with Comte de Lauzun. I must now warn you that the King broke this off yesterday at eleven o'clock in the evening, so that few people could be aware of the fact before the departure of the post. I have already outlined a circular letter from his Majesty, to be sent to all the Foreign Ministers, to inform them of what has pa.s.sed in regard to this affair during the past seven or eight days; but as the King does not wake before nine o'clock, and as the courier will by that time have departed, his Majesty will not be able to sign in time for the letters to be forwarded to-day, and you must be contented with the simple news, that the affair is ended. I pray you to send a copy of this note to M. le Chevalier de Terlon and to the Sieur Rousseau,[254] and to advise them that I have requested you so to do.

Before referring to the circular letter of His Majesty upon the subject which caused the cries and tears of his poor cousin, it should be noted that it seemed perfectly natural, to judge by the doc.u.ments of the times, to advise officially foreign powers of events with which they were actually but little concerned. In the opinion of the seventeenth century, the man was inseparable from the sovereign, and France was deeply impressed with the universal importance of Louis XIV. and by consequence of the obligations devolving upon him. "He must account to all Europe for his actions," says, in regard to the "Affair Lauzun," the "relation" already quoted.[255]

It is also well to recollect, in order to understand the text of the letter, that one of the half-sisters of Mademoiselle had married the Duc de Guise, cadet of the House of Lorraine; an alliance hardly less unequal in the eyes of the French aristocracy than that of Lauzun with the Princess. This marriage had excited but little attention, there being a wide difference between the importance of the sisters. Referring to this event, the "Deputies of the n.o.bility of France" had not failed to a.s.sert that the n.o.bles of France and the officers of the Crown were quite equal to foreign princes, and in particular to the "Lorraines" in spite of their pretensions. With this explanation, the text of the long despatch addressed to the amba.s.sadors is given. It begins in these terms:

As what has taken place during the past five or six days in regard to a plan formed by my cousin for marrying the Comte de Lauzun, one of the Captains of the Body Guard, will probably make a great noise everywhere, and as my conduct in the matter is liable to be interpreted malignantly, and to be blamed by those who may be incorrectly informed of the facts, I believe it a duty to instruct all my Foreign Ministers."

The King then explains in detail the affair, and this explanation exactly accords with the recital of Mademoiselle, save that Louis XIV.

states that he was opposed to the marriage from the beginning, and only yielded because he was weary of the discussion, being constantly hara.s.sed by his cousin and the Deputies of the n.o.bility: "She [Mademoiselle] continued ... through notes and every other available means to press me urgently to give the consent she demanded of me, as this alone could, as she said, give the happiness and repose of her life." The Deputies had also represented to him

that after having consented to the marriage of my cousin de Guise, not only without making the least difficulty but with pleasure, I should resist this, so ardently desired by her sister, I should clearly show that I made a great distinction between the cadets of royal houses and the Officers of my Crown. Such a distinction Spain did not make, but on the other hand, gave precedence to its own Grandees over any foreign Princes, and it was impossible that the making of this difference in France should not greatly mortify the entire n.o.bility of the kingdom. In conclusion, the urgency of these four persons was so strong, and their reasons so convincing, especially that emphasising the danger of insulting the French n.o.bility, that I yielded, and gave consent to the marriage, shrugging my shoulders at the folly of my cousin, and only saying that as she was forty-three, she might do as she pleased.

He continued, "From this moment it was considered that the affair was concluded." Then follow the details already known, preparations for the ceremony, the crowd at the Luxembourg; rumours "very injurious" that the King was responsible for the marriage, wishing to favour Lauzun; and finally, the resolve to break off the affair.

This is the single point on which Louis XIV. believed it to be his duty to restrict his confidences to the universe. He pa.s.ses over in silence the supplications of Mme de Montespan and the fact of Conde being hidden behind the door: