The Queen`s Confession

The French Marriage

It was said that I was born ‘with the vision of a throne and a French executioner’ over my cradle; but this was long after, and it is a habit to remember prophetic signs and symbols when time has shown the course of events. In fact my birth caused my mother little inconvenience, for it happened just as the Seven Years War was about to break out and she was more concerned with this threat than with her baby daughter. Almost as soon as I was born she was carrying on with state affairs, and I am sure scarcely gave me a thought. She was accustomed to bearing children; I was her fifteenth child.

She had wanted a boy, of course, although she had four, because rulers always want boys; and she had seven daughters left to her, three having died before I was born, either at birth or in infancy. I liked to hear how she had made a bet with the old Duke of Tarouka as to what my sex would be. She had wagered that the child would be a girl. So Tarouka had to pay up.

While she was awaiting my birth, my mother decided that my sponsors should be the King and Queen of Portugal. In later years this was considered to be another evil omen, for on the day I was born a terrific earthquake shattered Lisbon, wrecking the town and killing forty thousand people. Afterwards, long afterwards, it was said that all children born on that day were unlucky. But few princesses can have had a happier childhood than mine. During those long sunny days when my sister Caroline and I used to play together in the gardens of the Schonbrunn Palace, neither of us gave a thought to the future; it never seemed to occur to me that life could not go on in this way for ever. We were Archduchesses, our mother was the Empress of Austria, and it was the nature of custom and tradition that our childhoods should inevitably be cut short and that we, being girls, would be sent away from home to be wives to strangers. It was different for our brothers-Ferdinand, who came between Caroline and me, and Max, who was a year younger than I and the baby of the family.

They were safe. They would marry and bring their brides to Austria.

But we never discussed this during these summers at Schonbrunn and winters at the Hofburg in Vienna. We were two happy carefree children—our only anxieties being which of the bitches would have her litter first and what the little darlings would be like. We loved dogs, both of us.

There were lessons, but we knew how to manage our Aja, as we called her. To everyone else she was Countess von Brandeiss, outwardly stem and fond of ceremony, but she doted on us and we could always get what we wanted. I remember sitting in the schoolroom looking out on the gardens and thinking how lovely it was out there while I was trying to copy Aja’s writing. There were blots on the page and I could never keep the lines straight. She came to me and clicking her tongue said I would never learn and she would be sent away because of it. Then I put my arms about her neck and said I loved her—which was true—and that I should never allow her to be sent away—which was absurd, because if my mother said she was to go away she would go without delay. But she softened and drew me to her; then she made me sit beside her while she drew for me in fine pencil so that all I had to do to produce an excellent drawing was go over her pencil lines in ink. After that it became a habit; and she would even write out my exercises in pencil and I would go over them with my pen, so that in the end it seemed as though I had written a very fair essay.

I was called Maria Antonia—Antonia in the family; it was not until later, when it was decided that I should go to France, that my name was changed to Marie Antoinette and I had to learn to forget I was Austrian and become French.

Our mother was the centre of our lives although we did not see her very often; but she was always there, a presence, someone whose word and wish were law. We were all terrified of her.

How well I remember the cold of the Hofburg in winter, where all the windows had to be kept wide open because our mother believed that fresh air was good for everyone. The bitterly cold wind would whistle through the palace. I have never known anything so cold as those Viennese winters, and I used to pity her attendants, particularly the poor little hairdresser who had to get up at five in the morning to dress my mother’s hair and stand in that cold room near the open window. She was so proud when my mother had selected her to do her hair on account of her special talents, but I asked her—for I was always friendly with the attendants—if she did not sometimes wish she had not been so good, then she would not have been chosen.

“Oh, Madame Antonia,” she replied, ‘it’s glorious slavery. “

That was how everyone felt about my mother. We all had to obey her but it seemed right and natural that we should, and we should never have thought of doing anything else. We all knew that she was the supreme ruler because she was the daughter of our grandfather Charles VI who had had no son, and although our father was known as the Emperor, he was second to her.

Dear Father! How I loved him! He was lighthearted and careless, and I imagine I took after him. Perhaps that was why I was his favourite.

Mother had no favourites and we were such a large family that I scarcely knew some of my elder brothers and sisters. There had been sixteen of us, but five I never knew because they died before I was able to be aware of them. Mother was proud of us and used to bring foreign visitors to see us.

“My family is not small,” she would say, and her manner showed how pleased she was to have so many children.

Once a week the doctors used to examine us to see that we were in good health, and their reports were sent to our mother, who studied them carefully. When we were summoned to her presence we were all subdued and unlike our selves; she would question us and we had to have the right answers. It was easy for me being the youngest but one; but some of the elder ones were terrified even Joseph, my eldest brother, who was fourteen years older than I and seemed so important because he would one day be Emperor. Everyone saluted him wherever he went, and in fact, when he was not in my mother’s presence, he was treated as though he were already the Emperor. Once when he wanted to ride his sledge out of season his servants brought snow down from the mountains so that he could do so. He was very obstinate and inclined to be haughty and Ferdinand told me that our mother had reproved him because of his ‘wild desire to have his own way. “

I believe our father was in awe of her too. He took little part in affairs of state, but we saw a great deal of him. He was not always happy and once said rather sadly, and a little resentfully: “The Empress and the children are the Court. Here I am simply an individual.”

Long afterwards when I was lonely and in my prison, I thought of those early days and I understood my family much better than I had when I was surrounded by them. It was like standing back and looking at a painting. Every thing fell into focus and what I had been scarcely aware of at the time became very clear to me.

I saw my mother a good woman, eager to do the best for her children and her country, loving my father dearly, but determined not to give up one bit of her power to him. I saw her, not as the martinet, whom I had feared too much to love, but as the wise, shrewd mother, who was constantly concerned for me. How she must have suffered when I went to my new country I I was like a child walking a tightrope, not realising the danger I was in; but she, though miles away, was deeply aware.

Then my father. How could any man be expected to live contentedly under the domination of such a woman I I know now that the whisperings I heard meant that he was not faithful to her and that this was something which wounded her deeply. Yet, although she would have done a great deal for him, she would not give him what he wanted—a little of her power.

As for myself, I was feather-brained. I know I had the excuse of youth, but I was naturally like this. I was full of high spirits, very healthy, and loved being out of doors, playing . always playing. I could not sit still for five minutes at a time. I could never concentrate for a moment; my mind would fly off at a tangent; I just wanted to laugh and chatter and play all the time. Looking back I can see what great dramas were going on in our household—and there was I playing with my dogs, whispering my little-girl secrets with Caroline and not being aware of them.

I must have been seven when my brother Joseph married, for he was twenty-one. He did not want to get married, and said: I am more afraid of marriage than of battle. “

That surprised me, for I had not thought marriage was something to fear. But like everything else I heard, it went in at one ear and out of the other; I never concerned myself about anything or wondered very much. I was absorbed by what ribbons Aja would put out for me and whether I could change for Caroline’s if I did not like the colour.

Now I can visualise the drama clearly. His bride was quite the loveliest creature we had ever seen. We were all so fair and she was dark. Our mother loved Isabella, and Caroline confided to me that she was sure our mother wished we were all like her. Perhaps she did, for Isabella was not only beautiful, she was very clever—which none of us was. But she had one other characteristic, which we lacked. She was melancholy. I might have been frivolous; I might have known little about books; but there was one thing I did know and that was how to enjoy life; and this was something which, for all her learning, was beyond Isabella’s powers. The only rime I ever saw her laugh was with our sister Maria Christina, who was a year younger than Joseph.

Isabella would go into the gardens when Maria Christina was there; they would walk together arm in arm, and then Isabella looked as nearly happy-as she ever could. I was glad that she liked one of us, but it was a pity it was not Joseph, for he had fallen deeply in love with her.

There was a great deal of excitement when she was going to have a baby; but when the child was born it was a weakling, and it did not live long. She had two children and they both died.

Caroline and I were too busy with our own affairs to think much about Joseph and his. I must have noticed that he looked very sad, always, and it certainly made some impression on me even then, because it comes back so clearly all these years later. What a dark tragedy that was! And there was I living under the same roof with it.

Isabella was constantly talking about death and how she longed for it.

That seemed strange to me. Death was something which happened to old people—or little babies whom one did not really know. It had little to do with us.

Caroline and I, hiding ourselves behind a clipped hedge in the gardens, once heard Isabella and Maria Christina talking together.

“What right have I in this world?” Isabella was saying.

“I am no good.

If it were not sinful I would kill myself. I should already have done so. “

Maria Christina laughed at her. Maria Christina was not the kindest of our sisters and on the rare occasions when she did notice us she would say something spiteful, so we avoided her.

“You suffer from a desire to seem heroic,” she retorted.

“It’s utter selfishness.”

Then she walked away and left Isabella looking after her, stricken.

I thought about that scene tor five whole minutes, which was a long rime for me.

And Isabella did die just as she had said she wanted to. She was in Vienna for only two years in all. Poor Joseph was heartbroken. He was constantly writing letters to Isa bella’s father in Parma and they were all about Isabella, how wonderful she had been, how there was no one like her.

I have lost everything,” he told my brother Leopold.

“My beloved wife my love … has gone. How can I survive this terrible separation?”

One day I saw Joseph with Maria Christina. Her eyes were Sashing with hatred and she was saying: “It’s true. I will show you her letters.

They will tell you all you want to know. You will see that I not you was the one she loved. “

It falls into place now. Poor Joseph! Poor Isabella! I understand why Isabella was so sad and wished for death, ashamed of her love and yet unable to suppress it; and Maria Christina, who would always want her revenge, had betrayed her to poor Joseph.

Immersed as I was then in my own affairs I saw this tragedy as through a misted glass, but because my own suffering has now made of me a different person from the careless creature I was in my youth, I understand so much and I have sympathy to give to others who suffer. I brood on their sufferings perhaps because I cannot bear to contemplate my own.

Joseph was very unhappy for a long time, but because he was the eldest and more important than any of us he must have a wife. He was so angry when a new wife was selected for him by our mother and Prince Wenzel Anton Kaunitz that when she arrived in Vienna he scarcely spoke to her. She was very different from Isabella, being small and fat, with brown uneven teeth and red spots on her face. Joseph told Leopold, in whom he used to confide more than in anyone else at our mother’s court, that he was wretched and he was not going to pretend to be anything else for it was not in his nature to pretend. Her name was Josepha and she must have been unhappy too, for he had a barrier built across the balcony on to which their separate rooms opened so that he would never meet her if she stepped from her room at the same time as he stepped from his.

Maria Christina said: “If I were Joseph’s wife, I’d go and hang myself on a tree in the Schonbrunn gardens.”

When I was ten years old I was aware of tragedy, which was real even to me because it concerned me deeply.

Leopold was going to be married. There was nothing very exciting to Caroline and me about this, because with so many brothers and sisters there were other weddings; and it was only one which was held in Vienna which would have interested us; but Leopold was being married in Innsbruck. < Father was going to the wedding, but Mother could not leave Vienna as her state duties kept her there, i I was in the schoolroom tracing a picture when one of my father’s pages came to say that my father wanted to say goodbye to me at once.

I was surprised because I had said goodbye to him half an hour earlier and I had seen him ride off with his attendants.

Aja was in a fluster.

“Something has happened,” she said.

“Go at once.”

So I went with the servants. My father was on his horse looking back at the Palace, and when he saw me coming his eyes lit up and he seemed very pleased. He did not dismount but I was lifted up and he held me against him so tightly that it was painful. I felt he was trying to say something and did not know how to, but he hated to let me go. I thought he was going to take me to Innsbruck with him, but this could not be, for my mother would have arranged that if it were so.

His hold loosened and he looked at me tenderly. I threw my arms about his neck and cried: “Dear, dear Papa.” There were tears in his eyes and he gripped me with his right arm while he touched my hair with his left. He had always liked to touch my hair, which was thick and light in colour—auburn, some called it, though my brothers Ferdinand and Max called me “Carrots.” His servants were watching, and abruptly he signed to one of them to take me from him.

He turned to the friends who were beside him and said in a voice shaken with emotion: “Gentlemen, God knows how much I desired to kiss that child.”

That was all. Father smiled goodbye and I went back to the schoolroom, puzzled for a few minutes, and then characteristically forgot the incident.

That was the last I saw of him. In Innsbruck, he felt rather ill and his friends begged him to be bled, but he had arranged to go to the opera with Leopold that afternoon and he knew that if he were bled he would have to rest and cancel the opera, which would worry Leopold, who, like all his children, loved him dearly. It was better, he said, to go to the opera and be quietly bled afterwards without disturbing his son.

So he went to the opera and was taken ill there. He had a stroke and died in Leopold’s arms.

It was naturally said afterwards that he, being near death, had had a terrible premonition of my future and that was why he had sent for me in that unusual manner.

We were all desolate because we had lost our father. I was sad for several weeks and then it began to seem as though I had never known him. But my mother was heartbroken. She embraced my father’s dead body when it was brought home and she was only removed from it by force.

Then she shut herself into her apartments and gave herself up to grief which was so violent that the doctors were forced to open one of her veins in order to give her relief from her terrible emotion. She cut off her hair—of which she had been so proud—and she wore a widow’s sombre costume, which made her look more severe than ever. In the years which followed I never saw her differently dressed.

After my father’s death, my mother seemed to become more aware of me.

Before, I had been just one of the children, now I would often find her attention focused on me during those occasions when we all had to wait on her. This was alarming, but I soon discovered that if I smiled I could soften her, just as I could dear old Aja, though not so easily and not always; and of course I tried to cover up my shortcomings by using this gift of mine for making people indulgent towards me.

It was soon after Father’s death that I began to hear talk of “The French Marriage.” Couriers were constantly going j back and forth with letters between Kaunitz and my mother and my mother’s ambassador in France. ;

Kaunitz was the most important man in Austria. A dandy, The was nevertheless one of the shrewdest politicians in Europe and my mother thought very highly of him and trusted him more than she trusted anyone else. Before he became her j chief adviser he had been her ambassador at Versailles, where he had become a great friend of Madame de Pormpadour which had meant that he was well received by the King of France, and it was while he was in Paris that he had conceived the idea of an alliance between Austria and France which would be through a marriage between a the houses of Hapsburg and Bourbon. Living in France had given him the manners of a Frenchman, and as he also dressed like one, in Austria he was considered rather eccentric. But he was very much a German in some ways-calm, disciplined and precise. Ferdinand told us that he osed egg yolks for his complexion, smearing them over his face to keep his skin fresh; and to preserve his teeth he used to clean them with a sponge and a scraper after every meal—at the table. He was so determined that his wig should be powdered all over that he ordered his valets to form two rows between which he walked while they used their bellows. He was enveloped in a cloud of powder, but this ensured that his wig was evenly powdered.

We used to laugh at him. I did not realise then that while we were laughing together about his odd habits, he was deciding -my future, and but for him I should not be where I am at this moment. Caroline discovered that there was a possibility that either I she or I might marry the King of France, which set us I giggling at the incongruity of this, for he was an old man nearly sixty and we thought it would be funny to have a husband who was older than our mother. But when the

Dauphin of France—the son of that King who might have been a husband to one of us died and his son became Dauphin, there was great excitement because the new Dauphin was only a boy, about a year older than I was.

Sometimes Caroline and I talked about “The French Marriage and then we would forget about it for weeks; but all the time we were growing farther and farther away from childhood. Ferdinand tried seriously to discuss it with us how good it would be for Austria if there was an alliance between Hapsburg and Bourbon.

The widow of the recently dead Dauphin, who had great influence with the King, was against it and wanted a princess from her own House to marry her son; but she died suddenly of consumption, which she had probably caught when nursing her husband, and my mother was very pleased.

My brother Joseph’s poor unhappy wife died of the small pox, and my sister Maria Josepha, who was four years older than I, caught it and died. She was on the point of going to Naples to marry the King and our mother decided that an alliance with Naples was necessary so Caroline should be the bride instead.

This was the biggest tragedy of all so far. I had loved my father and had been sad, in my way, when he had died, but Caroline had been my constant companion and I could not imagine what it would be like without her. Caroline, who felt everything more deeply than I, was heartbroken.

I was twelve; Caroline was fifteen; and as Caroline had been selected for Naples, my mother at this time decided to train me to be ready to go to France. She announced that I should no longer be called Antonia.

I should be Antoinette or Marie Antoinette. That in itself made me seem like a different person. I was now brought into my mother’s salon and made to answer the questions important men put to me; I had to have the right answers and was primed beforehand, but it was so easy for me to forget.

The comfortable life was over. I was watched; I was talked about; and I fancied that my mother and her ministers were trying to represent me as a very different person from the one I was rather the person they wanted me to be, or the French would like me to be. I was always hearing stories about my goodness, my charm and cleverness which astonished I me. When I was younger, Mozart the musician had come to the Court; be was only a child then, but brilliant, and my mother was encouraging him. When he came into the great salon to play to the company he was so overawed that he slipped. and fell and everyone laughed. But I ran out to see if he was hurt and to tell him that it did not matter, and after that we became friends and he played for me specially. He said once that he would like to marry me, and as I thought that would be pleasant, I agreed to his proposal. This was I remembered and told about me. It was supposed to be one of the ‘charming’ stories. On one occasion my mother told me that the French Ambassador would probably talk to me when I visited her salon and if he were to ask me which nation I should most I like to rule I must say “The French’; and if he were to ask why, I was to reply: “Because they had Henri Quatre the Good and Louis Quatorze the Great.” I learned it off by heart and was afraid I should get it wrong because I was not very sure who these people were; but I managed it and that was another story which was told about me. I was supposed to learn about the French; I was to practise speaking French; everything was changing.

As for Caroline, she was always weeping and was no longer the pleasant companion she had been. She was very frightened of marriage and knew she was going to hate the King of Naples.

Our mother came to the schoolroom and talked to her very severely.

You are no longer a child she said, ‘and I have heard ( that you have been very bad-tempered. ” :

I wanted to explain that Caroline was only bad-tempered because she was frightened; but it was impossible to explain to my mother.

Then she looked at me and went on: “I am going to separate you from Antoinette. You spend your time in stupid chattering and there is to be no more of this useless gossip. It will stop at once. I warn you that you will be watched, and you, Caroline, as the elder, will be held responsible.”

Then my mother dismissed me and kept Caroline there to lecture her further on how she should behave.

I went away with a heavy heart. I should miss Caroline so much.

Strangely enough I did not think of my own fate. France was too far off to be real, and I had perfected my natural inclination to forget what it was not pleasant to remember.

Caroline left at last pale-faced, silent and not in the least like my gay little sister. Joseph accompanied her and I believe he was quite sorry for her; there was something good about Joseph although he was so haughty and pompous.

There was trouble with another of my sisters, but this seemed more remote, for Maria Amalia was nine years older than I was. Caroline and I had known for a long time that she was in love with a young man of the Court, Prince Zweibriicken, and hoped that she would be able to marry him, which was perhaps foolish of her, for she should have known that we had to marry Heads of States for the good of Austria. But Maria Amalia was like me in that she was apt to believe what she wanted to, so she went on believing that she would be allowed to marry Prince Zweibriicken.

Caroline’s fears were fully realised. She was very unhappy in Naples and wrote home that her husband was very ugly, but because she remembered what my mother had told her she tried to be brave, and added that she was growing quite accustomed to him. She wrote to Countess von Lerchenfeld, who helped Aja as governess:

“One suffers martyrdom, and it is all the greater because one must pretend to be happy. How I pity Antoinette who has to face this. I would rather die than suffer it again. But for my religion I should have killed myself rather than live as I did for eight days. It was like hell and I wished to die. When my little sister has to face this I shall weep for. her.”

The Countess had not wanted to show me this, but I begged and pleaded and she gave way as she always did; and when I read it I wished I hadn’t. Was it really so bad? My sister-in-law Isabella had talked about killing herself. I, who loved life so much, could not understand this attitude; yet it seemed strange that those two who had had so much more experience of life than I should both have talked like that.

I thought about Caroline’s letter for some hours and then it slipped to the back of my mind and I forgot it perhaps because my mother was now turning her attention more and more on me.

She came to the schoolroom to investigate my progress and was horrified when she realised how little I knew. My handwriting was untidy and laborious. As for speaking French, I was hopeless, although I could chatter in Italian; but I could not write even German really grammatically.

My mother was not angry with me; she was merely pained. She drew me to her, held me in the crook of her arm and explained to me about the great honour which might be done to me. It would be the most wonderful thing in the world if this plan which Prince von Kaunitz here in Vienna and the Due de Choiseui in France were trying to work out could come to fruition. It was the first time I had heard the Due de Choiseul’s name mentioned and I asked my mother who he was. She told me that he was a brilliant statesman, adviser to the King of France and, most important of all, A Friend to Austria. So much depended on him and we must do nothing to offend him. What he would say if he knew what a little ignoramus I was, she could not imagine. The whole plan would prob ably founder.

She looked at me so severely that I was momentarily down cast. It seemed such a great responsibility; then I felt my mouth turning up at the corners because I could not believe I was all that important. And as I laughed I saw that my mother was trying not to smile, so I put my arms about her neck and said I was sure Monsieur de Choiseui would not mind very much that I was not clever.

She held me tightly against her, and then, putting me from her, looked severe again. She told me about the mighty Sun King who had built

Versailles which, she said, was the greatest palace in the world, and die French Court was the moat cultured and elegant, and that I was the luckiest girl in the world to have a chance of going there. I listened for a while to her accounts of the wonderful gar dens and the beautiful salons which were far more splendid than anything we had in Vienna, but soon, although I was nodding and smiling, I was not really listening.

I suddenly realised that she was saying my governesses were not suitable and I must have other teachers. She wanted me, in a few months’ time, to be talking in French, thinking in French, so that it would be as though I were French.

“But never forget that you are a good German.”

I nodded, smiling.

But you must speak good French. Monsieur de Choiseui writes that the King of France has a very sensitive ear for the French language, and that you should have an accent of grace and purity which will not offend aim. You under stand? “

Yes, Mamma. “

“So you will have to work very very hard.”

“Oh yes. Mamma.”

“Antoinette, are you listening?”

“Oh yes. Mamma.” I smiled widely to show her I was taking in every word and giving it serious consideration at least as serious as I was able to manage. She sighed. I knew she was concerned for me, but she was for less severe with me than she had been with Caroline.

‘now there is a theatrical company in Vienna a FmicA theatrical company, and I have commanded that two actors shall come here and teach you to speak French as they do at the French Court, and French manners and customs. “

“Actors I’ I cried ecstatically, thinking of the fun we used to have during winters in the Hofburg when my elder brothers and sisters acted plays and danced ballets and sang in opera. Caroline, Ferdinand, Max and I were only allowed to watch, being, as our elder sisters and brothers told us, too young to take part. But how I had longed to!

When I had a chance I would leap on to the stage and dance, until they

turned me off with the constant cry of: “Go away, Antonia. You are too young to play in this. You must watch.” If it was a play or a ballet I could scarcely stop myself from joining in, in spite of them. I loved dancing more than anything. So when my mother told me actors were coming I was excited.

They are not here to play with you, Antoinette,” she said severely.

“They will be here to teach you French. You j must study hard.

Monsieur Aufresne will advise you on your pronunciation and Monsieur Sainville will take you in French singing. “

“Yes, Mamma.” My mind was far away on the amateur stages when Maria Christina was so angry because she was not the heroine of the play, or Maria Amalia was watching the Prince Zweibriicken all the time she was saying her lines; and Max and I were Jumping up and down in our seats with excitement.

“And Monsieur Noverre will come to teach you to dance

Oh . Mamma! “

“You have never heard of Monsieur Noverre, but he is the finest dancing master in Europe.”

“I shall love him I’ I cried.

“You must not be so impulsive, my child. Think before you speak. One does not love a dancing master. But you should be grateful that you have the finest teacher in Europe and you must follow his instructions That was a happy time. It helped me to stop thinking of poor Caroline in Naples and that other family crisis when Maria Amalia was sent off to Parma to marry Isabella’s brother. She was twenty-three and he was only a boy not much more than fourteen and Maria Amalia had to say goodbye to the Prince Zweibriicken. She was not meek like Caroline; she stormed and raged, and I thought she was going to do what no one had dared do before defy my mother. But she went, because it was good for Austria, and we continued our alliance with Parma, so stormy Maria Amalia had this little boy for a husband while Caroline who was only fifteen had the old man from Naples.

But so much was happening to me that I had only time to think of what was expected of me. My mother was in despair because I could not learn. My actor teachers never forced me to study; and when I spoke French—as I was obliged to all the time—they would smile tenderly and say:

It is charming, charming, Madame Antoinette. Not French, but charming I’ Then we would all laugh together, so the lessons were not unpleasant. But what I enjoyed most were the dancing lessons. Noverre was delighted with me. I could learn the steps easily and he would applaud me almost ecstatically. Sometimes I made a false step and he would stop me and then cry: “No. We will leave it just like that. It is more charming the way you do it.” My teachers were all so kind.

They were constantly paying compliments and never scolding and I thought the French must be the most delightful people in the world.

My complacency did not last. I was closely watched and the Marquis de Durfort, the French Ambassador at our Court, reported everything to Versailles, so it was soon known there that I was being taught by Monsieur Aufresne and Monsieur Sainville. The Dauphine of France to be taught by strolling players! That was unthinkable. Monsieur de Choiseui would see that a suitable tutor was sent without delay. I had my lessons one day and the next my friends were gone. I felt very sad for a while; but I was growing accustomed to having people to whom I had become familiar suddenly whisked away from me.

My mother sent for me and told me that Monsieur de Choiseui was sending me a new tutor. I must forget my old ones and never mention them. I was being greatly honoured because the Bishop of Orleans had found a French tutor for me. He was the Abbe Vermond.

I grimaced. An Abbe was going to be very different from my gay actors.

My mother pretended not to see the grimace and gave me one of those homilies about the importance of learning the language and customs of my new country. I was not looking forward to the arrival of the Abbe Vermond.

I need not have worried, because from the moment I saw him I knew that I could cajole him as I had my governesses; and when I was young I had an insight into character which was astonishing in one of my superficial nature. I do not mean that I could probe deeply into the motives of those about me. If I had been blessed with that quality I might have saved myself a good deal of trouble; but I could see little quirks of behaviour which I could reproduce rather amusingly (I think I could have been a tolerably good actress) and this enabled me to get what I wanted from people. Most of my sisters and brothers were cleverer than I, but they did not know how to lure my mother from a scolding mood to one of affection, as I did. It may have been because of my childishness, my innocence as they called it; and then, of course, my appearance helped. I was small and fairy-like; in fact the French Ambassador, who was constantly commenting on my appearance to his masters at Versailles, referred to me as ‘a dainty morsel. ” But I don’t think it was entirely this. I do believe that I could, in an extremely superficial way, of course, assess those little traits of character which would enable me to know how far I could go in my dealings with a person. So as soon as I saw the Abbe Vermond I was relieved.

He was learned, naturally, so he was going to be appalled by my ignorance; and he was. What could I do? I could speak Italian and French after a fashion with a great many German expressions to help me along; my handwriting was disgraceful; I knew little of history and nothing of French literature, which Monsieur de Choiseui had said was so necessary. I could sing fairly well; I loved music; and I could dance ‘comme un ange,” as Noverre had said. I also had been an Archduchess from my birth and when I was in my mother’s salon I seemed to know instinctively which people I should speak to and to whom I should merely incline my head. This was inherent. It was true that in the privacy of my own apartments I was sometimes too familiar with my servants and if any of them had any young children I liked to play with them, for I adored children, and when Caroline had said that marriage was hateful I did remind her that marriage meant having children and it must be worth a lot of discomfort to have them.

Although I was more friendly with the servants than the rest of my family were, because I had this inherent royal demeanour, they rarely took advantage of it. My mother was aware of it, and I believe she thought it better not to try to change it.

The Abbe Vermond was by no means handsome. He seemed old to me, but now I would say he was middle-aged when be came to Vienna. He had been a librarian and it quickly became clear to me that he was delighted to have been selected for this appointment to teach me. I was beginning to be aware of how important I was becoming. I was being trained to become the Dauphine of France who could very quickly become the Queen and this was one of the most elevated positions any woman in the world could hold. It was very different from being Archduchess of Austria.

Sometimes it was too alarming to be thought of-so in accordance with my usual practice, I did not think of it.

Although the Abbe was astonished by my ignorance, he desperately wanted to please me. The actors and my dancing master had wanted to please me because I was an attractive girl; but the Abbe Vermond wanted to please me because one day I might well be Queen of France. I knew the difference.

It became clear soon that he was quite unaccustomed to living in palaces, and although our Schonbrunn and Hofburg would not compare with Versailles, or the other chateaux and palaces of France, he betrayed quite clearly that it was very grand in his eyes. He had been brought up in a village where his father had been a doctor and his brother an accoucheur; he himself had become a priest and would never have reached his present position but for the patronage of the Archbishop.

Aware of this desire to please not only my mother but me, I was quite content to study with the Abbe. We read together and studied for an hour each day which he said was enough because he knew that was all I could endure without becoming bored and irritated. Much later when I talked about those days with Madame Campan, who by then was more than first lady of the bedchamber and had become a friend, she pointed out the harm Vermond had done. But she disliked him and she thought he had a share of the blame for every thing that happened to us. Instead of reading together in our lighthearted way, and his allowing me to break off and give imitations of various people of the Court of whom some remark would remind me, I should have been given a thorough grounding not only in French literature but in the manners and customs of that land. I should, she said, have been made ready for the Court of which I was to be a part. I should have been made to study throughout the day if necessary (no matter how unpopular that made Monsieur Vermond); I should have been taught something of French history and of the people of France; I should have learned something about the rumbling dissatisfaction which long before I went there was making itself felt.

But dear Campan was a natural bos bleu and she hated Vermond and loved me; moreover, she was desperately anxious for me at that time.

So although I had to substitute a priest for my actors, the exchange was not so bad after all; and the daily hour with Vermond went pleasantly enough.

But I was not left alone. My appearance was under continual discussion. Why? I wondered, thinking of Joseph’s wife with the dumpy figure and the red spots. I had a good complexion, fine and delicately coloured; my hair was abundant; some said it was golden, some russet, some red. Blonde cendre, the French were to call it; and in the shops of Paris they would display gold-coloured silk and call it chevetix de la Reme. But my high forehead caused a great deal of consternation. My mother was disturbed because Prince Starhemburg, our ambassador in France, reported:

“This trifling imperfection might appear considerable at a time when high foreheads are no longer in fashion.”

I would sit before the mirror contemplating this offending forehead which I had not before noticed was different from other people’s; and very soon Monsieur Larsenneur arrived from Paris. He clucked over my hair, frowned at my fore head and went to work. He tried all sorts of styles and eventually decided that if my hair were dressed in a high pile straight up from my forehead, the latter would appear to be low in comparison with the hair. So it was pulled so tightly that it hurt, and was held in place by false hair, my own colour. To my disgust I was obliged to wear it like that, and as soon as Monsieur Larsenneur had gone I used to loosen the pins. Some of my mother’s courtiers thought it unbecoming, but old Baron Neny said that when I reached Versailles all the ladies would dress their hair ‘a la Dauphine’. Remarks like that always gave me an uneasy twinge because they implied that the great change was coming nearer and nearer; and I was trying hard to forget this in all the excitement of new hairstyles and dancing steps, and luring Abbe Vermond from the book we were reading to give imitations of people at Court.

My teeth gave cause for concern too, because they were uneven. A dentist was sent from France and he looked at them and frowned, as Monsieur Larsenneur had over my hair. He was always pushing my teeth about but I don’t think he made much difference and eventually he gave up. They were a little prominent, which, as they said, made my lower lip look ‘disdainful,” I tried smiling, which, although it exposed the uneven teeth, did abolish the disdain.

I had to wear stays, which I hated, and to grow accustomed to high heels, which prevented my running about the gardens with my dogs. When I thought of leaving the dogs I would burst into tears and the Abbe would comfort me by saying that when I was Dauphine I should have as many French dogs as I desired.

As my fourteenth birthday approached my mother decided that there should be a fete over which I should preside. The whole Court was going to attend, and it was to be a test to discover whether I was capable of being the centre of such an occasion.

This did not greatly alarm me. It was lessons which I could not endure. So without a qualm I received the guests and danced as Noverre had taught me. I knew I was a success, because even Kaunitz, who had come solely to watch me and not to be entertained, said so. My mother told me afterwards that he had remarked: “The Archduchess will do well in spite of her childishness, providing no one spoils her.”

The words my mother emphasised were childishness and spoils. I must grow up quickly, she insisted. I must not believe that everyone would do as I wished merely because I smiled.

The time was passing. In two months, providing all the arrangements had been made and all the disagreements between the French and the Austrians settled, I was to leave for France. My mother was deeply disturbed. I was so unprepared, she said. I was summoned to her salon and told that I should sleep in her bedroom so that she could find spare moments now and then to give me her attention. I was far more horrified by this immediate prospect than by the all-important one of starting a new life in a new country which was an indication of my character.

I still remember nostalgically now those days and nights of utter discomfort and apprehension. The big state bedroom was icy; all windows were wide open to let in the fresh air; the snow fluttered into the room, but that was not so bad as the bitter wind. We were all supposed to have our windows open but in my room I would persuade my servants to close them. They were willing enough as long as they were opened again before it could be discovered that they had been shut. But there was no such comfort in my mother’s bedroom.

The only warm place was in bed; and sometimes I would pretend to be asleep when she stood over me, pulling the clothes from my face, and it was all I could do to stop myself wincing from the icy draught.

With cold fingers she would move the hair out of my eyes, and she would kiss me very tenderly so that I almost forgot I was pretending to be asleep and would want to jump up and throw my aims about her neck.

Only now can I understand how anxious she was for me. I believe I became her favourite daughter not only because I had been my father’s, but because I was small, naive, impossible to educate, and . vulnerable. I realised later that she was continually asking herself what would become of me. I thank God that she did not live long enough to find out.

I could not always pretend to be asleep, and there were long dialogues, or rather monologues, in which I was instructed what I must do. I remember one of them.

“Don’t be too curious. This is a matter on which I am very concerned for you. Avoid familiarities with subordinates. “

“Yes, Mamma. “

“Monsieur and Madame de Noailles have been chosen by the King of France to be your guardians. You will always ask them if you are in any doubt as to what you should do. Insist that they warn you of what you should know. And don’t be ashamed to ask for advice. “

“No, Mamma. “

“Do nothing without consulting those in authority first. ” I found my thoughts straying. Monsieur and Madame de Noailles. What were they like? I started building up incongruous images in my mind which would make me want to smile. My mother saw the smile and was half exasperated, half tender. She took me in her arms and held me against her.

“Oh, my darling child, what will become of you? ” It would all be so different there, she said. There was a vast difference between the French and the Austrians. The French believed that everyone who was not French was a barbarian.

“You must be as a Frenchwoman, for you will be a Frenchwoman. You will be the Dauphine of Prance and in time Queen. But do not show eagerness for that. The King would detect it and naturally be displeased.”

She said nothing about the Dauphin who was to be my husband, so I did not think of him either. It was all the King, the Due de Choiseui, the Marquis de Durfort, Prince Starhem burg and the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau all those important men who had taken their minds from state affairs to think about Me. But then I had become a matter of state the most important they had ever had to deal with. It was so incongruous that I wanted to laugh at it.

At the beginning of every month,” said my mother, ” I shall send a messenger to Paris. In the meantime you can prepare your letters so that they can be given to the messengers and brought to me at once.

Destroy my letters. This will enable me to write to you more frankly.”

I nodded earnestly. It seemed so very exciting like one of the games

Ferdinand and Max used to like to play. I saw myself receiving my mother’s letters, reading them and hiding them in some secret place until I could bum them.

“Antoinette, you are not attending I’ My mother sighed. It was a reproach I constantly heard.

“Say nothing about domestic affairs here.”

I nodded again. No! I must not tell them how Caroline had cried, how she had declared the King of Naples to be ugly; what Maria Amalia had said about the boy she had, been sent out to marry; how Joseph had hated his second wife and how his first had loved Maria Christina. I must forget all that. ‘a “Speak of your family with truth and moderation.” H Should I speak of these matters if I were asked? I was pondering this but my mother went on: “Always say your prayers on rising and say them on your knees. Read from a spiritual book every day. Hear Mass every day and with-l draw for meditation when you are able.”

“Yes, Mamma.” I was determined to try to do all she said.

“Do not read any book or pamphlet without the consent of your confessor. Don’t listen to gossip, and don’t favour anyone.”

One had one’s friends, of course. I could not help liking some people better than others and when I liked them I wanted to give them things.

It went on endlessly. You must do this. You must not do that. And I shivered as I listened, for although the weather f was improving as we came nearer to April it was still cold in the bedroom.

“You must learn how to refuse favours—that is very important. Always answer gracefully if you have to refuse something. But most of all never be ashamed to ask for advice.”

“No, Mamma.”

Then I would escape perhaps to the Abbe Vermond for my lesson, which was not so bad, or to the hairdresser, who pulled my hair, or to my dancing lesson, which was sheer joy. There was an understanding between Monsieur Noverre and me that we would forget the time; we would be surprised when a servant came to tell us that Monsieur l”Abbe was waiting for me, or the hairdresser, or that I must be ready for my interview with Prince von Kaunitz in ten minutes’ time.

“We were absorbed in the lesson,” he would say, as though by referring to that delightful exercise as a lesson he excused us.

You are fond of dancing, my child,” my mother said in the cold bedroom.

“Yes, Mamma.”

And Monsieur Noverre tells me you make excellent progress. Ah, if only you were as well advanced in all your studies. ” I would show her a new step and she would smile and say I did it prettily.

“Dancing is after all a necessary accomplishment. But do not forget that we are not here for our own pleasure. Pleasures are given by God as a relief.”

A relief? A relief from what? Here was another suggestion that life was a tragedy. I started thinking about poor Caroline but my mother brought me out of my reverie with:

“Do nothing contrary to the customs of France, and never quote what is done here.”

“No, Mamma.”

“And never imply that we do something better in Vienna than they do in France. Never suggest that anything we do here should be imitated there. Nothing can exasperate more. You must learn to admire everything French.”

I knew I should never remember all the things I was to do and not to do. I should trust to my luck, to my ability to smile my way out of my mistakes.

During those two months I was sleeping in my mother’s bedroom she was in a state of tension because she feared there might be no marriage at all. She and Kaunitz were constantly closeted together and the Marquis de Durfort was always coming to see them.

This was a respite for me because I was spared those lectures which had become a part of my life in the draughty state bedroom. It was all a matter of who should take precedence over whom—whether my mother’s and brother’s names or that of the King of France should be first on the documents. Kaunitz was calm but anxious.

“The whole question of a marriage could be dropped,” he told my mother.

“It’s ridiculous that so much should hang on such insignificant details.” They were arguing about the formal ceremony of handing me over. Should it take place on French or Austrian soil? One or the other had to be chosen. The French said it must be on French;

The Austrians said it must be Austrian. My mother sometimes told me snatches of these matters.

“Because it is good for you to know.”

So much prestige was involved. It was a matter of the greatest importance how many servants I took with me and how many of these should accompany me into France. There came a time when I was certain there would be no marriage and I was not sure whether I was pleased or sorry. I should be disappointed if all the attention stopped, but on the other hand I thought it would be comforting to stay at home until I was twenty-three as Maria Amalia had. ? I have often, during the last months, thought of those i wrangles and wondered how different my life would have been if the statesmen had failed to come to an agreement.

But fate decided differently and at last agreement was reached.

The Marquis de Durfort returned to France to receive instructions from his master; there were hasty reconstructions to enlarge the French Embassy because there must be fifteen hundred guests and it would be a breach of etiquette to leave one out. Etiquette! That was a word I heard repeatedly.

News reached us that since there was to be rebuilding in Vienna, King Louis had decided that an opera house be erected at Versailles so that the wedding could be celebrated there.

My mother was determined that I should be provided with clothes as grand as anything the French could produce. I J could not help showing my delight with all this fuss surrounding me and sometimes I saw my mother watching me quizzically. I wonder now whether she was glad of my frivolity, J which prevented my being too concerned at the prospect of leaving home. After the suicidal attitude of Caroline must have been a relief.

When the Marquis de Durfort returned to Vienna really did seem like a wonderful game in which I ha been selected to play the biggest and most exciting role for this was the beginning of the official ceremonies. April had come and the weather was benign. On the seventeenth of that month the Ceremony of Renunciation took place, when I was called upon to renounce the hereditary Austrian Succession. It all seemed rather meaningless to me as I stood in the hall of the Burgplatz and signed the Act, which was in Latin, and took the Oath before the Bishop of Laylac I found the ceremony tedious but I enjoyed the banquet at ball which followed.

The huge ballroom was brilliantly lighted with threg thousand five hundred candles and I was told that eight hundred firemen had to work continuously with damp sponge because of the sparks which fell from the candles. When I danced I was oblivious of everything but the joy of dancing. I even forgot that this would be one of the last balls I should attend in my own country.

The very next day the Marquis de Durfort entertained the Austrian Court on behalf of the King of France, and of course this occasion must be as grand if not grander than that of the previous evening, so he hired the Lichteii. stein Palace in which to hold it. That was a wonderful evening too. I remember driving there it was in the suborj, of Rosseau and all along the road the trees had been illuminated, and between the trees dolphins had been set up each dolphin carrying a lantern. It was enchanting and e were exclaiming with wonder as we rode along.

In the ballroom the Marquis de Durfort had ordered th beautiful pictures be hung, symbolic of the occasion, and softline particularly remember one of myself on the road to France Spread out before me was a carpet of flowers which weight being thrown by a nymph representing love.

There were fireworks and music; and the splendour on that evening did in fact exceed ours, in spite of those three thousand five hundred candles. On the nineteenth I was married by proxy. This was all part of a game to me, for Ferdinand played the part of bride groom, and because my brother was standing proxy for the Dauphin of France it seemed exactly like one of those plays I used to watch my brothers and sisters perform, only now I was old enough to join in. Ferdinand and I knelt together at the altar and I kept saying to myself “Volo et ita promitto’ so that I should get it right when the moment came to say it aloud.

After the ceremony guns were fired at the Spitalplatz, and then . the banquet.

I was to leave my home two days later, and suddenly I began to realise what this was going to mean. It struck me that I might never see my mother again. She called me to her room and again gave me many instructions. I listened fearfully; I was beginning to feel apprehensive.

She told me to be seated at a desk and take up my pen. I was to write a letter to my grandfather, for the King of France would now be that.

I must remember it. I must seek to please him. I must obey him and never offend him. And now I must write to him. I was glad I was not expected to compose the letter. That would, indeed, have been beyond my powers; it was bad enough to have to write to my mother’s dictation. She watched me. I can imagine her fears. There I sat, my head on one side, frowning in concentration, biting my tongue, the tip of which protruded slightly, making the utmost effort, but only managing to produce a childish scrawl with crooked lines. I remember asking the King of France to be indulgent to me and begging him to ask the indulgence of the Dauphin on my behalf.

I paused to think of the Dauphin, the other important player in this . farce, comedy or tragedy? How could I know which it was to be?

Later I came to think of it as all three. What of the Dauphin? No one spoke much of him. Sometimes my attendants referred to him as though he were a handsome hero . as all princes should be. Of course he would be handsome. We should dance together and we should have babies.

How I longed for babies! Little goldenhaired children who would adore me. When I became a mother I should cease to be a child. Then I thought of Caroline—those poor pathetic letters of hers.

“He is very ugly … but one grows accustomed to that….” My mother had talked to me of everything that I might encounter at the Court of France . except my bridegroom.

My mother then put her arm about me and held me to her while she wrote to the King of France. I looked at her quick pen, admiring the skill with which it travelled over the paper. She was begging the King of France to care for her ‘very dear child. “

“I pray you be indulgent towards any thoughtless act of my dear child’s. She has a good heart, but she is impulsive and a little wild….” I felt the tears coming to my eyes because I was sorry for her. That seemed strange, but she was so worried because she knew me so well and she could guess at the sort of world into which I was being thrust.

The Marquis de Durfort had brought with him to Austria two carriages which the King of France had had made for the sole purpose of taking me to France. We had heard of these carriages in advance. They had been made by Francien, the leading camagemaker in Paris, and the King of France had ordered that no expense should be spared in the making.

Prancien had lived up to his reputation arid they were quite magnificent, lined with satin and decorated with paintings in delicate colours, with gold crowns on the outside to proclaim them royal carriages. I was to discover that they were not only the most beautiful I had ever travelled in but the most comfortable.

The Marquis came with a hundred and seventeen bodyguards, all in coloured uniforms; and it was boasted that the cost of this merry little cavalcade was about three hundred and fifty thousand ducats.

On the twenty-first of April my journey to France began. During the last few years I have often thought of my mother when she said goodbye to me. She knew it was the last time she would hold me in her arms, the last time she would kiss me. No doubt words came into her mind.

Remember this. Don’t do that. Surely she had said it all to me in her icy bedroom; but knowing me, she would realise that I had forgotten half of it by now. In any case I should have heard little of what she said to me. Now I knew she was praying silently to God and the Saints, asking them to guard me. She saw me as a helpless child wandering in the jungle.

“My dearest child,” she whispered; and suddenly I did not want to leave her. This was my home. I wanted to stay in it-even if it did mean lessons and painful hairstyles and lectures in a cold bedroom. I should not be fifteen until November and suddenly I felt very young and inexperienced. I wanted to plead to be allowed to stay at home for a little longer, but Monsieur de Durfort’s magnificent carriages were waiting; Kaunitz was looking impatient and relieved that all the bargaining was over. Only my mother was sad and I wondered if I could be alone with her and beg to be allowed to stay. But of course I could not. Much as she loved me she would never allow my whims to interfere with state affairs. It was a state affair. The thought made me want to laugh—and it pleased me too. I really was a very important person.

“Goodbye, my dearest child. I shall write to you regularly. It will be as though I am with you.”

“Yes, Mamma.”

“We shall be apart but I shall never cease to think of you until I die. Love me always. It is the only thing that can console me.”

And then I was getting into the carriage with Joseph, who was to accompany me for the first day. I had had little to do with Joseph, who was so much older and had become so important now that he was Emperor and co-ruler with my mother. He was kind, but because of my mood I found his pomposity irritating, and all the time he gave me advice to which I did not want to listen. I wanted to think about my little dogs, which the servants had assured me they would care for.

When we passed the Schonbrunn Palace I looked at the yellow walls and the green shutters and remembered how Caroline, Ferdinand, Max and I used to watch the older ones perform their plays, operas and ballets.

I remembered how the servants used to bring refreshments to us in the gardens—lemonade, which my mother thought was good for us, and little Viennese cakes covered with cream.

Before I left, my mother had given me a packet of papers which she said I was to read regularly. I had glanced at them and saw that they contained rules and regulations which she had already given me during our talks. I would read them later, I promised myself. I wanted now to think about the old times—the pleasantness of the days before Caroline and Maria Amalia had been so unhappy. I glanced at Joseph, who had had his own tragedies, and thought he seemed to have recovered as he sat there so serenely against the gorgeous satin upholstery.

“Always remember you are a German…. I wanted to yawn. Joseph in his laboured way was trying to impress upon me the importance of my marriage. Did I realise that my retinue consisted of one hundred and thirty-two persons? Yes, Joseph, I had heard it all before.

“Ladies-in-waiting, your servants, your hairdressers, dressmakers, secretaries, surgeons, pages, furriers, chaplains, cooks and so on.

Your grand postmaster the Prince of Paar has thirty-four subordinates.”

“Yes, Joseph, it is a great number.”

“It is not to be supposed that we should allow the French to think that we cannot send you off in a style to match their own. Did you know that we are using three hundred and seventy-six horses and that these horses have to be changed four or five times a day?”

“No, Joseph. But now you have told me.”

“You should know these things. Twenty thousand horses have been placed along the road from Vienna to Strasbourg to convey you and your retinue there.”

“It is a great number.”

I wished that he had talked to me more of his marriage and had warned me what to expect of mine. I was bored by these figures, and all the time I was fighting my desire to cry.

At Moick, which we reached after eight hours’ driving, we stayed at the Benedictine convent, where the scholars per formed an opera for us. It was a bore. I felt very sleepy, and as I kept thinking of the previous night, which I had spent in my mother’s bedroom in the Hofburg, I felt I wanted to cry for the comfort she could give me. For oddly enough, in spite of the lectures, she had comforted me; with out knowing it I had felt that while she was there, omnipotent and omniscient, I was safe because all her care was for me.

Joseph left me the next day and I was not sorry. He was a good brother who loved me but his conversation made me so tired and I always found it difficult to concentrate at the best of times.

What a long journey! The Princess of Paar shared my carriage and tried to comfort me by talking of the wonders of Versailles and what a brilliant future lay before me. To Enns, to Lambach, on to Nymphenburg. At Giinsburg we rested for two days with my father’s sister. Princess Charlotte I had vague memories of her at Schonbrunn for she had at one time been a member of our household. My father had been very fond of her and they used to take long walks together, but my mother resented her presence. Perhaps she resented anyone of whom my father was fond; and eventually Charlotte retired to Remiremont, where she became the Abbess. She talked lovingly of my father and I went with her to distribute food to the poor, which was a change from all the banquets and balls.

We crossed the Black Forest and came to the Abbey of Schiittern, where I was visited by the Comte de Noailles who was to be my guardian. He was old and very proud of the duty which had been entrusted to him by his friend the Due de Choiseul. I thought he was a vain old fellow and I was not sure whether I liked him. He did not stay long with me for there arose a difficulty about the ceremony which lay before me. It was again a matter of whose names should come first on a document.

Prince Starhemburg, who was going to hand me formally over to the French, was in a great passion about this; and so was the Comte de Noailles.

I felt very sad that night because I knew it was going to be my last on German soil. I suddenly found myself crying bitterly in the arms of the Princess of Paar and saying over and over again: “I shall never see my mother again.”

That day a letter had reached me from her. She must have sat down and written it as soon as I left; and I knew that she had written it in tears. Snatches of it come back to me now:

My dear child, you are now where Providence has placed you. Even if one were to think no more of the greatness of your position, you are the happiest of your brothers and sisters. You will find a tender father who will be at the same time your friend. Have every confidence in him. Love him and be submissive to him. I do not speak of the Dauphin. You know my delicacy on that subject. A wife is subject to her husband in all things and you should have no other aim than to please him and do his will. The only real happiness in this world comes through a happy marriage. I can say this from experience. And all depends on the woman, who should be willing, gentle and able to amuse. “

I read and re-read that letter. That night it was my greatest comfort.

The next day I would pass into my new country;

I would say goodbye to so many of the people who had accompanied me so far. There was so much I had to learn, so much which would be expected of me—and all I could do was cry for my mother.

“I shall never see her again,” I murmured into my pillow.