Recollections of Europe

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The Dauphine had scarcely disappeared, when her Royal Highness, Madame,
was announced, and the Duchess of Berri went through in a similar
manner. Her air was altogether less constrained, and she had smiles and
inclinations for all she passed. She is a slight, delicate, little
woman, with large blue eyes, a fair complexion, and light hair. She
struck me as being less a Bourbon than an Austrian, and, though wanting
in _embonpoint_, she would be quite pretty but for a cast in one of her
eyes.

A minute or two later, we had Monseigneur le Dauphin, who passed through
the gallery in the same manner as his wife and sister-in-law. He had
been reviewing some troops, and was in the uniform of a colonel of the
guards; booted to the knees, and carrying a military hat in his hand. He
is not of commanding presence, though I think he has the countenance of
an amiable man, and his face is decidedly Bourbon. We were indebted to
the same lantern like construction of the palace, for this preliminary
glimpse at so many of the actors in the coming scene.

After the passage of the Dauphin, a few courtiers and superior officers
of the household began to appear within the railed space. Among them
were five or six duchesses. Women of this rank have the privilege of
being seated in the presence of the king on state occasions, and
_tabourets_ were provided for them accordingly. A _tabouret_ is a
stuffed stool, nearly of the form of the ancient cerulean chair, without
its back, for a back would make it a chair at once, and, by the
etiquette of courts, these are reserved for the blood-royal,
ambassadors, etc. As none but duchesses could be seated at the _grand
couvert_, you may be certain none below that rank appeared. There might
have been a dozen present. They were all in high court dresses. One, of
great personal charms and quite young, was seated near me, and my
neighbour, an old _abbe_, carried away by enthusiasm, suddenly exclaimed
to me--"Quelle belle fortune, monsieur, d'etre jeune, jolie, et
duchesse!" I dare say the lady had the same opinion of the matter.

Baron Louis, not the financier, but the king's physician, arrived. It
was his duty to stand behind the king's chair, like Sancho's tormentor,
and see that he did not over-eat himself. The ancient usages were very
tender of the royal person. If he travelled, he had a spare litter, or a
spare coach, to receive him, in the event of accident,--a practice that
is continued to this day; if he ate, there was one to taste his food,
lest he might be poisoned; and when he lay down to sleep, armed
sentinels watched at the door of his chamber. Most of these usages are
still continued, in some form or other, and the ceremonies which are
observed at these public dinners are mere memorials of the olden time.

I was told the following anecdote by Mad. de ----, who was intimate with
Louis XVIII. One day, in taking an airing, the king was thirsty, and
sent a footman to a cottage for water. The peasants appeared with some
grapes, which they offered, as the homage of their condition. The king
took them and ate them, notwithstanding the remonstrances of his
attendants. This little incident was spoken of at court, where all the
monarch does and says becomes matter of interest, and the next time Mad.
de ---- was admitted, she joined her remonstrances to those of the other
courtiers. "We no longer live in an age when kings need dread
assassins," said Louis, smiling. A month passed, and Mad. de ---- was
again admitted. She was received with a melancholy shake of the head,
and with tears. The Duc de Berri had been killed in the interval!

A few gentlemen, who did not strictly belong to the court, appeared
among the duchesses, but, at the most, there were but six or eight. One
of them, however, was the gayest looking personage I ever saw in the
station of a gentleman, being nothing but lace and embroidery, even to
the seams of his coat; a sort of genteel harlequin. The _abbe_, who
seemed to understand himself, said he was a Spanish grandee.

I was near the little gate, when an old man, in a strictly court dress,
but plain and matter-of-fact in air, made an application for admittance.
In giving way for him to pass, my attention was drawn to his appearance.
The long white hair that hung down his face, the _cordon bleu_, the lame
foot, the imperturbable countenance, and the _unearthly aspect_, made me
suspect the truth. On inquiring, I was right. It was M. de Talleyrand!
He came as grand chamberlain, to officiate at the dinner of his master.

Everything, in a court, goes by clock-work. Your little great may be out
of time, and affect a want of punctuality, but a rigid attention to
appointments is indispensable to those who are really in high
situations. A failure in this respect would produce the same impression
on the affairs of men, that a delay in the rising of the sun would
produce on the day. The appearance of the different personages named,
all so near each other, was the certain sign that one greater than all
could not be far behind. They were the dawn of the royal presence.
Accordingly, the door which communicated with the apartments of the
king, and the only one within the railed space, opened with the
announcement of "Le service du Roi," when a procession of footmen of the
palace appeared, bearing the dishes of the first course. All the
vessels, whether already on the table, or those in their hands, were of
gold, richly wrought, or, at least, silver gilt, I had no means of
knowing which; most probably they were of the former metal. The dishes
were taken from the footmen by pages, of honour in scarlet dresses, and
by them placed in order on the table. The first course was no sooner
ready, than we heard the welcome announcement of "Le Roi." The family
immediately made their appearance, at the same door by which the service
had entered. They were followed by a proper number of lords and ladies
in waiting. Every one arose, as a matter of course, even to the "jeunes,
jolies, et duchesses;" and the music, as became it, gave us a royal
crash. The huissier, in announcing the king, spoke in a modest voice,
and less loud, I observed, than in announcing the Dauphin and the
ladies. It was, however, a different person; and it is probable one was
a common huissier, and the other a gentleman acting in that character.

Charles X. is tall, without being of a too heavy frame, flexible of
movement, and decidedly graceful. By remembering that he is king, and
the lineal chief of the ancient and powerful family of the Bourbons, by
deferring properly to history and the illusions of the past, and by
feeling _tant soit peu_ more respect for those of the present day than
is strictly philosophical, or perhaps wise, it is certainly possible to
fancy that he has a good deal of that peculiar port and majesty that the
poetry of feeling is so apt to impute to sovereigns. I know not whether
it is the fault of a cynical temperament, or of republican prejudices,
but I can see no more, about him than the easy grace of an old
gentleman, accustomed all his life to be a principal personage among the
principal personages of the earth. This you may think was quite
sufficient,--but it aid not altogether satisfy the _exigence_ of my
unpoetical ideas. His countenance betrayed, a species of vacant
_bonhommie_, rather than of thought or dignity of mind; and while he
possessed, in a singular degree, the mere physical machinery of his
rank, he was wanting in the majesty of character and expression, without
which no man can act well the representation of royalty. Even a little
more severity of aspect would have better suited the part, and rendered
_le grand couvert encore plus grand_.

The king seated himself, after receiving the salutations of the
courtiers within the railing, taking no notice however, of those who, by
a fiction of etiquette, were not supposed to be in his presence. The
rest of the family occupied their respective places in the order I have
named, and the eating and drinking began, from the score. The different
courses were taken off and served by footmen and pages in the manner
already described, which, after all, by substituting servants out of
livery for pages, is very much the way great dinners are served, in
great houses, all over Europe.

As soon as the king was seated, the north door of the gallery, or that
on the side opposite to the place where I had taken post, was opened,
and the public was admitted, passing slowly through the room without
stopping. A droller _melange_ could not be imagined than presented
itself in the panoramic procession; and long before the _grand couvert_
was over, I thought it much the most amusing part of the scene. Very
respectable persons, gentlemen certainly, and I believe in a few
instances ladies, came in this way, to catch a glimpse of the spectacle.
I saw several men that I knew, and the women with them could have been
no other than their friends. To these must be added, _cochers de
fiacres_ in their glazed hats, _bonnes_ in their high Norman caps,
peasants, soldiers in their shakos, _epiciers_ and _garcons_ without
number. The constant passage, for it lasted without intermission for an
hour and a half, of so many queer faces, reminded me strongly of one of
those mechanical panoramas, that bring towns, streets, and armies,
before the spectator. One of the droll effects of this scene was
produced by the faces, all of which turned, like sunflowers, towards the
light of royalty, as the bodies moved steadily on. Thus, on entering,
the eyes were a little inclined to the right; as they got nearer to the
meridian, they became gradually bent more aside; when opposite the
table, every face, was _full_; and, in retiring, all were bent backwards
over their owners' shoulders, constantly offering a dense crowd of
faces, looking towards a common centre, while the bodies were coming on,
or moving slowly off the stage. This, you will see, resembled in some
measure the revolutions of the moon around our orb, matter and a king
possessing the same beneficent attraction. I make no doubt, these good
people thought we presented a curious spectacle; but I am persuaded they
presented one that was infinitely more so.

I had seen in America, in divers places, an Englishman, a colonel in the
army. We had never been introduced, but had sat opposite to each other
at _tables d'hotes_, jostled each other in the President's House, met in
steam-boats, in the streets, and in many other places, until it was
evident our faces were perfectly familiar to both parties; and yet we
never nodded, spoke, or gave any other sign of recognition, than by
certain knowing expressions of the eyes. In Europe, the colonel
reappeared. We met in London, in Paris, in the public walks, in the
sight-seeing places of resort, until we evidently began to think
ourselves a couple of Monsieur Tonsons. To-night, as I was standing near
the public platform, whose face should appear in the halo of
countenances but that of my colonel! The poor fellow had a wooden leg,
and he was obliged to stump on in his orbit as well as he could, while I
kept my eye on him, determined to catch a look of recognition if
possible. When he got so far forward as to bring me in his line of
sight, our eyes met, and he smiled involuntarily. Then he took a
deliberate survey of my comfortable position, and he disappeared in the
horizon, with some such expression on his features as must have belonged
to Commodore Trunnion, when he called out to Hatchway, while the hunter
was leaping over the lieutenant, "Oh! d--n you; you are well anchored!"

I do not think the dinner, in a culinary point of view, was anything
extraordinary. The king ate and drank but little, for, unlike his two
brothers and predecessors, he is said to be abstemious. The Daupin
played a better knife and fork; but on the whole, the execution was by
no means great for Frenchmen. The guests sat so far apart, and the music
made so much noise, that conversation was nearly out of the question;
though the King and the Dauphin exchanged a few words in the course of
the evening. Each of the gentlemen, also, spoke once or twice to his
female neighbour, and that was pretty much the amount of the discourse.
The whole party appeared greatly relieved by having something to do
during the desert, in admiring the service, which was of the beautiful
Sevres china. They all took up the plates, and examined them
attentively; and really I was glad they had so rational an amusement to
relieve their _ennui_.

Once, early in the entertainment, M. de Talleyrand approached the king,
and showed him the bill of fare! It was an odd spectacle to see this old
_diplomate_ descending to the pantomime of royalty, and acting the part
of a _maitre d'hotel_. Had the duty fallen on Cambaceres, one would
understand it, and fancy that it might be well done. The king smiled on
him graciously, and, I presume, gave him leave to retire; for soon after
this act of loyal servitude, the prince disappeared. As for M. Louis, he
treated Charles better than his brother treated Sancho; for I did not
observe the slightest interference, on his part, during the whole
entertainment; though one of those near me said he had tasted a dish or
two by way of ceremony,--an act of precaution that I did not myself
observe. I asked my neighbour, the _abbe_, what he thought of M. de
Talleyrand. After looking up in my face distrustfully, he
whispered:--"Mais, monsieur, c'est un chat qui tombe toujours sur ses
pieds;" a remark that was literally true tonight, for, the old man was
kept on his feet longer than could have been agreeable to the owner of
two such gouty legs.

The Duchesse de Berri, who sat quite near the place where I stood, was
busy a good deal of the time _a lorgner_ the public through her
eye-glass. This she did with very little diffidence of manner, and quite
as coolly as an English duchess would have stared at a late intimate
whom she was disposed to cut. It certainly was neither a graceful, nor a
feminine, nor a princely occupation. The Dauphine played the Bourbon
better; though, when she turned her saddened, not to say _cruel_ eyes,
on the public, it was with an expression that almost amounted to
reproach. I did not see her smile once during the whole time she was at
table; and yet _I_ thought there were many things to smile at.

At length the finger-bowls appeared, and I was not sorry to see them.
Contrary to what is commonly practised in very great houses, the pages
placed them on the table, just as Henri puts them before us democrats
every day. I ought to have said, that the service was made altogether in
front, or at the unoccupied side of the table, nothing but the bill of
fare, in the hands of M. de Talleyrand, appearing in the rear. As soon as
this part of the dinner was over, the king arose, and the whole party
withdrew by the door on the further side of the galery. In passing the
_gradins_ of the ladies, he stopped to says a few kind words to an old
woman who was seated there, muffled in a cloak, and the light of royalty
vanished.

The catastrophe is to come. The instant the king's back was turned, the
gallery became a scene of confusion. The musicians ceased playing, and
began to chatter; the pages dashed about to remove the service, and
everybody was in motion. Observing that your ---- was standing undecided
what to do, I walked into the railed area, brushed past the gorgeous
state table, and gave her my arm. She laughed, and said it had all been
very magnificent and amusing, but that some one had stolen her shawl! A
few years before, I had purchased for her a merino shawl, of singular
fineness, simplicity, and beauty. It was now old, and she had worn it on
this occasion, because she distrusted the dirt of a palace; and laying
it carelessly by her side, in the course of the evening she had found in
its place a very common thing of the same colour. The thief was deceived
by its appearance your ---- being dressed for an evening party, and had
probably mistaken it for a cashmere. So much for the company one meets
at court! Too much importance, however, must not be attached to this
little _contretems_, as people of condition are apt to procure tickets
for such places, and to give them to their _femmes de chambre_.
Probably, half the women present, the "jeunes et jolies" excepted, were
of this class. But mentioning this affair to the old Princesse de ----,
she edified me by an account of the manner in which Madame la Comtesse
de ---- had actually appropriated to the service of her own pretty person
the _cachemire_ of Madame la Baronne de ----, in the royal presence; and
how there was a famous quarrel, _a l'outrance_, about it; so I suspend
my opinions as to the quality of the thief.

LETTER X.

Road to Versailles.--Origin of Versailles.--The present Chateau.--The
two Trianons.--La Petite Suisse.--Royal Pastime.--Gardens of Versailles.
--The State Apartments.--Marie Antoinette's Chamber.--Death of Louis XV.
--Oeil de Boeuf.--The Theatre and Chapel.--A
Quarry.--Caverns.--Compiegne.--Chateau de Pierre-font.--Influence of
Monarchy.--Orangery at Versailles.

To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.

We have been to Versailles, and although I have no intention to give a
laboured description of a place about which men have written and talked
these two centuries, it is impossible to pass over a spot of so much
celebrity in total silence.

The road to Versailles lies between the park of St. Cloud and the
village and manufactories of Sevres. A little above the latter is a
small palace, called Meudon, which, from its great elevation, commands a
fine view of Paris. The palace of St. Cloud, of course, stands in the
park; Versailles lies six or eight miles farther west; Compiegne is
about fifty miles from Paris in one direction; Fontainebleau some thirty
in another, and Rambouillet rather more remotely, in a third. All these
palaces, except Versailles, are kept up, and from time to time are
visited by the court. Versailles was stripped of its furniture in the
revolution; and even Napoleon, at a time when the French empire extended
from Hamburgh to Rome, shrunk from the enormous charge of putting it in
a habitable state. It is computed that the establishment at Versailles,
first and last, in matters of construction merely, cost the French
monarchy two hundred millions of dollars! This is almost an incredible
sum, when we remember the low price of wages in France; but, on the
other hand, when we consider the vastness of the place, how many natural
difficulties were overcome, and the multitude of works from the hands of
artists of the first order it contained, it scarcely seems sufficient.

Versailles originated as a hunting-seat, in the time of Louis XIII. In
that age, most of the upland near Paris, in this direction, lay in
forest, royal chases; and, as hunting was truly a princely sport,
numberless temporary residences of this nature existed in the
neighbourhood of the capital. There are still many remains of this
barbarous magnificence, as in the wood of Vincennes, the forest of St.
Germain, Compiegne, Fontainebleau, and divers others; but great inroads
have been made in their limits by the progress of civilization and the
wants of society. So lately as the reign of Louis XV. they hunted quite
near the town; and we are actually, at this moment, dwelling in a
country house, at St. Ouen, in which, tradition hatch it, he was wont to
take his refreshments.

The original building at Versailles was a small chateau, of a very ugly
formation, and it was built of bricks. I believe it was enlarged, but
not entirely constructed, by Louis XIII. A portion of this building is
still visible, having been embraced in the subsequent structures; and,
judging from its architecture, I should think it must be nearly as
ancient as the time of Francis I. Around this modest nucleus was
constructed, by a succession of monarchs, but chiefly by Louis XIV. the
most regal residence of Europe, in magnificence and extent, if not in
taste.

The present chateau, besides containing numberless wings and courts, has
vast _casernes_ for the quarters of the household troops, stables for
many hundred horses, and is surrounded by a great many separate hotels,
for the accommodation of the courtiers. It offers a front on the garden,
in a single continuous line, that is broken only by a projection in the
centre of more than a third of a mile in length. This is the only
complete part of the edifice that possesses uniformity; the rest of it
being huge piles grouped around irregular courts, or thrown forward in
wings, that correspond to the huge body like those of the ostrich. There
is on the front next the town, however, some attempt at simplicity and
intelligibility of plan; for there is a vast open court lined by
buildings, which have been commenced in the Grecian style. Napoleon, I
believe, did something here, from which there is reason to suppose that
he sometimes thought of inhabiting the palace. Indeed, so long as France
has a king, it is impossible that such a truly royal abode can ever be
wholly deserted. At present, it is the fashion to grant lodgings in it
to dependants and favourites. Nothing that I have seen gives me so just
and so imposing an idea of the old French monarchy as a visit to
Versailles. Apart from the vastness and splendour of the palace, here is
a town that actually contained, in former times, a hundred thousand
souls, that entirely owed its existence to the presence of the court.
Other monarchs lived in large towns; but here was a monarch whose
presence created one. Figure to yourself the style of the prince, when a
place more populous than Baltimore, and infinitely richer in externals,
existed merely as an appendage to his abode!

The celebrated garden contains two or three hundred acres of land,
besides the ground that is included in the gardens of the two Trianons.
These Trianons are small palaces erected in the gardens, as if the
occupants of the chateau, having reached the acme of magnificence and
splendour in the principal residence, were seeking refuge against the
effect of satiety in these humbler abodes. They appear small and
insignificant after the palace; but the Great Trianon is a considerable
house, and contains a fine suite of apartments, among which are some
very good rooms. There are few English abodes of royalty that equal even
this of Le Grand Trianon. The Petit Trianon was the residence of Madame
de Maintenon; it afterwards was presented to the unfortunate Marie
Antoinette, who, in part converted its grounds into an English garden,
in addition to setting aside a portion into what is called La Petite
Suisse.

We went through this exceedingly pretty house and its gardens with
melancholy interest. The first is merely a pavilion in the Italian
taste, though it is about half as large as the President's House, at
Washington. I should think the Great Trianon has quite twice the room of
our own Executive residence; and, as you can well imagine, from what has
already been said, the Capitol itself would be but a speck among the
endless edifices of the chateau. The projection in the centre of the
latter is considerably larger than the capitol, and it materially
exceeds that building in cubic contents. Now this projection is but a
small part indeed of the long line of facade, it actually appearing too
short for the ranges of wings.

Marie Antoinette was much censured for the amusements in which she
indulged in the grounds of the Little Trianon, and vulgar rumour
exaggerating their nature, no small portion of her personal unpopularity
is attributable to this cause. The family of Louis XVI. appears to have
suffered for the misdeeds of its predecessors, for it not being very
easy to fancy anything much worse than the immoralities of Louis XV. the
public were greatly disposed "to visit the sins of the fathers on the
children."

La Petite Suisse is merely a romantic portion of the garden, in which
has been built what is called the Swiss Hamlet It contains the miniature
abodes of the Cure, the Farmer, the Dairywoman, the Garde-de-Chasse, and
the Seigneur, besides the mill. There is not much that is Swiss,
however, about the place, with the exception of some resemblance in the
exterior of the buildings. Here, it is said, the royal family used
occasionally to meet, and pass an afternoon in a silly representation of
rural life, that must have proved to be a prodigious caricature. The
King (at least, so the guide affirmed), performed the part of the
Seigneur, and occupied the proper abode; the Queen was the Dairy woman,
and we were shown the marble tables that held her porcelain milk-pans;
the present King, as became his notorious propensity to field-sports,
was the Garde-de-Chasse, the late King was the Miller, and, _mirabile
dictu_, the Archbishop of Paris did not disdain to play the part of the
Cure. There was, probably, a good deal of poetry in this account; though
it is pretty certain that the Queen did indulge in some of these
phantasies. There happened to be with me, the day I visited this spot,
an American from our own mountains, who had come fresh from home, with
all his provincial opinions and habits strong about him. As the guide
explained these matters, I translated them literally into English for
the benefit of my companion, adding, that the fact rendered the Queen
extremely unpopular with her subjects. "Unpopular!" exclaimed my country
neighbour; "why so, sir?" "I cannot say; perhaps they thought it was not
a fit amusement for a queen." My mountaineer stood a minute cogitating
the affair in his American mind; and then nodding his head, he said:--"I
understand it now. The people thought that a king and queen, coming from
yonder palace to amuse themselves in this toy hamlet, in the characters
of poor people, _were making game of them_!" I do not know whether this
inference will amuse you as much as it did me at the time.

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