The Ancient Regime Part 9

Not that the drawing room needs all that to be filled. Being the source of all preferment and of every favor, it is natural that it should overflow[2129]. It is the same in our leveling society (in 1875), where the drawing room of an insignificant deputy, a mediocre journalist, or a fas.h.i.+onable woman, is full of courtiers under the name of friends and visitors. Moreover, here, to be present is an obligation; it might be called a continuation of ancient feudal homage; the staff of n.o.bles is maintained as the retinue of its born general. In the language of the day, it is called "paying one's duty to the king." Absence, in the sovereign's eyes, would be a sign of independence as well as of indifference, while submission as well as regular attention is his due.

In this respect we must study the inst.i.tution from the beginning.

The eyes of Louis XIV go their rounds at every moment, "on arising or retiring, on pa.s.sing into his apartments, in his gardens,. . . n.o.body escapes, even those who hoped they were not seen; it was a demerit with some, and the most distinguished, not to make the court their ordinary sojourn, to others to come to it but seldom, and certain disgrace to those who never, or nearly never, came."[2130] Henceforth, the main thing, for the first personages in the kingdom, men and women, ecclesiastics and laymen, the grand affair, the first duty in life, the true occupation, is to be at all hours and in every place under the king's eye, within reach of his voice and of his glance. "Whoever," says La Bruyere, "considers that the king's countenance is the courtier's supreme felicity, that he pa.s.ses his life looking on it and within sight of it, will comprehend to some extent how to see G.o.d const.i.tutes the glory and happiness of the saints." There were at this time prodigies of voluntary a.s.siduity and subjection. The Duc de Fronsac, every morning at seven o'clock, in winter and in summer, stationed himself, at his father's command, at the foot of the small stairway leading to the chapel, solely to shake hands with Mme. de Maintenon on her leaving for St. Cyr.[2131] "Pardon me, Madame," writes the Duc de Richelieu to her, "the great liberty I take in presuming to send you the letter which I have written to the king, begging him on my knees that he will occasionally allow me to pay my court to him at Ruel, for I would rather die than pa.s.s two months without seeing him." The true courtier follows the prince as a shadow follows its body; such, under Louis XIV, was the Duc de la Rochefoucauld, the master of the hounds. "He never missed the king's rising or retiring, both changes of dress every day, the hunts and the promenades, likewise every day, for ten years in succession, never sleeping away from the place where the king rested, and yet on a footing to demand leave, but not to stay away all night, for he had not slept out of Paris once in forty years, but to go and dine away from the court, and not be present on the promenade."--If; later, and under less exacting masters, and in the general laxity of the eighteenth century, this discipline is relaxed, the inst.i.tution nevertheless subsists;[2132]

in default of obedience, tradition, interest and amour-propre suffice for the people of the court. To approach the king, to be a domestic in his household, an usher, a cloak-bearer, a valet, is a privilege that is purchased, even in 1789, for thirty, forty, and a hundred thousand livres; so much greater the reason why it is a privilege to form a part of his society, the most honorable, the most useful, and the most coveted of all.--In the first place, it is a proof of n.o.ble birth. A man, to follow the king in the chase, and a woman, to be presented to the queen, must previously satisfy the genealogist, and by authentic doc.u.ments, that his or her n.o.bility goes back to the year 1400.--In the next place, it ensures good fortune. This drawing room is the only place within reach of royal favors; accordingly, up to 1789, the great families never stir away from Versailles, and day and night they lie in ambush. The valet of the Marshal de Noaillles says to him one night on closing his curtains,

"At what hour will Monseigneur be awakened?" "At ten o'clock, if no one dies during the night."[2133]

Old courtiers are still found who, "at the age of eighty, have pa.s.sed forty-five on their feet in the antechambers of the king, of the princes, and of the ministers. . .

"You have only three things to do," says one of them to a debutant, "speak well of everybody, ask for every vacancy, and sit down when you can."

Hence, the king always has a crowd around him. The Comtesse du Barry says, on presenting her niece at court, the first of August, 1773, "the crowd is so great at a presentation, one can scarcely get through the antechambers."[2134] In December, 1774, at Fontainebleau, when the queen plays at her own table every evening, "the apartment, though vast, is never empty. . . . The crowd is so great that one can talk only to the two or three persons with whom one is playing." The fourteen apartments, at the receptions of amba.s.sadors are full to overflowing with seigniors and richly dressed women. On the first of January, 1775, the queen "counted over two hundred ladies presented to her to pay their court."

In 1780, at Choisy, a table for thirty persons is spread every day for the king, another with thirty places for the seigniors, another with forty places for the officers of the guard and the equerries, and one with fifty for the officers of the bedchamber. According to my estimate, the king, on getting up and on retiring, on his walks, on his hunts, at play, has always around him at least forty or fifty seigniors and generally a hundred, with as many ladies, besides his attendants on duty. At Fontainebleau, in 1756, although "there were neither fetes nor ballets this year, one hundred and six ladies were counted." When the king holds a "grand apartement," when play or dancing takes place in the gallery of mirrors, four or five hundred guests, the elect of the n.o.bles and of the fas.h.i.+on, range themselves on the benches or gather around the card and cavanole tables.[2135] This is a spectacle to be seen, not by the imagination, or through imperfect records, but with our own eyes and on the spot, to comprehend the spirit, the effect and the triumph of monarchical culture. In an elegantly furnished house, the drawing room is the princ.i.p.al room; and never was one more dazzling than this.

Suspended from the sculptured ceiling peopled with sporting cupids, descend, by garlands of flowers and foliage, blazing chandeliers, whose splendor is enhanced by the tail mirrors; the light streams down in floods on gilding, diamonds, and beaming, arch physiognomies, on fine busts, and on the capacious, sparkling and garlanded dresses. The skirts of the ladies ranged in a circle, or in tiers on the benches, "form a rich espalier covered with pearls, gold, silver, jewels, spangles, flowers and fruits, with their artificial blossoms, gooseberries, cherries, and strawberries," a gigantic animated bouquet of which the eye can scarcely support the brilliancy. There are no black coats, as nowadays, to disturb the harmony. With the hair powdered and dressed, with buckles and knots, with cravats and ruffles of lace, in silk coats and vests of the hues of fallen leaves, or of a delicate rose tint, or of celestial blue, embellished with gold braid and embroidery, the men are as elegant as the women. Men and women, each is a selection; they all are of the accomplished cla.s.s, gifted with every grace which good blood, education, fortune, leisure and custom can bestow; they are perfect of their kind. There is no toilet, no carriage of the head, no tone of the voice, no expression in language which is not a masterpiece of worldly culture, the distilled quintessence of all that is exquisitely elaborated by social art. Polished as the high society of Paris may be, it does not approach this;[2136] compared with the court, it seems provincial. It is said that a hundred thousand roses are required to make an ounce of the unique perfume used by Persian kings; such is this drawing-room, the frail vial of crystal and gold containing the substance of a human vegetation. To fill it, a great aristocracy had to be transplanted to a hot-house and become sterile in fruit and flowers, and then, in the royal alembic, its pure sap is concentrated into a few drops of aroma. The price is excessive, but only at this price can the most delicate perfumes be manufactured.

IV. Everyday Life In Court.

The king's occupations.--Rising in the morning, ma.s.s, dinner, walks, hunting, supper, play, evening receptions.

--He is always on parade and in company.

An operation of this kind absorbs him who undertakes it as well as those who undergo it. A n.o.bility for useful purposes is not transformed with impunity into a n.o.bility for ornament;[2137] one falls himself into the ostentation which is subst.i.tuted for action. The king has a court which he is compelled to maintain. So much the worse if it absorbs all his time, his intellect, his soul, the most valuable portion of his active forces and the forces of the State. To be the master of a house is not an easy task, especially when five hundred persons are to be entertained; one must necessarily pa.s.s one's life in public and all the time being on exhibition. Strictly speaking it is the life of an actor who is on the stage the entire day. To support this load, and work besides, required the temperament of Louis XIV, the vigor of his body, the extraordinary firmness of his nerves, the strength of his digestion, and the regularity of his habits; his successors who come after him grow weary or stagger under the same load. But they cannot throw it off; an incessant, daily performance is inseparable from their position and it is imposed on them like a heavy, gilded, ceremonial coat. The king is expected to keep the entire aristocracy busy, consequently to make a display of himself, to pay back with his own person, at all hours, even the most private, even on getting out of bed, and even in his bed. In the morning, at the hour named by himself beforehand,[2138] the head valet awakens him; five series of persons enter in turn to perform their duty, and, "although very large, there are days when the waiting-rooms can hardly contain the crowd of courtiers."--The first admittance is "l'entree familiere," consisting of the children of France, the princes and princesses of the blood, and, besides these, the chief physician, the chief surgeon and other serviceable persons.[2139] Next, comes the "grande entree;' which comprises the grand-chamberlain, the grand-master and master of the wardrobe, the first gentlemen of the bedchamber, the Ducs d'Orleans and de Penthievre, some other highly favored seigniors, the ladies of honor and in waiting of the queen, Mesdames and other princesses, without enumerating barbers tailors and various descriptions of valets. Meanwhile spirits of wine are poured on the king's hands from a service of plate, and he is then handed the basin of holy water; he crosses himself and repeats a prayer. Then he gets out of bed before all these people and puts on his slippers. The grand-chamberlain and the first gentleman hand him his dressing-gown; he puts this on and seats himself in the chair in which he is to put on his clothes. At this moment the door opens and a third group enters, which is the "entree des brevets;" the seigniors who compose this enjoy, in addition, the precious privilege of a.s.sisting at the "pet.i.te coucher," while, at the same moment there enters a detachment of attendants, consisting of the physicians and surgeons in ordinary, the intendants of the amus.e.m.e.nts, readers and others, and among the latter those who preside over physical requirements; the publicity of a royal life is so great that none of its functions can be exercised without witnesses. At the moment of the approach of the officers of the wardrobe to dress him the first gentleman, notified by an usher, advances to read to the king the names of the grandees who are waiting at the door: this is the fourth entry called "la chambre," and larger than those preceding it; for, not to mention the cloak-bearers, gun-bearers, rug-bearers and other valets it comprises most of the superior officials, the grand-almoner, the almoners on duty, the chaplain, the master of the oratory, the captain and major of the body-guard, the colonel-general and major of the French guards, the colonel of the king's regiment, the captain of the Cent Suisses, the grand-huntsman, the grand wolf-huntsman, the grand-provost, the grand-master and master of ceremonies, the first butler, the grand-master of the pantry, the foreign amba.s.sadors, the ministers and secretaries of state, the marshals of France and most of the seigniors and prelates of distinction. Ushers place the ranks in order and, if necessary, impose silence. Meanwhile the king washes his hands and begins his toilet. Two pages remove his slippers; the grand-master of the wardrobe draws off his night-s.h.i.+rt by the right arm, and the first valet of the wardrobe by the left arm, and both of them hand it to an officer of the wardrobe, whilst a valet of the wardrobe fetches the s.h.i.+rt wrapped up in white taffeta. Things have now reached the solemn point, the culmination of the ceremony; the fifth entry has been introduced, and, in a few moments, after the king has put his s.h.i.+rt on, all that is left of those who are known, with other house hold officers waiting in the gallery, complete the influx. There is quite a formality in regard to this s.h.i.+rt. The honor of handing it is reserved to the sons and grandsons of France; in default of these to the princes of the blood or those legitimized; in their default to the grand-chamberlain or to the first gentleman of the bedchamber;--the latter case, it must be observed, being very rare, the princes being obliged to be present at the king's lever, as were the princesses at that of the queen.[2140]

At last the s.h.i.+rt is presented and a valet carries off the old one; the first valet of the wardrobe and the first valet-de-chambre hold the fresh one, each by a right and left arm respectively,[2141] while two other valets, during this operation, extend his dressing-gown in front of him to serve as a screen. The s.h.i.+rt is now on his back and the toilet commences. A valet-de-chambre supports a mirror before the king while two others on the two sides light it up, if occasion requires, with flambeaux. Valets of the wardrobe fetch the rest of the attire; the grand-master of the wardrobe puts the vest on and the doublet, attaches the blue ribbon, and clasps his sword around him; then a valet a.s.signed to the cravats brings several of these in a basket, while the master of the wardrobe arranges around the king's neck that which the king selects. After this a valet a.s.signed to the handkerchiefs brings three of these on a silver salver, while the grand-master of the wardrobe offers the salver to the king, who chooses one. Finally the master of the wardrobe hands to the king his hat, his gloves and his cane. The king then steps to the side of the bed, kneels on a cus.h.i.+on and says his prayers, whilst an almoner in a low voice recites the orison Quoesumus, deus omnipotens. This done, the king announces the order of the day, and pa.s.ses with the leading persons of his court into his cabinet, where he sometimes gives audience. Meanwhile the rest of the company await him in the gallery in order to accompany him to ma.s.s when he comes out.

Such is the lever, a piece in five acts.--Nothing could be contrived better calculated to fill up the void of an aristocratic life; a hundred or thereabouts of notable seigniors dispose of a couple of hours in coming, in waiting, in entering, in defiling, in taking positions, in standing on their feet, in maintaining an air of respect and of ease suitable to a superior cla.s.s of walking gentlemen, while those best qualified are about to do the same thing over in the queen's apartment.[2142]--The king, however, as an indirect consequence, suffers the same torture and the same inaction as he imposes. He also is playing a part; all his steps and all his gestures have been determined beforehand; he has been obliged to arrange his physiognomy and his voice, never to depart from an affable and dignified air, to award judiciously his glances and his nods, to keep silent or to speak only of the chase, and to suppress his own thoughts, if he has any. One cannot indulge in reverie, meditate or be absent-minded when one is before the footlights; the part must have due attention. Besides, in a drawing room there is only drawing room conversation, and the master's thoughts, instead of being directed in a profitable channel, must be scattered about like the holy water of the court. All hours of his day are pa.s.sed in a similar manner, except three or four during the morning, during which he is at the council or in his private room; it must be noted, too, that on the days after his hunts, on returning home from Rambouillet at three o'clock in the morning, he must sleep the few hours he has left to him. The amba.s.sador Mercy,[2143] nevertheless, a man of close application, seems to think it sufficient; he, at least, thinks that "Louis XVI is a man of order, losing no time in useless things;"

his predecessor, indeed, worked much less, scarcely an hour a day.

Three-quarters of his time is thus given up to show. The same retinue surrounds him when he puts on his boots, when he takes them off; when he changes his clothes to mount his horse, when he returns home to dress for the evening, and when he goes to his room at night to retire. "Every evening for six years, says a page,[2144] either myself or one of my comrades has seen Louis XVI get into bed in public," with the ceremonial just described. "It was not omitted ten times to my knowledge, and then accidentally or through indisposition." The attendance is yet more numerous when he dines and takes supper; for, besides men there are women present, d.u.c.h.esses seated on the folding-chairs, also others standing around the table. It is needless to state that in the evening when he plays, or gives a ball, or a concert, the crowd rushes in and overflows. When he hunts, besides the ladies on horses and in vehicles, besides officers of the hunt, of the guards, the equerry, the cloak-bearer, gun-bearer, surgeon, bone-setter, lunch-bearer and I know not how many others, all the gentlemen who accompany him are his permanent guests. And do not imagine that this suite is a small one;[2145] the day M. de Chateaubriand is presented there are four fresh additions, and "with the utmost punctuality" all the young men of high rank join the king's retinue two or three times a week. Not only the eight or ten scenes which compose each of these days, but again the short intervals between the scenes are besieged and carried. People watch for him, walk by his side and speak with him on his way from his cabinet to the chapel, between his apartment and his carriage, between his carriage and his apartment, between his cabinet and his dining room.

And still more, his life behind the scenes belongs to the public. If he is indisposed and broth is brought to him, if he is ill and medicine is handed to him, "a servant immediately summons the 'grande entree.'"

Verily, the king resembles an oak stifled by the innumerable creepers which, from top to bottom, cling to its trunk. Under a regime of this stamp there is a want of air; some opening has to be found; Louis XV availed himself of the chase and of suppers; Louis XVI of the chase and of lock-making. And I have not mentioned the infinite detail of etiquette, the extraordinary ceremonial of the state dinner, the fifteen, twenty and thirty beings busy around the king's plates and gla.s.ses, the sacramental utterances of the occasion, the procession of the retinue, the arrival of "la nef" "l'essai des plats," all as if in a Byzantine or Chinese court.[2146] On Sundays the entire public, the public in general, is admitted, and this is called the "grand couvert,"

as complex and as solemn as a high ma.s.s. Accordingly to eat, to drink, to get up, to go to bed, is to a descendant of Louis XIV, to officiate.[2147] Frederick II, on hearing an explanation of this etiquette, declared that if he were king of France his first edict would be to appoint another king to hold court in his place. In effect, if there are idlers to salute there must be an idler to be saluted. Only one way was possible by which the monarch could have been set free, and that was to have recast and transformed the French n.o.bles, according to the Prussian system, into a hard-working regiment of serviceable functionaries. But, so long as the court remains what it is, that is to say, a pompous parade and a drawing room decoration, the king himself must likewise remain a showy decoration, of little or no use.

V. Royal Distractions.

Diversions of the royal family and of the court.--Louis XV.

--Louis XVI.

In short, what is the occupation of a well-qualified master of a house? He amuses himself and he amuses his guests; under his roof a new pleasure-party comes off daily. Let us enumerate those of a week.

"Yesterday, Sunday," says the Duc de Luynes, "I met the king going to hunt on the plain of St. Denis, having slept at la Muette, where he intends to remain shooting to day and to-morrow, and to return here on Tuesday or Wednesday morning, to run down a stag the same day, Wednesday."[2148] Two months after this, "the king," again says M. de Luynes, "has been hunting every day of the past and of the present week, except to day and on Sundays, killing, since the beginning, 3,500 partridges." He is always on the road, or hunting, or pa.s.sing from one residence to another, from Versailles to Fontainebleau, to Choisy, to Marly, to la Muette, to Compiegne, to Trianon, to Saint-Hubert, to Bellevue, to Rambouillet, and, generally, with his entire court.[2149]

At Choisy, especially, and at Fontainebleau this company all lead a merry life. At Fontainebleau "Sunday and Friday, play; Monday and Wednesday, a concert in the queen's apartments; Tuesday and Thursday, the French comedians; and Sat.u.r.day it is the Italians;" there is something for every day in the week. At Choisy, writes the Dauphine,[2150] "from one o'clock (in the afternoon) when we dine, to one o'clock at night we remain out. . . After dining we play until six o'clock, after which we go to the theater, which lasts until half-past nine o'clock, and next, to supper; after this, play again, until one, and sometimes half-past one, o'clock." At Versailles things are more moderate; there are but two theatrical entertainments and one ball a week; but every evening there is play and a reception in the king's apartment, in his daughters', in his mistress's, in his daughter-in-law's, besides hunts and three petty excursions a week.

Records show that, in a certain year, Louis XV slept only fifty-two nights at Versailles, while the Austrian Amba.s.sador well says that "his mode of living leaves him not an hour in the day for attention to important matters."--As to Louis XVI, we have seen that he reserves a few hours of the morning; but the machine is wound up, and go it must.

How can he withdraw himself from his guests and not do the honors of his house? Here propriety and custom are tyrants and a third despotism must be added, still more absolute: the imperious vivacity of a lively young queen who cannot endure an hour's reading.--At Versailles, three theatrical entertainments and two b.a.l.l.s a week, two grand suppers Tuesday and Thursday, and from time to time, the opera in Paris.[2151]

At Fontainebleau, the theater three times a week, and on other days, play and suppers. During the following winter the queen gives a masked ball each week, in which "the contrivance of the costumes, the quadrilles arranged in ballets, and the daily rehearsals, take so much time as to consume the entire week." During the carnival of 1777 the queen, besides her own fetes, attends the b.a.l.l.s of the Palais-Royal and the masked b.a.l.l.s of the opera; a little later, I find another ball at the abode of the Comtesse Diana de Polignac, which she attends with the whole royal family, except Mesdames, and which lasts from half-past eleven o'clock at night until eleven o'clock the next morning.

Meanwhile, on ordinary days, there is the rage of faro; in her drawing room "there is no limit to the play; in one evening the Duc de Chartres loses 8,000 louis. It really resembles an Italian carnival; there is nothing lacking, neither masks nor the comedy of private life; they play, they laugh, they dance, they dine, they listen to music, they don costumes, they get up picnics (fetes-champetres), they indulge in gossip and gallantries." "The newest song,"[2152] says a cultivated, earnest lady of the bedchamber, "the current witticism and little scandalous stories, formed the sole subjects of conversation in the queen's circle of intimates."--As to the king, who is rather dull and who requires physical exercise, the chase is his most important occupation.

Between 1755 and 1789,[2153] he himself, on recapitulating what he had accomplished, finds "104 boar-hunts, 134 stag-hunts, 266 of bucks, 33 with hounds, and 1,025 shootings," in all 1,562 hunting-days, averaging at least one hunt every three days; besides this there are a 149 excursions without hunts, and 223 promenades on horseback or in carriages. "During four months of the year he goes to Rambouillet twice a week and returns after having supped, that is to say, at three o'clock in the morning."[2154] This inveterate habit ends in becoming a mania, and even in something worse. "The nonchalance," writes Arthur Young, June 26, 1789, "and even stupidity of the court, is unparalleled; the moment demands the greatest decision, and yesterday, while it was actually a question whether he should be a doge of Venice or a king of France, the king went a hunting!" His journal reads like that of a gamekeeper's. On reading it at the most important dates one is amazed at its entries. He writes nothing on the days not devoted to hunting, which means that to him these days are of no account:

July 11, 1789, nothing; M. Necker leaves.

July 12th vespers and benediction; Messieurs de Montmorin, de Saint-Priest and de la Luzerne leave.

July 13th, nothing.

July 14th, nothing.

July 29th, nothing; M. Necker returns.....

August 4th, stag-hunt in the forest at Marly; took one; go and come on horseback.

August 13th, audience of the States in the gallery; Te Deum during the ma.s.s below; one stag taken in the hunt at Marly. . .

August 25th, complimentary audience of the States; high ma.s.s with the cordons bleus; M. Bailly sworn in; vespers and benediction; state dinner....

October 5th, shooting near Chatillon; killed 81 head; interrupted by events; go and come on horseback.

October 6th, leave for Paris at half-past twelve; visit the Hotel-de-Ville; sup and rest at the Tuileries.

October 7th nothing; my aunts come and dine.

October 8th, nothing. . .

October 12th, nothing; the stag hunted at Port Royal.

Shut up in Paris, held by the crowds, his heart is always with the hounds. Twenty times in 1790 we read in his journal of a stag-hunt occurring in this or that place; he regrets not being on hand. No privation is more intolerable to him; we encounter traces of his chagrin even in the formal protest he draws up before leaving for Varennes; transported to Paris, shut up in the Tuileries, "where, far from finding conveniences to which he is accustomed, he has not even enjoyed the advantages common to persons in easy circ.u.mstances," his crown to him having apparently lost its brightest jewel.

VI. Upper Cla.s.s Distractions.

Other similar lives.--Princes and princesses.--Seigniors of the court.--Financiers and parvenus.--Amba.s.sadors, ministers, governors, general officers.

As is the general so is his staff; the grandees imitate their monarch.

Like some costly colossal effigy in marble, erected in the center of France, and of which reduced copies are scattered by thousands throughout the provinces, thus does royal life repeat itself, in minor proportions, even among the remotest gentry. The object is to make a parade and to receive; to make a figure and to pa.s.s away time in good society.--I find, first, around the court, about a dozen princely courts. Each prince or princess of the blood royal, like the king, has his house fitted up, paid for, in whole or in part, out of the treasury, its service divided into special departments, with gentlemen, pages, and ladies in waiting, in brief, fifty, one hundred, two hundred, and even five hundred appointments. There is a household of this kind for the queen, one for Madame Victoire, one for Madame Elisabeth, one for Monsieur, one for Madame, one for the Comte d'Artois, and one for the Comtesse d'Artois. There will be one for Madame Royale, one for the little Dauphin, one for the Duc de Normandie, all three children of the king, one for the Duc d'Angouleme, one for the Duc de Berry, both sons of the Comte d'Artois: children six or seven years of age receive and make a parade of themselves. On referring to a particular date, in 1771,[2155] I find still another for the Duc d'Orleans, one for the Duc de Bourbon, one for the d.u.c.h.esse, one for the Prince de Conde, one for the Comte de Clermont, one for the Princess dowager de Conti, one for the Prince de Conti, one for the Comte de la Marche, one for the Duc de Penthievre.--Each personage, besides his or her apartment under the king's roof has his or her chateau and palace with his or her own circle, the queen at Trianon and at Saint-Cloud, Mesdames at Bellevue, Monsieur at the Luxembourg and at Brunoy, the Comte d'Artois at Meudon and at Bagatelle, the Duc d'Orleans at the Palais Royal, at Monceaux, at Rancy and at Villers-Cotterets, the Prince de Conti at the Temple and at Ile-Adam, the Condes at the Palais-Bourbon and at Chantilly, the Duc de Penthievre at Sceaux, Anet and Chateauvilain. I omit one-half of these residences. At the Palais-Royal those who are presented may come to the supper on opera days. At Chateauvilain all those who come to pay court are invited to dinner, the n.o.bles at the duke's table and the rest at the table of his first gentleman. At the Temple one hundred and fifty guests attend the Monday suppers. Forty or fifty persons, said the d.u.c.h.esse de Maine, const.i.tute "a prince's private company."[2156] The princes' train is so inseparable from their persons that it follows them even into camp. "The Prince de Conde," says M. de Luynes, "sets out for the army to-morrow with a large suite: he has two hundred and twenty-five horses, and the Comte de la Marche one hundred. M. le duc d'Orleans leaves on Monday; he has three hundred and fifty horses for himself and suite."[2157] Below the rank of the king's relatives all the grandees who figure at the court figure as well in their own residences, at their hotels at Paris or at Versailles, also in their chateaux a few leagues away from Paris. On all sides, in the memoirs, we obtain a foreshortened view of some one of these seignorial existences. Such is that of the Duc de Gevres, first gentleman of the bedchamber, governor of Paris, and of the Ile-de-France, possessing besides this the special governors.h.i.+ps of Laon, Soissons, Noyon, Crespy and Valois, the captainry of Mousseaux, also a pension of 20,000 livres, a veritable man of the court, a sort of sample in high relief of the people of his cla.s.s, and who, through his appointments, his airs, his luxury, his debts, the consideration he enjoys, his tastes, his occupations and his turn of mind presents to us an abridgment of the fas.h.i.+onable world.[2158] His memory for relations.h.i.+ps and genealogies is surprising; he is an adept in the precious science of etiquette, and on these two grounds he is an oracle and much consulted. "He greatly increased the beauty of his house and gardens at Saint-Ouen. At the moment of his death," says the Duc de Luynes, "he had just added twenty-five arpents to it which he had begun to enclose with a covered terrace. . . . He had quite a large household of gentlemen, pages, and domestic of various kinds, and his expenditure was enormous. . . . He gave a grand dinner every day. . . . He gave special audiences almost daily. There was no one at the court, nor in the city, who did not pay his respects to him. The ministers, the royal princes themselves did so. He received company whilst still in bed. He wrote and dictated amidst a large a.s.semblage. . . . His house at Paris and his apartment at Versailles were never empty from the time be arose till the time he retired." 2 or 300 households at Paris, at Versailles and in their environs, offer a similar spectacle. Never is there solitude. It is the custom in France, says Horace Walpole, to burn your candle down to its snuff in public. The mansion of the d.u.c.h.esse de Gramont is besieged at day-break by the n.o.blest seigniors and the n.o.blest ladies. Five times a week, under the Duc de Choiseul's roof, the butler enters the drawing room at ten o'clock in the evening to bestow a glance on the immense crowded gallery and decide if he shall lay the cloth for fifty, sixty or eighty persons;[2159] with this example before them all the rich establishments soon glory in providing an open table for all comers. Naturally the parvenus, the financiers who have purchased or taken the name of an estate, all those traffickers and sons of traffickers who, since Law, a.s.sociate with the n.o.bility, imitate their ways. And I do not allude to the Bourets, the Beaujons, the St.

Jameses and other financial wretches whose paraphernalia effaces that of the princes; but take a plain a.s.socie des fermes, M. d'Epinay, whose modest and refined wife refuses such excessive display.[2160] He had just completed his domestic arrangements, and was anxious that his wife should take a second maid; but she resisted; nevertheless, in this curtailed household.

"The officers, women and valets, amounted to sixteen. . . . When M.

d'Epinay gets up his valet enters on his duties. Two lackeys stand by awaiting his orders. The first secretary enters for the purpose of giving an account of the letters received by him and which he has to open; but he is interrupted two hundred times in this business by all sorts of people imaginable. Now it is a horse-jockey with the finest horses to sell. . . . Again some saucy girl who calls to bawl out a piece of music, and on whose behalf some influence has been exerted to get her into the opera, after giving her a few lessons in good taste and teaching her what is proper in French music. This young lady has been made to wait to ascertain if I am still at home. . . . I get up and go out. Two lackeys open the folding doors to let me make it through this eye of a needle, while two servants bawl out in the ante-chamber, 'Madame, gentlemen, Madame!' All form a line, the gentlemen consisting of dealers in fabrics, in instruments, jewellers, hawkers, lackeys, s...o...b..acks, creditors, in short everything imaginable that is most ridiculous and annoying. The clock strikes twelve or one before this toilet matter is over, and the secretary, who, doubtless, knows by experience the impossibility of rendering a detailed statement of his business, hands to his master a small memorandum informing him what he must say in the a.s.sembly of fermiers."

Indolence, disorder, debts, ceremony, the tone and ways of the patron, all seems a parody of the real thing. We are beholding the last stages of aristocracy. And yet the court of M. d'Epinay is a miniature resemblance of that of the king.

So much more essential is it that the amba.s.sadors, ministers and general officers who represent the king should display themselves in a grandiose manner. No circ.u.mstance rendered the ancient regime so brilliant and more oppressive; in this, as in all the rest, Louis XIV is the princ.i.p.al originator of evil as of good. The policy which fas.h.i.+oned the court prescribed ostentation.

"A display of dress, table, equipages, buildings and play was made purposely to please; these afforded opportunities for entering into conversation with him. The contagion had spread from the court into the provinces and to the armies, where people of any position were esteemed only in proportion to their table and magnificence."[2161]

During the year pa.s.sed by the Marshal de Belle-Isle at Frankfort, on account of the election of Charles VI, he expended 750,000 livres in journeys, transportations, festivals and dinners, in constructing a kitchen and dining-hall, and besides all this, 150,000 livres in snuff-boxes, watches and other presents; by order of Cardinal Fleury, so economical, he had in his kitchens one hundred and one officials.[2162]