pupil, that he subsequently directed and decided almost all the actions of the queen: at that age when all impressions are the strongest, he had found means to gain her unbounded confidence, without taking any great pains about her instruction: indeed, he left her purposely in ignorance on many subjects. Marie Antoinette spoke French fluently and pleasingly, but wrote it not so well. Vermond corrected all the letters which she afterwards sent to Vienna.

The marquis de Durfort was appointed to perform the marriage ceremony as proxy for the dauphin. The pomp and magnificence of the train which escorted the princess from Strasburg were extraordinary. The king and the dauphin received her at Compiegne, where they passed some days before they made their grand entry into Paris. The king committed a scandalous breach of decorum for a sovereign and father of a family, in making the young princess, the royal family, and the ladies of the court, sup with his mistress, du Barry. Marie Antoinette felt justly offended at this procedure; but she contrived to disguise her anger. Not so the people, who loudly expressed their disapprobation of conduct which they deemed degrading to the royal dignity.

Two days afterwards, the dauphin was married to his bride in the chapel royal, and the festivities commenced in Paris and at Versailles. These were so magnificent and so expensive as to excite murmurs. The cost of them had been estimated at twenty millions. In vain did the abbé Terrai, comptroller of the finances, remonstrate against this profusion. Louis XV., who had no notion of any other glory, strove to surpass his predecessor in this particular. Unpleasant circumstances which took place at the balls on the score of etiquette, negligent and defective preparations, and the disagree

able sight of a crowd of importunate beggars who beset the palace, dispelled in a great degree the magic charm of these fêtes. An accident which occurred at the last of them, and which originated in the most culpable neglect, turned the general joy into mourning, and was regarded by the suffering people, who had placed all their hopes on the young royal couple, as a most unlucky omen, which in the sequel was but too fully verified.

The city of Paris, namely, gave a fête, on the 30th of May, 1770, in honour of the marriage. Fireworks were to be exhibited in the spacious Place Louis XV., where a statue of that monarch had recently been erected. Workmen were just then employed in completing the Rue Royale, leading from that Place to the Boulevard ; it was encumbered with building materials, and holes which had not been filled up rendered the passage through it inconvenient. An immense number of carriages had proceeded in great disorder to the Quai, and blocked up the most commodious outlet from this Place. Some patroles, lost in the crowd, were totally inadequate to preserve order and to prevent accidents.

The fireworks disappointed the anticipations of the thousands of spectators. Before the bouquet of rockets was discharged, some of the decorations of wood caught fire. This fire was at first admired, as it was supposed to have been purposely kindled to give more effect to the whole. But, when it was observed to spread with great rapidity, admiration was succeeded by alarm, and every one endeavoured to get away as fast as possible. The pedestrians hastened from the Quai, lest they should be run over by the carriages and horses, and all hurried towards the Rue Royale. The confusion was already very great, when thieves and pickpockets strove to increase it by thrusting and shouting, in order to rob those whom they hustled. Not a creature could force

his way out of this crowd, which was to the full as dangerous as a field of battle. Dreadful was the situa tion of those who had wives and children along with them. Such was the state of things for above half an hour, during which people were crushed, knocked down, trampled upon. At length, the crowd began to clear away, but one hundred and thirty-three dead and a far greater number of wounded strewed the Place. The victims of this day, for similar accidents occurred in other places, especially at the Quai of the Tuileries, were computed at twelve hundred.

Vehement was the outcry raised against the government, which had taken measures so inadequate for preventing such a calamity. The parliament declared that it would obtain satisfaction for the public, and set on foot an investigation. But the guilty were found to be so numerous, and persons of so much consequence, that nobody was called to account and nobody punished. The old king, whose feelings were blunted by sensual indulgence, gave himself no concern about the matter; but so much the more deeply did the young dauphin take the terrible catastrophe to heart. To no purpose were attempts made to divert him from it; he inquired into the minutest details, and his bride was drowned in tears. Both sent their income for a whole year, accompanied by a pathetic letter, to the city authorities, requesting them to apply it to the support of the most distressed families.

Louis XV. was, like every one else, enchanted with the dauphiness: her vivacity, her most agreeable manners, her frankness, and her naïveté, fascinated the whole royal family and all who had the privilege of approaching her. She pleased still more when, after the festivities were over, she had laid aside all her diamonds and other ornaments. In a light, simple dress

of cambric or muslin she was likened to the Medicean Venus, or the Atalanta in the gardens of Marly. Poets vied with each other in celebrating her charms, and painters in delineating them: a portrait, representing her in the centre of an opening rose, was a particular favourite. The king talked of nothing but her, so that Madanie du Barry began to be jealous, and set about devising means to throw some shade upon so much brightness. She jeered the old king for his blind partiality to the young Austrian, and made spiteful remarks on the irregularity of her features. It was not long before Choiseul, the minister who had negociated this alliance between France and Austria, was dismissed: he had a high esteem for the dauphiness, and, before she left Vienna, her mother had earnestly recommended to her to cultivate his friendship. She was now without any other guide or adviser than the abbé Vermond, at a court where the enemies of the man who had been the means of bringing her thither were triumphant-enemies who hated not only Austria but any alliance with the imperial house, and who, though active, had laboured in vain to prevent this alliance.

Several parties were soon formed, owing to the preference given by Marie Antoinette to the Princess Elisabeth, of which Madame Marsan, gouvernante of the enfuns de France, was in some measure jealous. The different views on the subject of education entertained by the two parties were pressed into the quarrel, and those which Maria Theresa had followed in regard to her daughter were loudly and unbecomingly censured. The abbé Vermond felt himself affronted, took part in the quarrel, added his complaints and his raillery to those of the dauphiness, and severely criticised and attacked the gouvernante. Busybodies made a point of repeating to each party the animadversions of the other,

and from this moment there was no end to intrigues and cabals. In the circle of Madame Marsan, even the most indifferent actions of the dauphiness were canvassed, and frequently represented in an entirely false light. The cardinal prince Louis de Rohan, at that time ambassador at Vienna and a creature of the Marsan party, repeated there all the unfounded complaints which were transmitted to him, and thus drew upon the dauphiness frequent admonitions and reproofs from her mother, the cause of which could not long remain unknown to her. Upon pretence of a friendly zeal, Rohan had not ceased to paint the conduct of Marie Antoinette to the court of Vienna in the most hateful colours, and to condemn her inconceivable levity, which must alienate from her all hearts in France. Such were the grounds upon which the queen harboured a permanent enmity against cardinal Rohan, which nothing could mitigate, and which, in the sequel, proved almost equally injurious to both.

Louis XVI. was scarcely twenty years old when he ascended the throne, and, as it has been already observed, through the fault of his grandfather, he was wholly inexperienced in matters of government. The mistress, annoyed by his rigid morals, had found means to render him ridiculous and contemptible in the eyes of the king, and was particularly exasperated against the dauphiness. The ministers durst not break with her, if they meant to keep their places, and showed as little disposition to spare the dauphin. This party had reported that the heir-apparent was a man of austere manners, and decidedly inclined to arbitrary despotism; an imputation to which a somewhat grave and melancholy look unfortunately gave a degree of plausibility. In his whole person and manner were plainly expressed the two principal features of his character-honesty