Maria Antoinette

Efforts to alienate the king's affections

Eight years had now passed away since the marriage of Maria Antoinette, and still she was in name only, the wife of Louis. She was still a young lady, for he had never yet approached her with any familiarity with which he would not approach any young lady of his court. But about this time the king gradually manifested more tenderness toward her. He began really and tenderly to love her. With tears of joy, she confided to her friends the great change which had taken place in his conduct. The various troubles and embarrassments which began now to lower about the throne and to darken their path, bound their sympathies more strongly together. Strenuous efforts were made to alienate the king from the queen by exciting his jealousy. Maria was accused of the grossest immoralities, and insinuations to her injury were ever whispered in to the ear of the king.

Agitation of the queen

One morning Madame Campan entered the queen's chamber when she was in bed. Several letters were lying upon the bed by her side, and she was weeping as though her heart would break. She immediately exclaimed, covering her swollen eyes with her hands, "Oh! I wish that I were dead! I wish that I were dead! The wretches! the monsters! what have I done that they should treat me thus! it would be better to kill me at once." Then, throwing her arms around the neck of Madame Campan, she burst more passionately into tears. All attempts to console her were unavailing. Neither was she willing to confide the cause of her heart-rending grief. After some time she regained her usual serenity, and said, with an attempted smile, "I know that I have made you very uncomfortable this morning, and I must set your poor heart at ease. You must have seen, on some fine summer's day, a black cloud suddenly appear, and threaten to pour down upon the country and lay it in waste. The lightest wind drives it away, and the blue sky and serene weather are restored. This is just the image of what has happened to me this morning."

Maria's children

Notwithstanding, however, these efforts of the malignant, the king became daily more and more strongly attached to the queen. In the embarrassments which were gathering around him, he felt the support of her energetic mind, and looked to her counsel with continually increasing confidence. It was about nine years after their marriage when their first child was born. Three others were subsequently added to their family. Two, however, of the children, a son and a daughter, died in early childhood, leaving two others, Maria Theresa and Louis Charles, to share and to magnify those woes which subsequently overwhelmed the whole royal family.

Royal visitors

Extravagant expenditures

Rising discontents

During all these early years of their reign, Versailles was their favorite and almost constant abode. They were visited occasionally by monarchs from the other courts of Europe, whom they entertained with the utmost display of royal grandeur. Bonfires and illuminations turned night into day in the groves and gardens of those gorgeous palaces. Thousands were feasted in boundless profusion. Millions of money were expended in the costly amusements of kings, and queens, and haughty nobles. The people, by whose toil the revenues of the kingdom were furnished, looked from a humble distance upon the glittering throng, gliding through the avenues, charioted in splendor, and now and then a deep thinker, struggling against poverty and want, would thus soliloquize: "Why do we thus toil to minister to the useless luxury of these our imperious masters? Why must I eat black bread, and be clothed in the coarsest garments, that these lords and ladies may glitter in jewelry and revel in luxury? Why must my children toil like bond slaves through life, that the children of these nobles may be clothed in purple and fine linen, and fare sumptuously every day?" The multitude were bewildered by the glare of royalty. But here and there a sullen fish-woman, leading her ragged, half-starved children, would mumble and mutter, and curse the "Austrian," as the beautiful queen swept by in her gorgeous equipage. These discontents and portentous murmurs were spreading rapidly, when neither king, queen, nor courtiers dreamed of their existence.

La Fayette and Franklin

The people begin to count the costs

Letter from the Empress Catharine

A few had heard of America, its freedom, its equality, its fame even for the poorest, its competence. La Fayette had gone to help the Republicans crush the crown and the throne. Franklin was in Paris, the embassador from America, in garb and demeanor as simple and frugal as the humblest citizen, and all Paris gazed upon him with wonder and admiration. A few bold spirits began to whisper, "Let us also have no king." The fires of a volcano were kindling under the whole structure of French society. It was time that the mighty fabric of corruption should be tumbled into the dust. The splendor and the extravagance of these royal festivities added but fuel to the flame. The people began to compute the expense of bonfires, palaces, equipages, crown jewels, and courtiers. It is extremely impertinent, Maria thought and said, for the people to meddle in matters with which they have no concern. Slaves have no right to question the conduct of their masters. It was the misfortune of her education, and of the influences which ever surrounded her, that she never imagined that kings and queens were created for any other purpose than to live in luxury. The Empress Catharine II. of Russia, as these discontents were loud and threatening wrote to Maria Antoinette a letter, in which she says, "Kings and queens ought to proceed in their career undisturbed by the cries of the people, as the moon pursues her course unimpeded by the howling of dogs." This was then the spirit of the throne.

The clouds thicken

And now the days of calamity began to grow darker. Intrigues were multiplied, involving Maria in interminable difficulties. There were instinctive presentiments of an approaching storm. Death came into the royal palace, and distorted the form of her eldest son, and by lingering tortures dragged him to the grave. And then her little daughter was taken from her. Maria watched at the couch of suffering and death with maternal anguish. The glowing heart of a mother throbbed within the bosom of Maria. The heartlessness and emptiness of all other pursuits had but given intensity to the fervor of a mother's love. Though but twenty-three years of age, she had drained every cup of pleasure to its dregs. And now she began to enter upon a path every year more dark, dreary, and desolate.

Chapter IV.

The Diamond Necklace

1786

Remark of Talleyrand

About this time there occurred an event which, though apparently trivial, involved consequences of the most momentous importance. It was merely the fraudulent purchase of a necklace, by a profligate woman, in the name of the queen. The circumstances were such as to throw all France into agitation, and Europe was full of the story. "Mind that miserable affair of the necklace," said Talleyrand; "I should be nowise surprised if it should overturn the French monarchy." To understand this mysterious occurrence, we must first allude to two very important characters implicated in the conspiracy.

The Cardinal de Rohan

Rohan's smuggling operations

He is disgraced

The Cardinal de Rohan, though one of the highest dignitaries of the Church, and of the most illustrious rank, was a young man of vain and shallow mind, of great profligacy of character, and perfectly prodigal in squandering, in ostentatious pomp, all the revenues within his reach. He had been sent an embassador to the court of Vienna. Surrounding himself with a retinue of spendthrift gentlemen, he endeavored to dazzle the Austrian capital with more than regal magnificence. Expending six or seven hundred thousand dollars in the course of a few months, he soon became involved in inextricable embarrassments. In the extremity of his distress, he took advantage of his official station, and engaged in smuggling with so much effrontery that he almost inundated the Austrian capital with French goods. Maria Theresa was extremely displeased, and, without reserve, expressed her strong disapproval of his conduct, both as a bishop and as an embassador. The cardinal was consequently recalled, and, disappointed and mortified, he hovered around the court of Versailles, where he was treated with the utmost coldness. He was extremely anxious again to bask in the beams of royal favor. But the queen indignantly repelled all his advances. His proud spirit was nettled to the quick by his disgrace, and he was ripe for any desperate adventure to retrieve his ruined fortunes.

The Countess Lamotte

There was, at the same time, at Versailles a very beautiful woman, the Countess Lamotte. She traced her lineage to the kings of France, and, by her vices, struggled to sustain a style of ostentatious gentility. She was consumed by an insatiable thirst for recognized rank and wealth, and she had no conscience to interfere, in the slightest degree, with any means which might lead to those results. Though somewhat notorious, as a woman of pleasure, to the courtiers who flitted around the throne, the queen had never seen her face, and had seldom heard even her name. Versailles was too much thronged with such characters for any one to attract any special attention.

The queen's jewelry

Bœhmer, the crown jeweler

The diamond ear-rings

Change in the queen's life

Maria Antoinette, in her earlier days, had been extremely fond of dress, and particularly of rich jewelry. She brought with her from Vienna a large number of pearls and diamonds. Upon her accession to the throne, she received, of course, all the crown jewels. Louis XV. had also presented her with all the jewels belonging to his daughter, the dauphiness, who had recently died, and also with a very magnificent collar of pearls, of a single row, the smallest of which was as large as a filbert. The king, her husband, had, not long before, presented her with a set of rubies and diamonds of a fine water, and with a pair of bracelets which cost forty thousand dollars. Bœhmer, the crown jeweler, had collected, at a great expense, six pear-formed diamonds, of prodigious size. They were perfectly matched, and of the finest water. They were arranged as ear-rings. He offered them to the queen for eighty thousand dollars. The young and royal bride could not resist the desire of adding them, costly as they were, to her casket of gems. She, however, economically removed two of the diamonds which formed the tops of the clusters, and replaced them by two of her own. The jeweler consented to this arrangement, and received the reduced price of seventy-two thousand dollars, to be paid in equal installments for five years, from the private purse of the queen. Still the queen felt rather uneasy in view of her unnecessary purchase. Murmurs of her extravagance began to reach her ears. Satiated with gayety and weary of jewels, as a child throws aside its play-things, Maria Antoinette lost all fondness for her costly treasures, and began to seek novelty in the utmost simplicity of attire, and in the most artless joys of rural life. Her gorgeous dresses hung neglected in their wardrobes. Her gems, "of purest ray serene," slept in the darkness of the unopened casket. The queen had become a mother, and all those warm and noble affections which had been diffused and wasted upon frivolities, were now concentrated with intensest ardor upon her children. A new era had dawned upon Maria Antoinette. Her soul, by nature exalted, was beginning to find objects worthy of its energies. Rapidly she was groping her way from the gloom of the most wretched of all lives – a life of pleasure and of self-indulgence – to the true and ennobling happiness of benevolence and self-sacrifice.

The diamond necklace

Bœhmer, the jeweler, unaware of the great change which had taken place in the character of the queen, resolved to form for her the most magnificent necklace which was ever seen in Europe. He busied himself for several years in collecting the most valuable diamonds circulating in commerce, and thus composed a necklace of several rows, whose attractions, he hoped, would be irresistible to the queen. In the purchase of these brilliant gems, the jeweler had expended far more than his own fortune. For many of them he owed large sums, and his only hope of paying these debts was in effecting a sale to the queen.

The queen inspects the necklace

Answer of their majesties

Bœhmer requested Madame Campan to inform the queen what a beautiful necklace he had arranged, hoping that she might express a desire to see it. This, however, Madame Campan declined doing, as she did not wish to tempt the queen to incur the expense of three hundred and twenty thousand dollars, the price of the glittering bawble. Bœhmer, after endeavoring for some time in vain to get the gems exposed to the eye of the queen, induced a courtier high in rank to show the superb necklace to his majesty. The king, now loving the queen most tenderly, wished to see her adorned with this unparalleled ornament, and sent the case to the queen for her inspection. Maria Antoinette replied, that she had already as many beautiful diamonds as she desired; that jewels were now worn but seldom at court; that she could not think it right to encourage so great an expense for such ornaments; and that the money they would cost would be much better expended in building a man-of-war. The king concurred in this prudent decision, and the diamonds were returned to the jeweler from their majesties with this answer: "We have more need of ships than of diamonds."

Bœhmer's embarrassment

Bœhmer was in great trouble, and knew not what to do. He spent a year in visiting the other courts of Europe, hoping to induce some of the sovereigns to purchase his necklace, but in vain. Almost in despair, he returned again to Versailles, and proposed the king should take it, and pay for it partly in instalments and partly in life annuities. The king mentioned it again to the queen. She replied, that if his majesty wished to purchase the necklace, and keep it for their daughter, he might do so. But she declared that she herself should never be willing to wear it, for she could not expose herself to those censures for extravagance which she knew would be lavished upon her.

His interview with the queen

The jeweler complained loudly and bitterly of his misfortune. The necklace having been exhibited all over Europe, his troubles were a matter of general conversation. After several months of great perplexity and anxiety, Bœhmer succeeded in gaining an audience of the queen. Passionately throwing himself upon his knees before her, clasping his hands and bursting into tears, he exclaimed,

"Madame, I am disgraced and ruined if you do not purchase my necklace. I can not outlive my misfortunes. When I go hence I shall throw myself into the river."

The queen's remarks

The queen, extremely displeased, said, "Rise, Bœhmer! I do not like these rhapsodies; honest men have no occasion to fall upon their knees to make known their requests. If you were to destroy yourself, I should regret you as a madman in whom I had taken an interest, but I should not be responsible for that misfortune. I not only never ordered the article which causes your present despair, but, whenever you have talked to me about fine collections of jewels, I have told you that I should not add four diamonds to those I already possessed. I told you myself that I declined taking the necklace. The king wished to give it to me; I refused him in the same manner. Then never mention it to me again. Divide it, and endeavor to sell it piecemeal, and do not drown yourself. I am very angry with you for acting this scene of despair in my presence, and before this child. Let me never see you behave thus again. Go!"

Bœhmer's confusion

Bœhmer, overwhelmed with confusion, retired, and the queen, oppressed with a multitude of gathering cares, for some months thought no more of him or of his jewels. One day the queen was reposing listlessly upon her couch, with Madame Campan and other ladies of honor about her, when, suddenly addressing Madame Campan, she inquired,

"Have you ever heard what poor Bœhmer did with his unfortunate necklace?"

"I have heard nothing of it since he left you," was the reply, "though I often meet him."

"I should really like to know how the unfortunate man got extricated from his embarrassments," rejoined the queen; "and, when you next see him, I wish you would inquire, as if from your own interest in the affair, without any allusion to me, how he disposed of the article."

Alleged disposal of the necklace