‘She seldom dances,’ continued the garrulous abbe, ‘on account of her defect; and so she does not care always to be present at the balls. I can conceive the reason of her not being at the play.’
‘How was that?’ inquired the Gascon.
‘Because the King’s sentiments appear to be somewhat changed since our Molière was commanded to write the Princesse d’Elide. He was then madly in love with La Vallière, although at the time she resisted all his entreaties. What else could these lines mean?’
And Jean flinched as the abbe again commenced a piece of declamation, quoting from the piece in question in a monotonous tone of dulness suited to the subject—
The homage which is offer’d to a countenance refined
Is an honest indication of the beauty of the mind;
And scarcely possible it is, if love be not innate,
That a young prince should come to be or generous or great:
And this above all other regal qualities I love,
This sign alone the tenderness of royal hearts can prove!
To one like you, a bright and good career we may presage,
When once the soul is capable of loving, at your age.
Yes, this immortal passion, the most noble one of all,
An hundred goodly virtues training after it can call;
The most illustrious actions are engender’d by its fires,
And all the greatest heroes have experienced its desires.’[13]
Jean bowed respectfully at the termination of each line, as if he fully concurred in the sentiments it conveyed, but was very glad when it was over.
‘Ha! the music has ceased,’ said the abbe; ‘and there will be a masque, and some fireworks on the Bassin de Neptune, and the étang beyond. That will be also a trial for La Vallière. The last fetes at night were in her honour, and they are going to use the old machines newly decorated. It will be a renaissance of the Ile Enchantée.’
The company retired to the banks of turf which surrounded the Salle de Bal, Louis, and a few immediately attached to him only remained below, amongst whom were of course La Montespan and La Vallière. When the floor was cleared, a cavalcade of heralds, pages, and squires, all richly clad in armour, and dresses embroidered with thread of silver and of gold, marched into the bosquet, the music of Lulli’s band of twenty-four violins being exchanged for that of martial instruments. When they had taken their places, a large car, made to imitate the chariot of the Sun, was slowly moved into the ballroom by concealed means, conveying the Sun, surrounded by the four Ages of gold, silver, iron, and brass; the Seasons, the Hours, and other mythological characters. On arriving opposite the point where Louis was sitting, the colossal machine halted, and Spring addressed a complimentary oration to the King, involving also some flattering sentences for Madame de Montespan and Mademoiselle de la Vallière—but more especially for the former. When this had finished, the young person who had played the character of Spring descended from the car, and having offered some rare bouquets to Louis and his favourites, took her place amongst the company. She was the only performer in the masque who did this, being the lovely Françoise de Sévigné—the daughter of Madame de Sévigné—now about eighteen years of age. She had been requested, on account of her extreme beauty and propriety of expression to play the part,—since, in the fetes at Versailles, it was not usual for the dames de la cour to figure.
This portion of the masque having finished, the various mythological personages descended as well, but it was only to bring in a number of long tables, which they placed before the company on the lowest turf-benches of the amphitheatre. These they spread with cloth of gold, and thus gave the signal for another large piece of mechanism to enter, representing a mountain, on which were seated Pan and Diana. When it stopped, these deities opened various parts of it, and aided by the others, brought out an exquisite collation, which they placed upon the tables, the music playing all the time. At the first sight of the banquet, the abbe bustled off to find a place at the tables; and Jean Blacquart, not wishing to lose the caste which he imagined he had acquired, and knowing that he could not join the feasters, turned upon his heel into the gardens, to see if anywhere he could discover Maître Picard.
Few who had seen Marie de Brinvilliers, as she mingled in the dances which had been taking place before the appearance of the pageant, would have conceived that any other feelings but those of mirth and excitement amidst the glittering throng by which she was surrounded were paramount in her bosom. There was the same kind expression—so terrible in its quietude had her heart at that time been laid open—the same sweet features, almost girlish in their contour (for although she was now thirty years of age, she could well have passed for eighteen), which all admired so much. And when she smiled, the witchery that played around her rosy mouth, as her parted lips displayed that most beautiful set of teeth, whose dazzling whiteness had been the theme of more than one court epigram, captivated by its spell all who came within its magnetic influence. Of all that lovely throng of women who graced the court of Louis Quatorze—the bevy of fair dames, so many of whom swelled the conquests of that heartless, selfish, roué monarch—the Marchioness of Brinvilliers was the most fascinating. And this fair creature, who now, in the light of her peerless beauty, of which she seemed unconscious, moved gracefully in the dance—this fearful woman—had broken up a home; deserted her children at an age when a mother’s guidance was all they needed, with an unnatural indifference towards her offspring that one might have sought for in vain amidst the lowest animals; and adding parricide as a coup to her already dark career, was yet but on the verge of the terrible line she had marked out to be pursued. Woman, in her love and gentleness, in her ministering care and patient endurance, when all the holiest attributes of her sex exist in her character, approaches far nearer to the angel than her companion, man. Alas! it is equally true, that in the absence of these characteristics she sinks far deeper in approximating to the demon!