As soon as Louis XIV. formally established his mistresses at Court, it had been needful to frame new rules of etiquette. At first these rules were understood rather than formulated, but contemporary writers give evidence of their existence. It was the new regulations which gave scandal, rather than the fact of a weakness too common to all men of all times. The people had found the phrase suitable enough when it ran to gaze on "the three queens" in one carriage; Mlle. de La Vallière and Mme. de Montespan were publicly at the same time occupying the rank of secondary wives to the King. When the royal family made its solemn visits to any of its members who were mortally ill, these two ladies arrived after the King and Queen. Mademoiselle met them at the death-bed of Mme. Henriette; "Mme. de Montespan and La Vallière came." She met them again over the cradle of a daughter of Louis XIV. and of Marie-Thérèse, who died as an infant. "I found her in the last extremity.... We staid almost the entire night watching her die; Mme. de Montespan and Mme. de La Vallière were also there." The latter escaped from such honours as often as she could. Mme. de Montespan liked them better, and added to them. She had placed herself upon the footing of the Queen in regard to ordinary visits, which she never returned. "Never," says Saint-Simon, "not even to Monsieur or Madame or to the Grande Mademoiselle, or to the Hôtel de Condé."
The same hauteur was displayed in the manner of receiving the princes and princesses of the blood, and this "exterior of Queen" followed her into the retreat! All were accustomed to it.
"The habit of respect was preserved without murmur," says again Saint-Simon, who recalled Mme. de Montespan, disgraced and passing her time in penitence, nevertheless continuing to hold court in her convent,[207] with as royal an etiquette as at Saint-Germain or Versailles:
The back of her armchair was formed by the foot-piece of the bed, and there was no other chair in the room. Monsieur and the Grande Mademoiselle had always loved her, and often went to see her; for these, chairs were brought, and also for Madame la Princesse; but Mme. de Montespan did not dream of deranging herself for her own people nor for those they brought with them.... One can judge by this how she received "all the world."
The "all the world," which included some of the most distinguished, contented themselves with small "chairs with backs," or simple camp stools. No one was offended, and "all France came"; I do not know by what fantasy it was considered a duty to make visits from time to time. She spoke to each like a queen holding her court, who honours in "addressing." Marie-Thérèse herself, in the time in which Mme. de Montespan was the actual sovereign, had submitted to the long empire of custom. In 1675, the fourth year of the war in Holland, Louis XIV. being with the army while Mme. de Montespan was at her château at Clagny, one of their sons was "slightly ill."[208] The Queen considered it her duty to visit the child and to comfort the mother. She went to seek Mme. de Montespan, and led her one day to the Trianon, another to dine in some favourite convent, an example which brought the crowd to Clagny and made an end of hesitancy. "The wife of her firm (solide) friend," wrote Mme. de Sévigné, "visited her, and afterward the entire family in turn. She takes precedence of all the Duchesses." (July 3, 1675.)
There had been a time in which this fashion of ignoring rank would have excited the indignation of Mademoiselle; but this time was far distant, farther than she herself realised. In 1667 she had cried very loud because her second sister, Mademoiselle d'Alençon, had made a mésalliance in marrying a simple seigneur, the Duc de Guise, and she had looked very gloomily at the pair. The time had passed for such pride, as the poor woman was herself ready for a worse mésalliance. Her patience was at an end. Her agitation while Louis XIV. was attempting marriage negotiations with the Duc de Savoie must not be forgotten. No prince had thought of her since this affront. She was considered too old. She would not confess this to be the case, but she felt it, and a tempest gathered in the depths of her heart. The storm burst in 1669. It is impossible to say in what measure nature alone was responsible, and what was due to the atmosphere of moral disorder and voluptuousness which Mademoiselle was now inhaling at the Court in the frequent companionship of the favourite. One thing is certain, the Grande Mademoiselle did not try to struggle against the passion which seized her; her attitude was rather that of a person who sought its sway.
CHAPTER V
The Grande Mademoiselle in Love—Sketch of Lauzun and their Romance—The Court on its Travels—Death of Madame—Announcement of the Marriage of Mademoiselle—General Consternation—Louis XIV. Breaks the Affair.