Having quickly paid his voluntary toll in the shape of some witty or polite remark to each of those groups, he left them, as if his task had been fulfilled, and came up to his grandson, the Comte de Clary, with whom I happened to be chatting. ‘I remember,’ he said, ‘having begun one of my letters to Jean-Jacques Rousseau with a—“As you do not care, Monsieur, either for demonstrative people or for demonstrations....” A few notes couched in similar terms would not be out of place among some of the notable people here this evening; but they are so inflated with their own merit as to be unable to decipher their own addresses. And as, moreover, they are most obstinate and difficult to shake off, let us go and have a look at others where there will be a little more elbow-room. The ball is waiting for us. Come along, my lads, I’ll give you a lesson in taking your leave in French fashion.’ And this man, extraordinary in every relation of life, flitting away with the light step of a mere youth, suited the action to the word and positively ran to his carriage, laughing all the while at the boyish trick and at the disappointment of all those insipid talkers who merely courted his society to make him listen to their vapid utterances. It was nine o’clock when we reached the imperial palace, better known as the Hofburg.
That ancient residence had been specially chosen for those ingenious momons, character-masques in which the incognito of the domino often lent itself to political combinations in themselves masterpieces of intrigue and conception. The principal hall was magnificently lighted up, and running around it, there was a circular gallery giving access to huge rooms arranged for supper. On seats, disposed like an amphitheatre, there were crowds of ladies, some of whom merely wore dominos, while the majority represented this or that character. It would be difficult to imagine a scene more dazzling than this gathering of women, all young and beautiful, and each attired in a style most becoming to her beauty. All the centuries of the past, all the regions of the inhabited globe seemed to have appointed to meet in that graceful circle.
Several orchestras executed at regular intervals valses and polonaises: in adjoining galleries or rooms minuets were danced with particularly Teutonic gravity, which feature did not constitute the least comic part of the picture.
The prince had spoken the truth. Vienna at that time presented an abridged panorama of Europe, and the rout was an abridged panorama of Vienna. There could be no more curious spectacle than those masked or non-masked people, among whom, absolutely lost in the crowd, and practically defying identification, circulated all the sovereigns at that moment participating in the Congress.
The prince had a story or anecdote about each. ‘There goes Emperor Alexander. The man on whose arm he is leaning is Prince Eugène Beauharnais, for whom he has a sincere affection. When Eugène arrived here with his father-in-law, the King of Bavaria, the Court hesitated about the rank to be accorded to him. The emperor spoke so positively on the subject as to secure for Eugène all the honours due to his generous character. Alexander, as you are aware, is worthy of inspiring and of extending the deepest friendship.
‘Do you know the tall and noble-looking personage whom that beautiful Neapolitan girl is holding round the waist? It is the King of Prussia, whose gravity appears in no wise disturbed by the fact. For all that the clever mask may be an empress, on the other hand it is quite on the cards that she is merely a grisette who has been smuggled in.
‘That colossus in the black domino, which neither disguises nor decreases his stature, is the King of Würtemberg.[19] The man close to him is his son, the Crown Prince. His love for the Duchesse d’Oldenbourg, Emperor Alexander’s sister, is the cause of his stay at the Congress, rather than a concern for the grave interests which one day will be his. It is a romantic story, the dénouement of which we may witness before long.
‘The two young fellows who just brushed past us are the Crown Prince of Bavaria and his brother, Prince Charles.[20] The latter’s face would dispute the palm with that of Antinous. The crowd of people of different kind and garb who are disporting themselves, in every sense of the word, are, some, reigning princes, others archdukes, others again grand dignitaries of this or that empire. For, except a few Englishmen, easily picked out by their careful dress, I do not think there is a single personage here without a “handle” to his name.
‘This room in particular only represents a picture of pleasure, my dear boy....’
The moment the prince left me to myself I began to wander about, and if I had made a series of appointments, I could not have met with more acquaintances hailing from Naples to St. Petersburg, and from Stockholm to Constantinople. The variety of costume and languages was truly astonishing. It was like a bazaar of all the nations of the world. Honestly, I felt that for the first time in my life I was experiencing the intoxication of a masked ball. My brain seemed to reel under the spell of the incessant music, the secrecy of disguise, the atmosphere of mystery by which it was surrounded, the general state of incognito, the uncurbed and boundless gaiety, the force of circumstances, and the irresistible seductiveness of the picture before me. I feel certain that older and stronger heads than mine would have proved equally weak.