Condé and Enghien were, however, at cross-purposes; the one wished to form a man, a prince, a captain; the other thought only of making his son an accomplished courtier. That the hope of the Condés should be an invariable guest at Marly was in the latter’s eyes a more desirable thing than that he should command armies; that he should secure the reversion of the governments and offices which had been bestowed upon his father was of more importance than that he should inherit his grandsire’s fame.
It must be admitted that Enghien was indefatigable in his endeavours to further what he conceived to be the interests of his son. “With the prudence and calculation of an officer experienced in sieges, he pursued his plan, seeking to take possession of all the avenues which could conduct him to the heart of the King; hunting and shooting-parties, masquerades, ballets, fêtes at Marly, served him as approach-works; a direct attack that he was preparing could not fail to assure for his son the royal favour.”[234]
This “direct attack,” which was delivered in June, 1684, on the occasion of the visit which Louis XIV. paid to Chantilly, on his return from the siege of Luxembourg, took the form of demanding for the Duc de Bourbon the hand of Mlle. de Nantes, the elder of the King’s two surviving daughters by Madame de Montespan, who had celebrated her eleventh birthday a few days previously. To the intense joy of Monsieur le Duc, it was completely successful, and his Majesty graciously consented to bestow the hand of his legitimated daughter on the heir of the Condés. Owing, however, to the tender age of the young lady, the arrangement remained a secret for some months, and it was not until the following April that it was made public.
This was not the first alliance between the fruit of le Grand Monarques amours and the Princes of the Blood. In January, 1684, Condé’s nephew and ward the young Prince de Conti[235] had espoused Louise de la Vallière’s daughter, Mlle. de Blois, on which occasion, we learn from Madame de Sévigné that Monsieur le Prince, who had always clung to the bygone fashion of moustaches and a chin-tuft, astonished the Court by appearing clean-shaven, with his hair curled and powdered, and a justaucorps adorned with diamond buttons.[236] But, although Condé approved of the marriage arranged for his grandson, he was far from approving of the latter interrupting his studies to take upon himself conjugal responsibilities. However, such was the Monsieur le Duc’s impatience to see the young prince become the son-in-law of the King that he ultimately withdrew his objections, and Louis XIV. having also proved complaisant, the marriage was celebrated, in the chapel at Versailles, on 24 July, 1685.
So far as people were able to judge from features which were hardly yet formed, the twelve-year-old bride gave promise of being very pretty; and this promise was duly fulfilled. As much could not be said for the bridegroom. Both the Duc and Duchesse d’Enghien were short, though of no unusual diminutiveness, but their son was almost a dwarf,[237] and a very ugly one to boot, with an abnormally large head, an unwholesome complexion, and a surly expression.
The union of these two marionettes, as the Marquis de Sourches calls them, was celebrated with extreme magnificence, and “the Great Condé and his son left nothing undone to testify their joy, just as they had left nothing undone to bring about the marriage.”[238] The King secured to the duke the reversion of all the offices held by his father and gave him a pension of 90,000 livres, and to his daughter one of 100,000 livres.
In the evening, the happy pair proceeded to the pretended consummation of their marriage, without which the ceremony through which they had just passed would not have been considered binding. In the presence of the King and all their relatives, they entered a state bed, where they remained for half an hour, the Duchesse d’Enghien standing by the bridegroom’s side, and Madame de Montespan by that of the bride. This solemn farce terminated, they separated, not to meet again for several months, except in the presence of witnesses; and the Duc de Bourbon went back to his interrupted studies, which Monsieur le Prince had insisted on his continuing.
LOUIS III, DUC DE BOURBON, PRINCE DE CONDÉ (CALLED MONSIEUR LE DUC)
FROM A CONTEMPORARY PRINT