Naturally the Duchess Johanna Elizabetha held aloof, but she knew she must one day meet her rival face to face, one day take part in a court festivity where the woman would be only second in formal rank, in reality the first in the estimation of all.
The winter days grew short and dark, and Christmas approached. Christmas rejoicings with this sinful woman queening it at masque and dance! Even from informal family gatherings the Landhofmeisterin, as first lady in the land, could not be excluded.
'Dear and honoured Madame my Mother,' Johanna Elizabetha wrote, 'I have to meet this woman again. Let the first encounter not be before the world. I will invite her to our Christmas tree. Come you too, dear Madame my Mother, even if there is snow on the ground, to help your unhappy daughter, Johanna Elizabetha.' Thus she wrote to the formidable dame at Stetten.
It must be conceded that for the favourite this family gathering to which she was bidden presented disagreeable prospects of extreme difficulty, and she craved Eberhard Ludwig to permit her to decline the honour, but Serenissimus implored her to consent. It would be unwise to rebuff the Duchess's overture, and after all, possibly it was her Highness's intention to live peaceably with her husband's mistress. Other ladies had done so. He quoted history and recent events: Louis xiv., Louise de la Vallière, and Marie Thérèse of France, and so on. Also he represented to her that the first meeting with Johanna Elizabetha would be a trifle awkward with the whole court agape, so perhaps this private family gathering was an excellent opportunity; besides, as Landhofmeisterin, it was correct she should be included in the Petit Cercle.
She mocked at the homely custom of the Christmas tree, calling it unfitting for a grand seigneur's household to indulge in such old-fashioned peasant-like rejoicings.
'Can you dream of such a festivity at Versailles?' she asked, laughing.
He told her that his mother clung to the habit. It was an ancient German custom thus to celebrate the Birth of Christ.
'I love the notion, too, that in all my villages the peasants can have the same as I have, for once, poor souls!' he added simply.
'Eberhard, you are ridiculous!—yes, a ridiculous poet-fellow. But I will come to your peasant celebration, if it pleases you.' She was touched by this gentle saying of his.
And thus it fell out that on Christmas eve Wilhelmine ordered her coach to convey her to the castle. She drove through the snow in no happy frame of mind. Christmas trees and the favourite!—could anything be more incongruous? and she knew it. Angrily she sneered at the simple homeliness of the old German custom. Peasants could do these absurdities, but the Duchess of Wirtemberg?