The catastrophe is to come. The instant the king's back was turned, the gallery became a scene of confusion. The musicians ceased playing, and began to chatter; the pages dashed about to remove the service, and everybody was in motion. Observing that your —— was standing undecided what to do, I walked into the railed area, brushed past the gorgeous state table, and gave her my arm. She laughed, and said it had all been very magnificent and amusing, but that some one had stolen her shawl! A few years before, I had purchased for her a merino shawl, of singular fineness, simplicity, and beauty. It was now old, and she had worn it on this occasion, because she distrusted the dirt of a palace; and laying it carelessly by her side, in the course of the evening she had found in its place a very common thing of the same colour. The thief was deceived by its appearance your —— being dressed for an evening party, and had probably mistaken it for a cashmere. So much for the company one meets at court! Too much importance, however, must not be attached to this little contretems, as people of condition are apt to procure tickets for such places, and to give them to their femmes de chambre. Probably, half the women present, the "jeunes et jolies" excepted, were of this class. But mentioning this affair to the old Princesse de ——, she edified me by an account of the manner in which Madame la Comtesse de —— had actually appropriated to the service of her own pretty person the cachemire of Madame la Baronne de ——, in the royal presence; and how there was a famous quarrel, à l'outrance, about it; so I suspend my opinions as to the quality of the thief.
LETTER X.
Road to Versailles.—Origin of Versailles.—The present Chateau.—The
two Trianons.—La Petite Suisse.—Royal Pastime.—Gardens of Versailles.
—The State Apartments.—Marie Antoinette's Chamber.—Death of Louis XV.
—Oeil de Boeuf.—The Theatre and Chapel.—A
Quarry.—Caverns.—Compiègne.—Chateau de Pierre-font.—Influence of
Monarchy.—Orangery at Versailles.
To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.
We have been to Versailles, and although I have no intention to give a laboured description of a place about which men have written and talked these two centuries, it is impossible to pass over a spot of so much celebrity in total silence.
The road to Versailles lies between the park of St. Cloud and the village and manufactories of Sèvres. A little above the latter is a small palace, called Meudon, which, from its great elevation, commands a fine view of Paris. The palace of St. Cloud, of course, stands in the park; Versailles lies six or eight miles farther west; Compiègne is about fifty miles from Paris in one direction; Fontainebleau some thirty in another, and Rambouillet rather more remotely, in a third. All these palaces, except Versailles, are kept up, and from time to time are visited by the court. Versailles was stripped of its furniture in the revolution; and even Napoleon, at a time when the French empire extended from Hamburgh to Rome, shrunk from the enormous charge of putting it in a habitable state. It is computed that the establishment at Versailles, first and last, in matters of construction merely, cost the French monarchy two hundred millions of dollars! This is almost an incredible sum, when we remember the low price of wages in France; but, on the other hand, when we consider the vastness of the place, how many natural difficulties were overcome, and the multitude of works from the hands of artists of the first order it contained, it scarcely seems sufficient.
Versailles originated as a hunting-seat, in the time of Louis XIII. In that age, most of the upland near Paris, in this direction, lay in forest, royal chases; and, as hunting was truly a princely sport, numberless temporary residences of this nature existed in the neighbourhood of the capital. There are still many remains of this barbarous magnificence, as in the wood of Vincennes, the forest of St. Germain, Compiègne, Fontainebleau, and divers others; but great inroads have been made in their limits by the progress of civilization and the wants of society. So lately as the reign of Louis XV. they hunted quite near the town; and we are actually, at this moment, dwelling in a country house, at St. Ouen, in which, tradition hatch it, he was wont to take his refreshments.
The original building at Versailles was a small chateau, of a very ugly formation, and it was built of bricks. I believe it was enlarged, but not entirely constructed, by Louis XIII. A portion of this building is still visible, having been embraced in the subsequent structures; and, judging from its architecture, I should think it must be nearly as ancient as the time of Francis I. Around this modest nucleus was constructed, by a succession of monarchs, but chiefly by Louis XIV. the most regal residence of Europe, in magnificence and extent, if not in taste.
The present chateau, besides containing numberless wings and courts, has vast casernes for the quarters of the household troops, stables for many hundred horses, and is surrounded by a great many separate hotels, for the accommodation of the courtiers. It offers a front on the garden, in a single continuous line, that is broken only by a projection in the centre of more than a third of a mile in length. This is the only complete part of the edifice that possesses uniformity; the rest of it being huge piles grouped around irregular courts, or thrown forward in wings, that correspond to the huge body like those of the ostrich. There is on the front next the town, however, some attempt at simplicity and intelligibility of plan; for there is a vast open court lined by buildings, which have been commenced in the Grecian style. Napoleon, I believe, did something here, from which there is reason to suppose that he sometimes thought of inhabiting the palace. Indeed, so long as France has a king, it is impossible that such a truly royal abode can ever be wholly deserted. At present, it is the fashion to grant lodgings in it to dependants and favourites. Nothing that I have seen gives me so just and so imposing an idea of the old French monarchy as a visit to Versailles. Apart from the vastness and splendour of the palace, here is a town that actually contained, in former times, a hundred thousand souls, that entirely owed its existence to the presence of the court. Other monarchs lived in large towns; but here was a monarch whose presence created one. Figure to yourself the style of the prince, when a place more populous than Baltimore, and infinitely richer in externals, existed merely as an appendage to his abode!
The celebrated garden contains two or three hundred acres of land, besides the ground that is included in the gardens of the two Trianons. These Trianons are small palaces erected in the gardens, as if the occupants of the chateau, having reached the acmé of magnificence and splendour in the principal residence, were seeking refuge against the effect of satiety in these humbler abodes. They appear small and insignificant after the palace; but the Great Trianon is a considerable house, and contains a fine suite of apartments, among which are some very good rooms. There are few English abodes of royalty that equal even this of Le Grand Trianon. The Petit Trianon was the residence of Madame de Maintenon; it afterwards was presented to the unfortunate Marie Antoinette, who, in part converted its grounds into an English garden, in addition to setting aside a portion into what is called La Petite Suisse.