Marie Antoinette and Her Son

by L. Mühlbach

And with a quick movement she caught the dauphin, struck back at the same moment the fist of the cobbler, snatched the boy away like lightning, and passed by before Simon had time to put his arm back.

The people, delighted with this energetic and courageous action of the queen—the people, who would have howled with rage, if the queen had ordered her lackeys to push the cobbler back, now roared with admiration and with pleasure, to see the proud-hearted woman have the boldness to repel the assailant, and to free herself from him. They applauded, they laughed, they shouted from thousands upon thousands of throats, "Long live the queen! Long live the dauphin!" and the cry passed along like wildfire through the whole mass of spectators behind the fence, and all eyes followed the tall and proud figure of the queen as she walked away.

Only the eyes of Simon pursued her with a malicious glare, and his clinched fists threatened her behind her back.

"She shall pay for this!" he muttered, with a withering curse. "She has struck back my hand to-day, but the day will come when she will feel it upon her neck, and when I will squeeze the hand of the little rascal so that he shall cry out with pain! I believe now, what Marat has so often told me, that the time of vengeance is come, and that we must bring the crown down and tread it under our feet, that the people may rule! I will have my share in it. I will help bring it down, and tread it under foot. I hate the handsome Austrian woman, who perks up her nose, and thinks herself better than my wife; and if the golden time has come of which Marat speaks, when the people are the master, and the king is the servant, Marie Antoinette shall be my waiting-maid, and her son shall be my choreboy, and his buckle shall make acquaintance with my shoe- straps!"

And while Master Simon was muttering this to himself, he was making a way through the crowd with those great elbows of his, a slipping along the fence, to be able to follow as long as possible the tall figure of the queen, who was now leading the dauphin by the hand, traversing the Arcadian Walk. At the end of it was the fence which led into the little garden reserved for the royal family. Through the iron gate, hard by, adorned with the arms of the kings of France, Marie Antoinette entered an asylum, which had been saved to the crown, free from the intrusion of the people, and she drew a free breath when one of the lackeys closed the gate, and she heard the key grate in the lock.

She stood still a moment to regain her composure, and then she felt that her feet were trembling, and that she scarcely had the power to go farther. It would have been a relief to her to have fallen there upon her knees, and poured all her sorrows and trials into the ear of God. But there were the lackeys behind her; there was her little son, looking up to her with his great eyes; and there was that dreadful cry coming up from the quay like the roaring of the sea.

The queen could not utter a word of grief or sorrow, she could not sink to the ground in her weakness; she had to show a cheerful face to her son, and a proud brow to her servants. God only could look into her heart and see the tears which glowed there like burning coals. Yet in all her sadness she had a feeling of triumph, of proud satisfaction. She had preserved her freedom, her independence; she was not Lafayette's prisoner! No, the Queen of France had not put herself under the protection of the people's general; she had not given him the power of watching her with his hated National Guard, and of saying to them: "At this or that hour the queen takes her walks, and, that she may recreate herself, we will protect her against the rage of the people!"

No, she had defended herself, she had remained the queen all the while, the free queen, and she had gained a victory over the people by showing them that she did not fear them.

"Mamma," cried the dauphin, interrupting her in her painful and proud thought—" mamma, there comes the king, there comes my papa! Oh, he will be glad to hear that I was so courageous!"

The queen quickly stooped down and kissed him. "Yes, truly, my little Bayard, yon have done honor to your great exemplar, and you have really been a little chevalier sans peur et sans reproche. But, my child, true bravery does not glory in its great deeds, and does not desire others to admire them, but keeps silent and leaves it to others to talk about them!"