In 1872 all the surviving members of the French Royal Family assembled at Chantilly to celebrate the wedding of Princesse Marguerite, daughter of the Duc de Nemours with Prince Ladislas Czartoysky; and on this occasion the great battle-pieces representing the military glories of the great Condé were replaced in the Gallery.
In the early spring of that year, King Edward and Queen Alexandra—then Prince and Princess of Wales—paid a visit to the Duc d’Aumale; with whom they had contracted a warm friendship during his residence in England.
But just when calm and happiness seemed to have at last returned to Chantilly, another heavy blow fell upon it. The young Duc de Guise was struck down by typhoid fever and died after a few days’ illness. With his sudden death all plans for the improvement of the Château and estate came to an abrupt standstill, for the heart-broken father had now to realise that, as he himself mournfully put it, “la dernière flamme de son foyer était éteinte.”
A new scheme now took shape in the heart of the Lord of Chantilly: a scheme at first kept to himself, and which had revolved in his mind long before he made it public. He intended to take France by surprise. This scheme was a no less magnificent one than to bestow Chantilly with all its appurtenances and contents upon the French nation. Once more the long interrupted design of the architect Duban, made before the exile of the Duke and Duchess, was recommenced: this time by M. Daumet, who undertook also the difficult task of rebuilding the Grand Château. After years of labour there arose once more upon the vaults of this famous fortress the present building, destined to become the Musée Condé, a veritable palace of Literature and Art. Its architecture, in order to harmonise with that of Montmorency’s Petit Château, is directly copied from sixteenth-century designs. But to erect the stately marble staircase with its splendid gilt iron railings, an undertaking which offered the greatest difficulties, it was necessary to pierce the solid rock. The Chapel, adorned by an elegant spire and full of valuable relics of the Montmorency and the Condé families, was also restored at this time. It contains an altar of Senlis marble, the joint work of Jean Bullant and Jean Goujon; and exquisite wood carvings, dated 1548, were brought from Écouen, an old seat of the Montmorency family. In the stained-glass windows (dated 1544) are represented the sons and daughters of Anne de Montmorency, whose effigy and that of his wife, Madeleine of Savoy, are painted on the wall by a modern painter from a cartoon by Lechevallier Chevignard.[17] The fine bronze monument to Henri II de Bourbon by Jacques Sarrazin has also found a permanent abode in this chapel. It was saved by Alexander Lenoir and presented to the Prince de Condé in 1815.
During the execution of these works Chantilly was frequently the scene of very interesting family gatherings. Queen Christina of Denmark, on the occasion of the marriage of her youngest son Waldemar to Princesse Marie, eldest daughter of the Duc de Chartres, made a lengthy stay at Chantilly; and not long afterwards Princess Marie Amélie, daughter of the Comte de Paris, was betrothed here to the Duke of Braganza, afterwards King of Portugal. But in that same year Republican France suddenly pronounced a further sentence of banishment upon all claimants to the French Throne—Royalist and Imperialist; in which order the Duc d’Aumale was included. In his quality of a General in the French Army, he protested against this, but without avail; and once more Chantilly was deserted. But this time it was not for long; for on returning with a heavy heart to his English home at Woodnorton and feeling his end drawing near the Duke resolved to make known immediately the act of munificence upon which he had so long decided. He therefore made public his intention of leaving Chantilly with all its forests, parks and lakes, and all its art-treasures to the care of the Members of the Institut de France, in trust for the French Nation. This was his dignified answer to the French Republic; and it made a deep and lasting impression in France. Nor was this act of generosity without immediate consequences, for shortly after a Decree signed by President Carnot was sent to the Duke with the assurance that France would welcome him back.
Plate XIX.
