About the time of her death, one of her uncles passed away, leaving to the young student at the Collège du Plessis a large and valuable estate. This placed Lafayette in a very advantageous position so far as worldly matters were concerned. His fortune being now princely, his record at college without blemish, his rank unexceptionable among the titles of nobility, he was quickly mentioned as an eligible partner in marriage for a young daughter of one of the most influential families in France,—a family that lived, said one American observer, in the splendor and magnificence of a viceroy, which was little inferior to that of a king. This daughter was named, in the grand fashion of the French nobility, Marie-Adrienne-Françoise de Noailles. In her family she was called simply Adrienne.
Adrienne de Noailles was not old enough to give promise of the greatness of character of which she later showed herself possessed; but, as it proved, Lafayette found that in her he had a companion who was indeed to be his good genius. She became the object of the unwavering devotion of his whole life; and she responded with an affection that was without limit; she gave a quick and perfect understanding to all his projects and his ideals; she followed his career with an utterly unselfish zeal; and when heavy sorrows came, her courage and her cleverness were Lafayette's resource. Her name should appear among those of the world's heroines.
At the time of the proposed alliance, Lafayette was fourteen; the suggested fiancée was scarcely twelve. Her mother, the Duchess d'Ayen, a woman of great efficiency and of lofty character, knew that the Marquis de Lafayette was almost alone in the world, with no one to guide him in his further education or to lend aid in advancing his career. Moreover, she held that to have so large a fortune was rather a disadvantage than otherwise, since it might be a help or a hindrance, according to the wisdom of the owner, and she rightly saw that the allurements of the Paris of 1770 to an unprotected youth of fortune would be almost irresistible. She therefore refused to allow a daughter of hers to accept the proposal. For several months she withheld her consent, but at last she relented, on consideration that the young people should wait for two years before the marriage should take place. This admirable mother, who had carefully educated and trained her daughters, now took the further education of Lafayette into her care; she soon became very fond of him and cherished him as tenderly as if he had been her own son.
The marriage took place in Paris on the 11th of April, 1774. It was an affair of great splendor. There were many grand banquets; there were visits of ceremony, with new and elaborate toilettes for each visit; there were numberless beautiful presents, the families represented and their many connections vying with each other in the richness and fineness of their gifts. Diamonds and jewels in settings of quaint design were among them, and besides all these there were the ancestral jewels of Julie de la Rivière, the mother of Lafayette, to be received by the new bride, and by her handed down to her descendants.
The arrangement was that the wedded pair should make their home with the mother of the bride, the young husband paying eight thousand livres a year as his share of the expense. The sumptuous home was the family mansion of the Noailles family; it was situated in the rue St. Honoré, not far from the palace of the Tuileries, at the corner where the rue d'Alger has now been cut through. The Hôtel de Noailles it was called, and it was so large that to an observer of to-day it would appear more like a splendid hotel than like a private residence. When, a few years after Lafayette's wedding, John Adams was representing the United States in Paris, and was entertained in this palatial home, he was so amazed that he could not find words in English or in French to describe the elegance and the richness of the residence. In it were suites of rooms for several families, for troops of guests, and for vast retinues of servants. The building measured from six hundred to seven hundred feet from end to end. There were splendid halls and galleries and arcades. Toward the street the façade was plain but the interior was decorated with astonishing richness. The inner rooms faced on a garden so large that a small hunt could be carried on within it, with fox, horses, and hounds, all in full cry. Magnificent trees waved their branches above the great garden, and rabbits burrowed below.
Here was a delightful place for a few people to pursue beautiful lives. John Adams made a note of the fact that the Noailles family held so many offices under the king that they received no less than eighteen million livres (more than three and a half million dollars) income each year. It must be remembered that the streets of Paris about this time were crowded with a rabble of beggars. But of this the dwellers in such magical palaces and parks saw but little and thought less.
Conditions such as these give a hint of the causes that led to the French Revolution and explain in some degree why thoughts of liberty, fraternity, and equality were haunting the minds of the youth of France, and, to some of the more open-minded among them, suggesting dreams of noble exploit.