“And they assemble to give her a rose in public?”
“Yes. A fine reward for a poor creature who perhaps has not bread to eat, isn’t it? I shall have to go to-morrow to hear the evidence ... and again in a month for what they call the coronation. It might amuse you to see it once.... But the strangest thing is the importance these good people attach to the ceremony, and the exultation of the relations of the ‘rosière.’ One would think they had gained a valuable prize. It may amuse one for the moment, but when one has to see it every year, it is a ridiculous thing for a reasonable man.”
Félicité soon managed to make friends with all her husband’s relations. M. and Mme. de Puisieux not only got over their prejudice against her, but were devoted to her. She spent months together with them at Sillery, and was a great deal with them at Paris, where her great delight was to know every one who could remember the court of Louis XIV., for which she had the most ardent admiration.
There were, of course, still those to be met with whose appearance, manners, and ways recalled that stately, magnificent court, which long afterwards was the beau ideal Napoleon vainly tried to realise. Amongst others was the Duc de Richelieu, one of the most brilliant, the most polished, the most dissipated, and the most heartless figures of the courts of Louis XIV. and Louis XV. His son, the Duc de Fronsac, was, though not equally attractive, quite as vicious as his father, and they entertained for each other a hatred they generally veiled, at any rate in public, under the most polished sarcasm.
On one occasion the Duc de Richelieu so far departed from his usual habit as to recommend to the Duc de Fronsac a lad who bore a strong resemblance to himself, begging him to give him a post in his household and look after him. Fronsac, struck with jealousy of this protégé of his father’s, did all he could to corrupt and ruin him, taught him to be a gambler and reprobate, and finally led him into collision with himself in some love intrigue, challenged him to a duel, and killed him.
Shortly afterwards, passing his father in the great gallery at Versailles, the Duc de Richelieu said to him—
“Monsieur, you have killed your brother.”
“I knew it,” replied Fronsac, and passed on.
Within the first few years of her marriage, Félicité had three children—two girls and a boy.
The Comte de Genlis passed part of his time with her and the rest with his regiment, during which Félicité lived at Paris or stayed with his relations, chiefly the de Puisieux, leading a life of gaiety mingled with study and music, and going constantly into society, which has, perhaps, never been equalled in fascination and charm.