In her “Memoirs,” Mme. de Genlis says that the years she spent at the Palais Royal were the most brilliant and the most unhappy of her life.
The brilliant social success, and the life, a perpetual scene of pleasure, excitement and intense interest, were chequered with all sorts of annoyances. The envy she excited by her social triumphs, the favour of the Duchess, and later, of the Duc de Chartres, displayed itself as usual in slanders, misrepresentations, and different spiteful actions; while the hostility she aroused caused her more astonishment than would have been expected in a woman possessing so much knowledge of the world, and more unhappiness than one might suspect in one so entirely self-satisfied.
And although she was undoubtedly maligned, like many persons who gave less opportunity for gossip; still it was the consequence of her own act in placing herself in such a position, and identifying herself with such a crew. Her futile attempts to whitewash Philippe-Égalité can deceive nobody: he was too well-known. When she lays all his faults to his being badly brought up and surrounded with bad companions, one recollects the numbers of men and of women too, who, brought up and living under the same conditions, suffered and died with a heroism and loyalty that redeemed the faults and follies of their past.
And as to Mme. de Genlis, it appears more than probable that if she had followed the advice of Mme. de Custine, as she promised to do, and remained at the hôtel de Puisieux she would still have been a great literary and social success and also a better and happier woman.
Mme. de Montesson had so far succeeded in her plan that she had, in 1773, been privately married to the Duke of Orléans. The marriage was celebrated at midnight in the presence of a small number of persons of high position. But the marriage, though known and recognised in society, was only a morganatic one. Louis XV. would never hear of her taking the rank and title of Duchess of Orléans, or any precedence that would have been the consequence. This was of course a continual grievance to her, but she was obliged to resign herself and make the best of the position, at any rate far more exalted than any to which she had the least pretension to aspire. She had an unbounded influence over the Duc d’Orléans, in whose household and amongst whose friends she was always treated as a princess, and with whom she led a life of unbounded luxury and magnificence. Like Mme. de Maintenon after her morganatic marriage with Louis XIV. she renounced the title of Marquise and was known as Mme. de Montesson, possibly thinking like the hero of the well-known incident: “Princesse je ne puis pas, Marquise je ne veux pas, Madame je suis.” [116]
The year after the marriage Louis XV. died, but Louis XVI. would not depart from the attitude his grandfather had assumed, with regard to the morganatic marriage of the Duc d’Orléans.
The journeys of the court to the different country palaces, Versailles, Compiègne, Fontainebleau, Marly, &c., were affairs of enormous expense, and ceremony so preposterous, that, for instance, there was one sort of court dress for Versailles, and another, equally magnificent and uncomfortable, for Marly. On the 1st of January Louis XV. always arranged with care and consideration the journeys for the year to the different palaces, of which there were a great number. Mme. Campan [117] in her “Mémoires,” says that Marly, even more than Versailles, transported one vividly to the reign of Louis XIV.; its palaces and gardens were like a magnificent scene in an opera; fountains, pavilions, statues, marble basins, ponds and canals, thickets of shrubs, groups of tall trees, trellised walks and arbours, amongst which the ladies and gentlemen of the royal households and court walked about in full dress; plumes, paniers, jewels, and trains making any enjoyment of the country out of the question, but impressing with awe and admiration the crowds who were admitted to the gardens, and to the suppers and gambling at night. Every trace of this palace and gardens disappeared in the Revolution.
During the latter part of the reign of Louis XV. the rule of perpetual court dress at Marly was given up, and when Louis XVI. came to the throne he tried, but without success, to discourage the gambling, which he hated; but what Marie Antoinette disliked was the stiffness, fatigue, and restraint of these journeys, and she insisted that at Trianon, which the King had given her, she should be free from the intolerable gêne of the etiquette which the last two reigns had so increased as to be an intolerable burden, in former centuries unknown at the court of France.
The party in opposition to the Queen, absolutely unscrupulous and vindictive, hesitated at no calumny or exaggeration that might do her injury; and everything seemed to create fresh enemies for her.
When she received the ladies of the Court on her accession, Mme. de Clermont-Tonnerre, a thoughtless girl of sixteen, sat on the carpet all the time, hidden by the ladies of the household who stood before her, making grimaces behind her fan, whispering nonsense, pulling the dresses of her companions and making them all, even the Queen herself, unable to restrain their laughter; so that great offence was given and the blame of course laid on the Queen. The King was very angry, sent for Mme. de Clermont-Tonnerre and reprimanded her; whereupon she turned all her spite against the Queen, and all the Clermonts went into opposition.