It would have perhaps been no wonder if, after all she had suffered in France, she had identified herself with her mother’s family, and in another home and country forgotten as far as she could the land which must always have such fearful associations for her. But it was not so. Her father had told her that she was to marry no one but her cousin, the Duc d’Angoulême, who, failing her brother, would succeed to the crown; and had written to the same effect to his brother the Comte de Provence.
The Princess had therefore, as soon as she could get away from Austria, joined her uncles and aunts and married the Duc d’Angoulême, concentrating all her affection upon those remaining members of her family, who received her with the deepest joy and tenderness.
Louis XVIII. says of her—
“Madame Royale united all the virtues of her own sex with the energy of ours. She alone would have been able to reconquer our sceptre if, like her grandmother, Marie Thérèse, she had had the command of an army....”
Of their entry into Paris, he says—
“I was in an open carriage with Madame Royale by my side, [140] MM. de Condé were opposite; my brother and the Duc de Berri rode by us ... the Duc d’Angoulême was still in the south.... I saw nothing but rejoicing and goodwill on all sides; they cried ‘Vive le Roi!’ as if any other cry were impossible.... The more I entreated Madame Royale to control her emotion, for we were approaching the Tuileries, the more difficult it was for her to restrain it. It took all her courage not to faint or burst into tears in the presence of all these witnesses.... I myself was deeply agitated, the deplorable past rising before me.... I remembered leaving this town twenty-three years ago, about the same time of year at which I now returned, a King.... I felt as if I should have fallen when I saw the Tuileries. I kept my eyes away from Madame Royale for fear of calling forth an alarming scene. I trembled lest her firmness should give way at this critical moment. But arming herself with resignation against all that must overwhelm her, she entered almost smiling the palace of bitter recollections. When she could be alone the long repressed feelings overflowed, and it was with sobs and a deluge of tears that she took possession of the inheritance, which in the natural course of events must be her own.
“How thankful I was to find myself alone in the room occupied first by my brother, then by Buonaparte, to which I came back after so long an absence: absolute solitude was a necessity to my mind. I prayed and groaned without interruption, which relieved me; then I resolved irrevocably to act in such a manner as never to expose France or my family to the Revolution which had just ended.... I lay down in the bed of Buonaparte, it had also been that of the martyr king, and at first I could not sleep ... like Richard III. I saw in a vision those I had lost, and in the distance enveloped in a sanguinary cloud I seemed to see menacing phantoms.” [141]
With the King returned those that were left of the Orléans family. The best of the sons of Égalité, the Comte de Beaujolais had died in exile, so also had the Duc de Montpensier. The Duchess Dowager, saintly and good as ever, Mademoiselle d’Orléans and the Duc de Chartres remained. Both the latter had made their submission and expressed their repentance to the King, who in accepting the excuses of the Duc de Chartres said—