Gratitude also recalls to my mind my near relations the Comte and Comtesse de Flandre, and their many kindnesses which I have not forgotten. Their noble lives have known the awful sadness of the destruction of a tenderly nurtured future. But God has granted them reserves of hope and affection.
I was nearly forgetting one of the chief recollections of my earliest childhood—Queen Marie Amélie, the widow of King Louis Philippe.
This Royal lady, who bore her loss and her exile with so much dignity, was my great-grandmother and my godmother. She lived in retirement at Claremont, near Esher.
When the Queen received the news of my birth her first question was: "Has she small ears?" She expressed the wish for me to be named Louise Marie, in memory of her daughter, my venerated grandmother, the first Queen of the Belgians.
I can still picture my sweet old relation, with her white curls showing underneath a wide-brimmed lace cap. I can again see the early breakfast placed at the side of the deep arm-chair, and I remember the "pain à la Grecque" which she gave me when I had been good.
Then the pony was brought round, and my cousin Blanche de Nemours and myself were installed in the double panniers, and taken for our daily ride in the shady avenues of the great park.
The Queen had as reader Miss Müser, a German, who was the faithful friend and constant companion of her old age. I was very young at this time, certainly not more than four, but I have religiously treasured in my remembrance the face, the voice, and the tenderness of my great-grandmother, Marie Amélie, Queen of France.
As everyone knows, my two sisters, whom I always remember in those happy times when we still ignored what is called life, are both married. Stéphanie, like myself, married very early, and Clémentine much later in life.
Stéphanie as a child, a young girl and a young woman was the more beautiful. Clémentine, who was also beautiful, possessed the most charm. Destiny has smiled upon her. Her life with the King gave her the insight and guidance which we never enjoyed. Every life has its favours and its chances in the human lottery.
Clémentine married Prince Victor Napoleon and the widely varied possibilities attached to such a name.