The course of the spring of 1795 was marked only by the gradual fading away of the Dauphin. The Committee of General Safety sent physicians at last, and fresh keepers strove by their kindness to compensate in some feeble measure for the past cruelties he had endured, but it was too late. He grew weaker and weaker, then fever set in, which he had no strength to resist, and he died on the 9th of June. The poor child was only a little over ten years old.
With the death of her brother, Madame Royale’s memoirs come to a conclusion, but we learn from other sources what followed.
The Government seem to have felt they had gone too far. A feeling of pity for “the daughter of the last King” began to be awakened. A petition was presented from the City of Orleans, urging that she should be restored to freedom, and negotiations were set on foot which had in view an exchange of the princess for some prisoners in the custody of the Austrian Government. Meanwhile Madame Royale was treated with much greater consideration, and a lady, Madame de Chantereine, was appointed to attend on her.
Above all her old friends, Madame de Tourzel, and her daughter, Pauline, and Madame de Mackan, former sub-governess to the children of France, were, after some difficulty, allowed to visit the Temple. Madame de Tourzel, in her memoirs, has left us many details of their first meeting.
THE PARTING.
They had left the princess feeble and delicate, and were surprised to find her beautiful, tall, and strong, and with that air of distinction which was her peculiar characteristic, while they traced in her the features of the King, the Queen, and even of Madame Elizabeth. She had much to tell them of all three, and they drew from her many touching particulars of her solitary captivity. She confessed she had grown so weary of her profound solitude, that she had said to herself that she should not be able to keep from loving any companion they might give her short of a monster. When Madame de Tourzel expressed a hope that she might be allowed to leave France, Madame Royale answered sadly “that she still found some comfort in dwelling in a country which held the ashes of those who had been dearest to her in the world.” And, she added with a burst of tears, that “she would have been much happier if she could have shared their fate instead of being condemned to weep for them.” No single expression of bitterness, however, escaped from her.
The good Marquise was considerably shocked at the freedom with which Madame de Chantereine treated the princess, and the airs of authority which she assumed over her. The Marquise and her daughter endeavoured to make her see this by the great respect which they themselves showed Madame Royale, but is was to no purpose. Madame Royale, however, had attached herself to the lady, and did not resent her familiarity. Any companion who showed her kindness was welcome to her, and Madame de Chantereine was an educated person, could speak Italian, of which the princess was fond, and gave her lessons in embroidery, at which she was very skilful.
Madame Royale was allowed once more to walk in the garden of the Temple. The faithful Hué hired a room in a house overlooking the garden, and ventured to sing in her hearing a ballad which foretold that her captivity would soon be over. More than this, he contrived to have conveyed to the princess a letter, with which he had been entrusted by her uncle, Louis XVIII., and to obtain her reply. From Madame de Tourzel Madame Royale learnt that it was the wish of her uncle, as it had been that of her parents, that she should wed her cousin, the Duc d’Angoulême. It was the first time she had heard this, and she expressed surprise that her father and mother had never spoken to her on the subject, but Madame de Tourzel explained that they had probably refrained on account of her youth, and for fear of distracting her attention from her studies. The thought of being able to carry out what had been her parents’ wish made a great impression on the princess, and with a fresh interest thus awakened she asked Madame de Tourzel many questions respecting the Duke.
The discovery, however, of a supposed Royalist plot, and, later on, the application of the Tuscan Envoy to be allowed to salute the princess, caused her to be again more closely confined and debarred from the society of her friends. But her captivity was now to be only of short duration, and at the end of November the following order opened the gates of the Temple:—