Family: The Bourbons

Louis was rather plump. He was well educated: a studious man, cultivated, and a lover of music, he preferred the pleasures of conversation to those of hunting, balls, or spectacles. With a keen sense of morality, he was very much committed to his wife, Marie-Josèphe, as she was to him. Very devout, he was a fervent supporter of the Jesuits, like his mother and sisters, and was led by them to have a devotion to the Sacred Heart. He appeared in the eyes of his sisters as the ideal of the Christian prince, in sharp contrast with their father who was a notorious womanizer.

Kept away from government affairs by his father, Louis was at the center of the Dévots, a group of religiously-minded men who hoped to gain power when he succeeded to the throne.

Matterhorn wrote:She was a noble lady, it is very sad that her children, Louis XVI and Madame Elisabeth, were treated so cruelly.

http://historicallyobsessed.blogspot.com/2010/06/hfbrt-for-king-guest-post-by-catherine.html

The King and the Emperor: Louis XVIII and Napoléon
CATHERINE DELORS

My novel is called FOR THE KING for a reason (for several reasons, in fact, but I will leave it to the reader to discover those.)

In 1800 France was still a republic, nominally run by three Consuls. For all intents and purposes, only the First Consul, Napoléon Bonaparte, mattered. He had seized power in a bloodless coup in the fall of 1799.

At first, royalists indulged in the hope that Bonaparte would step down and restore the monarchy. The pretender to the throne was a younger brother of the late Louis XVI, Louis-Stanislas. He was now known to his followers as Louis XVIII, to allow for the theoretical reign of the young Louis XVII, son of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette, who had died jailed at the Temple.

In 1800 Louis XVIII was 45. He had been friendly to reform in the beginnings of the French Revolution. But as it took a more radical turn, he had fled at the same time as the royal couple. Only he had succeeded in reaching Brussels when Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette were arrested near the border.

Since then, Louis XVIII had lived the unhappy life of an exile, at the mercy of the varying generosity of foreign sovereigns and the vagaries of international politics. In 1800 he was living under the protection of the Tsar of Russia.

Louis XVIII was by all accounts, like his elder brother, a man of superior intelligence, but he was a far more astute politician than Louis XVI. He was patient, ambitious, cunning, and determined to step some day unto the throne of his ancestors.

This is what he wrote Napoléon in September of 1800:

General,
You must have long known that you have earned my esteem. If you ever doubted that I was able of gratitude, chose your own place, decide the fate of your friends.
As for my principles, I am a Frenchman: merciful by nature, I shall be all the more so by reason.

No, the victor of Lodi, Castiglione, Arcole, le conqueror of Italy and Egypt cannot prefer a vain fame to glory. However you are wasting precious time; we can ensure the peace of France. I say “we” because I need Bonaparte for that, and that he cannot do it without me.

General, Europe is watching you, glory awaits you, and I am impatient to restore peace to my people.

Keep in mind that Bonaparte had not yet given any indications that he planned to restore monarchy for his own benefit. He would only crown himself Emperor four years later. But he obviously thought the time had come to dash royalist illusions. Here is his response to Louis XVIII:

Sir,
I received your letter. I thank you for the kind things you write about me. You must not wish for your return to France. You would have to step upon 500,000 corpses.

Sacrifice your interest to the peace and happiness of France; history will remember it to your credit.

I am not indifferent to your family’s misfortunes. I will be happy to contribute to the comfort and tranquility of your retreat.
Bonaparte

Bonaparte had dropped the mask! These letters, by the way, provide useful glimpses into the minds of the two men. Note how Louis XVIII flatters Bonaparte, and emphasizes cooperation, and how all but one of Bonaparte’s sentences begin with “I”.

A few months later, royalists will detonate a bomb along the path of Bonaparte’s carriage, in the assassination attempt I describe in FOR THE KING. As to Louis XVIII, he had to bide his time. But eventually, he was restored to the throne, while Napoléon died in exile on the forlorn island of St. Helena. Twists and turns of history…

Princess Elisabeth de France was the last-born sibling of Louis XVI. A figure remarkable for her exuberance and piety, throughout her life she showed a strong attachment to her brother and sister-in-law, whom she followed to their final place of incarceration.

Born in the palace of Versailles in 1764, Elisabeth de France, called Madame Elisabeth, was the youngest sister of Louis XVI. Orphaned at the age of 3, she received an excellent education during which she was noted for her talents in mathematics and the sciences. Her contemporaries said she was a skilled rider, gifted for drawing and embroidery but a mediocre singer. From her childhood, she revealed an ambiguous personality, her great devotion combining with her dissipated and original character – she signed some of her letters “Elisabeth la Folle” (Mad Elisabeth). At an early age she showed great attachment to Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette, with whom she lived all her life, refusing to marry to be able to remain with them.

In 1783, when Madame Elisabeth was 19, Louis XVI gave her a plot of land and a house in the village of Montreuil, which can still be seen today in the Montreuil district of Versailles and is known as the “Domaine de Madame Elisabeth” (her estate). Although she was not allowed to sleep here before coming of age (25), she rode there every day from the palace of Versailles. The life she lived there, simpler than at the court, was dominated by the leisure activities that she had adopted in her childhood, and by the pious practices and works of charity that earned her the nickname “Bonne dame de Montreuil” (good lady of Montreuil).

When the French Revolution broke out, Madame Elisabeth adopted a very firm stand against the supporters of a constitutional monarchy and was opposed to any search for a compromise. Her attachment to Louis XVI led her to refuse the exile chosen by her aunts and other brothers. So she followed Marie-Antoinette to Varennes, to the Temple prison, and then to the scaffold on which she died in 1794 before being buried in a common grave.

Her attachment to her brother and sister-in-law, her intransigent opposition to the Revolution’s aspirations, her piety, her charitable work and the way she met her death led to the formation of a cult built around her personality in the first half of the 19th century. This cult was fostered within the royalist movement which developed in favour of a restoration of the monarchy and militated for the beatification of Madame Elisabeth.

Charles Emanuel and his new wife met for the first time on September 6, 1775, when they renewed their marriage vows in the Chapel Royal at Les Echelles, Savoy. In spite of the political reasons for the union, the couple were well-matched; they shared a profound attachment to the Catholic faith. The fact that they were not blessed with children was treated by them as the will of God to which they should resign themselves. After seven years of married life, they chose to live together as brother and sister.

Charles Emanuel was deeply troubled by the French Revolution whose effects were being felt throughout western Europe. In 1793 his brother-in-law King Louis XVI was executed. The following year his sister-in-law Queen Marie Antoinette met the same fate and the armies of the French Republic stormed into his father's dominions. Charles Emanuel took solace in his faith. In 1794 he became a member of the Third Order of Saint Dominic, taking the name Charles Emanuel of St. Hyacinth.

At the death of his father, King Victor Amadeus III of Sardinia, October 16, 1796, Charles Emanuel succeeded as King Charles Emanuel IV of Sardinia. It was a most difficult time to be a new monarch; Charles Emanuel referred to his throne as a "crown of thorns"....

Talleyrand, the Bishop turned diplomat extraordinaire, said of Queen Marie Leszczynska that “her virtues had something sad about them that failed to inspire sympathy.” That has remained the judgment of history, which remembers her as a dour, charmless, rather stupid but innocuous figure. This is, in my opinion, most unfair.

True, Maria Karolina Zofia Felicja Leszczynska was not destined to become the Queen consort of France. Her father, Stanislas Leszczynski, had been briefly Kind of Poland from 1704 to 1709 before being dethroned and sent into exile by one of the many convulsions in that country’s history.

Stanislas Leszczynski, an intellectual, kindly man, had limited ambitions for his daughter. He would have been happy to give her hand in marriage to any French Duke. But her dowry was so meager as to be considered nonexistent, and no candidates of suitable rank were in sight for Marie. A pity, for she has received an excellent education, and speaks five languages with perfect fluency. But that has never replaced money and connections…

As for Louis XV, then fifteen, he had been engaged since his childhood to his cousin, seven-year old Spanish princess Marie-Anne-Victoire de Bourbon. The marriage was considered such a sure thing that Marie-Anne was called the Infante-Reine (the “Infanta-Queen.”) She had lived in Versailles since the age of three.

But young Louis XV is sickly, and suddenly falls gravely ill. The Duc de Bourbon, head of the Conseil de Régence, represents that it is urgent for the King to sire an heir. Obviously for this purpose the little Infanta-Queen, at seven, will not do. The girl is thus unceremoniously shipped back to Spain. Years later, she will indeed become Queen, though of Portugal instead of France.

The choice of the Duc de Bourbon falls on Marie Leszczynska, a young woman of 22, the perfect child-bearing age, whom he had once considered, and rejected, as a potential bride. The match is greeted at first with incredulity and derision, both in Versailles and in foreign courts, where many a princess feels personally slighted by the unlikely choice of a “mere Polish young lady” as Queen of France. Vicious rumors spread through Versailles: Marie is ugly, she is epileptic, she is so deformed that she cannot bear children, she suffers from a purulent skin condition…

But Louis XV, when he meets his bride, is immediately delighted by her, a rare occurrence in royal marriages of the time. She is no stunning beauty, but she is comely, in all the glow of youth and health. At fifteen he has already reached sexual maturity and consummates the marriage with enthusiasm. His Queen is his first love, and she returns his feelings.

Less delighted with the bride, however, are the courtiers of Versailles. They sneer at the new Queen, poke fun at her age, her looks, her gowns, her French diction (it is native, as she has been given French governesses since childhood, but not deemed refined enough for a Queen.) She puts up graciously with all of this and, unlike her successor Marie-Antoinette decades later, finds help in her strict adherence to the étiquette, which at least protects her from the rudest of the courtiers’ slights.

Two years after her marriage, she gives birth to twin girls. Eight more children, the Dauphin Louis-Ferdinand, the much awaited male heir, then another boy and six more girls, follow in the next ten years.

At least Marie is no longer faulted for being barren, but at age 34, after ten children and nine pregnancies, she has lost her youthful looks. Louis XV is no longer a smitten teenager, he is now a handsome young man, with the same sexual appetites as his great-grandfather Louis XIV. He is still fond of his wife, but she is beginning to look like an old lady to him. Their age difference matters now. He takes a first mistress, then a second, then many more.

Marie, however, is still very much in love with her husband, and experiences bitter pangs of jealousy. The worst comes when Louis XV asks his wife to accept his chief mistress, the Marquise de Pompadour, as a lady-in-waiting. Again Marie puts up with her situation with grace and dignity. She greets her rival with all the appearances of friendliness, and seeks refuge in a small group of friends, picked for their religious leanings and intellectual affinities with her.

She gathers them in the private apartments allocated to her within the Palace of Versailles (the Petit Trianon is then reserved for Madame de Pompadour’s use.) Every autumn her parents visit her for a few months. Marie Leszczynska also finds comfort in artistic pursuits. She paints in watercolors and is passionately fond of music, all tastes she transmits to her daughters. She invites the famous castrate Farinelli to France to give her singing lessons.

Yet it would be a grave mistake to consider the Queen a political nonentity. Notwithstanding the low esteem of the courtiers, she is beloved by common people, and knows it. She once retorts, when told that she doesn’t dress smartly enough: “I do not need gowns when the poor have no shirts.” We are very far from the “Let them eat cake” (falsely) attributed to Marie-Antoinette.

Queen Marie’s death at the age of 65 is a disaster for the monarchy. It deprives the royal family of its most popular member. Her great rival, Madame de Pompadour, also a woman of taste and intellect, had already died a few years earlier. Louis XV is thus left to his own devices after the successive deaths of his mistress and wife. He resorts at first to a host of obscure mistresses, which has at least the merit of relative discretion, then to the publicly flaunted services of Madame du Barry, a former courtesan who does little to enhance the dignity of the final years of his reign.

So what remains of Queen Marie Leszczynska? A few portraits, including this beautiful work by Nattier (below) and very little else. Her private apartments at Versailles were destroyed during Marie-Antoinette’s remodeling of that part of the palace. The gilded rococo paneling and Boucher paintings we see in the Queen’s Bedchamber, however, are still the ones chosen by Marie Leszczynska.

Madame Adelaide and her younger sister, Madame Victoire, had lived in quiet retirement for some time before the French Revolution had fully developed. The women, who spent much of their time doing charity work and staying out of the public eye felt the dangers of the intense changing political thought.

They found it in their best interest to leave France for a while, until things quieted down. The ladies planned to travel to Rome where they would visit St. Peters, but ultimately they wanted to find a safe refuge. They secured their passports and with Louis XVI's permission, begun their journey.

The idea of members of the royal family leaving France, or fleeing France, was much discussed, and caused concern of planned escape of other members of the family, perhaps the king and queen, even plots of foreign involvement in the to-be revolution were considered.

The paper, Sabbats Jacobites, had written on the subject with much sarcasm:
"The Ladies are going to Italy to try the power of their tears and their charms upon the princes of that country. Already the Grand Master of Malta has caused Madame Adelaide to be informed that he will give her his heart and hand as soon as she has quitted France, and that she may count upon the assistance of three galleys and forty-eight cavaliers, young and old. Our Holy Father undertakes to marry Victoire and promises her his army of three hundred men to bring about a counter-revolution."

As a result of all the buzz, soon after they left, the daughters of Louis XV were detained at Arnay-le Duc, and awaited a decision from the National Assembly over whether or not they could proceed out of France.

The decision was not made in haste, and the National Assembly spent good time on the matter. The matter was resolved after Jacques-Francois Menou made the following observation:

"Europe will doubtless be much astonished, when it learns that the National Assembly of France spent four entire hours in deliberating on the departure of two ladies who would rather hear Mass in Rome than in Paris."

 With this, the National Assembly permitted them to leave the country, much to the dismay of many. Violent riots broke out in Arnay-le-Ducpreventing their departure for days. Paris too saw its share of rioting over the decision. When the mobs approached the Tuileries, where Louis and his family stayed, they demanded he order his aunts back. Louis held his position, and did not grant their demand nor consider it any further, and the crowds eventually dispersed, and the women made their way to Rome.