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It was, indeed, the famous necklace, the legendary necklace that Bohmer and Bassenge, court jewelers, had made for Madame Du Barry; the veritable necklace that the Cardinal de Rohan-Soubise intended to give to Marie-Antoinette, Queen of France; and the same that the adventuress Jeanne de Valois, Countess de la Motte, had pulled to pieces one evening in February, 1785, with the aid of her husband and their accomplice, Retaux de Villette.
The condemnation of queen Marie-Antoinette was directed against Europe; that of the twenty-two against the Girondists; of the wise Bailly against the old constitutionalists; lastly, that of the duke of Orleans against certain members of the Mountain who were supposed to have plotted his elevation.
Now and again there appeared one which was really clever, which embodied a smart, a witty idea; but how many of them were simply the outcome of a depraved, a lewd, a bestial imagination! The most offensive caricatures of Marie-Antoinette were as nothing beside those levelled at that unfortunate woman, the Empress Eugenie. Our last days of liberty were now slipping by.
This collection, printed by Simon de Colines, is dedicated to a bishop! to Francois Bohier, the brother of the man who, to save his credit at court and redeem his offence, offered to Diane, on the accession of Henri II., the chateau de Chenonceaux, built by his father, Thomas Bohier, a councillor of state under four kings: Louis XI., Charles VIII., Louis XII., and Francois I. What were the pamphlets published against Madame de Pompadour and against Marie-Antoinette compared to these verses, which might have been written by Martial?
He insists, you know, that he doesn't begin to know his way around that huge house!" "It was his father who built the Lenox place," commented Mrs. Marshall-Smith. "It suited his taste to perfection. Austin seems to have a sort of Marie-Antoinette reaction towards a somewhat painfully achieved simplicity. He's not the man to take any sort of pose.
"The official beatification," he discriminated, "for she was beatified in the heart of every true Catholic Scot on the day when Bloody Elizabeth murdered her." And Madame de Lafere put in a plea for Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette, and the little Dauphin. "Blessed Mary Bloody Elizabeth," laughed the Duchessa, in an aside to Peter; "here is language to use in the presence of a Protestant Englishman."
Among the toys paid for in diamonds was an automatic bird that warbled and flapped its wings. This was intended for the amusement of visitors. The carnival proved of short duration. It was on the 1st of February, 1783, that the diamond necklace was handed over to Madame de la Motte, Rohan receiving in return the forged signature of "Marie-Antoinette de France."
History has spoken of the necklace in all romances; history has spoken of a thousand things; but these are only suspicions and, I repeat, I know not by what authority these suspicions should be established as facts. And, since Marie-Antoinette died with the dignity of a sovereign and the calmness of a Christian, her life-blood should efface faults of which there are the strongest suspicions.
The Duke, when a young man, served with credit in the navy, but after the battle of Ushant, in 1778, where he commanded the blue squadron, he was received with such enthusiasm in Paris, that Marie-Antoinette obtained his dismissal from the service. From this period he withdrew from court and his opposition to the government began.
Louis-Charles was the second son of Louis XVI. and his consort Marie-Antoinette, and was born at the Chateau of Versailles, on the 27th of March, at five minutes before seven in the evening. An hour and a half later he was baptised with much ceremony by the Cardinal de Rohan and the Vicar of Versailles, and received the title of Duke of Normandy.
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