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The Senatorska does not approach Bond Street or the Rue de la Paix, and Netty, who knew those thoroughfares, seemed to find little to interest her in the street where Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski that weak dreamer built his great opera-house and cultivated the ballet.
He was bound for Augsburg, 400 miles to the west, and he set himself thirty miles a day as his rate of travel. He wore splendid clothes, because he was Stanislaus, the son of John Kostka, Lord of Kostkov, Senator, and Castellan of Zakroczym in the Duchy of Mazovia, Poland.
Bigotted to a family whose designs are plainly to render the crown hereditary, they not only set aside that great prince, under the vain and common-place pretence, that on electing him they might be too much under the influence of France; but also afterward, as resolved to push all good fortune from them with both hands, refused Stanislaus, a native of Poland, a strict observer of its laws, and a man to whose courage, virtue, and every eminent qualification even envy itself could make no objection, and thereby rendered their country the seat of war and theatre of the most terrible devastations of all kinds.
France was for Stanislaus, the father-in-law of Lewis XV., while the Emperor Charles VI. and Anne of Russia were for August III., elector of Saxony.
I hate the man so, for all he did to Yvonne; and when he dared to raise his hopes to me, knowing that I had been her nearest and dearest friend, knowing also that I was once pledged to Stanislaus, I was filled with a bitter hatred more terrible than words can describe. Oh, if you knew the bitterness of one who is used only for a tool, because she happens to possess beauty.
Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski was kind-hearted and very brave, but perhaps he wanted the necessary energy to hold down the spirit of rebellion reigning in his country. He did everything to make himself agreeable to the nobility and the people, and he partly succeeded.
Stanislaus said, yes, he understood perfectly. "And that you are closing the door on your return, that in no case will you ever be received again at Kostkov?" Yes, Stanislaus knew that too.
Bilinski and Paul and the doctors were astounded. "It cannot be!" they cried. "But you see that it is," said Stanislaus. "I am as well as ever. Our Lady and the little Jesus came and cured me. And now I must go to the church and thank them." Nor did the fever return. He was entirely recovered.
Just this: they did things more or less well; he did things perfectly. If he prayed, he put his whole mind and soul into his prayer. If he worked, he obeyed orders absolutely, because in doing so he was obeying God. There is in the Jesuit noviciate at Angers a series of paintings portraying incidents in the life of Stanislaus.
The most remarkable event of this summer was the battle of Poultowa, in which the king of Sweden was entirely defeated by the czar of Muscovy, and obliged to take refuge at Bender, a town of Moldavia, in the Turkish dominions. Augustus immediately marched into Poland against Stanislaus, and renounced his own resignation, as if it had been the effect of compulsion.
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