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Updated: May 31, 2025
He here received his "friend and enemy," Charles V, but strangely enough there is no monument in Compiègne to-day which is intimately associated with the stay here of the art-loving Francis. He preferred, after all, his royal manor at Villers-Cotterets near by.
Of the celebrated French palace and chateau gardens which are not centered upon the actual edifices with which they are more or less intimately connected, but are distinct and apart from the gardens which in most cases actually surround a dwelling, may be mentioned those of Montargis, Saint Germain, Amboise, Villers-Cotterets and Fontainebleau.
In reply, the Duke of Orleans was banished to Villers-Cotterets, whilst Councillors Freteau and Sabatier were arrested and taken to a state-prison. By the scandalousness of his life, as well as by his obstructive buildings in the Palais-Royal, the Duke of Orleans had lost favor with the public; his protest and his banishment restored him at once to his popularity.
I did not disclose it until the moment of our departure, and only then so that anyone forced down would know our destination. There is to be a considerable concentration of air forces on the apex of the salient between la Chapelle, this side of Chateau-Thierry, and Villers-Cotterets, on the other side. It is the beginning of a movement of concentration to drive the enemy back beyond the Vesle.
The house is quite modern, not at all pretty, a square white building, with very few trees near it, the lawn and one or two flower-beds not particularly well kept. The grounds ran straight down to the Villers-Cotterets forest, where M. M. has good shooting. The gates were open, the concierge said the ladies were there. That is one of the habits of this part of the country.
He was a tall, heavily-built man, square-shouldered, with the weather-beaten complexion of a man who spent all his days riding about his fields and woods; a pleasant, jovial manner, quite the type of the country gentleman. They lived in a charming old Louis XV. château almost in the forest of Villers-Cotterets their park touching the line of wood.
The church is a pretty, old gray building standing very high, with the little graveyard on one side, and a grass terrace in front, from which one has the most lovely view down the valley, and over the green slopes to the woods Borny and Villers-Cotterets on one side, Chézy the other. It is very worn and dilapidated inside, and is never open except on the day of St.
It was bitterly cold the ground frozen hard and we had a long drive, eighteen kilomètres through Villers-Cotterets forest but no snow, only a beautiful white frost all the trees and bushes covered with rime. It was like driving through a fairy forest. When we had occasional gleams of sunlight every leaf sparkled, and the red berries of the holly stood out beautifully from all the white.
"Is H. wounded?" I gasped. "No, Madame." I breathed again. "Where was he when you saw him?" "On the road between Villers-Cotterets and La Ferte Milon." "What's your message?" The boy put his hand to his breast pocket and drew forth a slip of paper.
Our visits were always long, as most of the châteaux were at a certain distance, and we were obliged to stay an hour and a half, sometimes longer, to rest the horses. It was before the days of five-o'clock tea. A tray was brought in with sweet wine (Malaga or Vin de Chypre) and cakes (ladies'-fingers) which evidently had figured often before on similar occasions. Conversation languished sometimes, though Mme. A. was wonderful, talking so easily about everything. In the smaller places, when people rarely went to Paris, it ran always in the same grooves the woods, the hunting (very good in the Villers-Cotterets forest), the schoolmaster (so difficult to get proper books for the children to read), the curé, and all local gossip, and as much about the iniquities of the republic as could be said before the wife of a republican senator. Wherever we went, even to the largest châteaux, where the family went to Paris for the season, the talk was almost entirely confined to France and French interests. Books, politics, music, people, nothing existed apparently au-del
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