more tie for him. He behaves to me most admirably, and nothing could be wanting to make me love him more. My dear mamma will forgive my twaddling about the little one; but she is so kind that sometimes I abuse her kindness.'
It was well for Marie Antoinette's happiness that her husband was one in whom, as we have seen that she told her mother, she could feel entire confidence, for during her seclusion in the measles the intriguers of the court had ventured to try and work upon him. Mercy had reason to suspect that some were even wicked enough to desire to influence him against his wife by the same means by which the Duke de Richelieu had formerly alienated his grandfather from Marie Leczinska; and the queen herself received proof positive that Maurepas, in spite of her civilities to him and his countess, had become jealous of her political influence, and had endeavored to prevent his consulting her on public affairs. But all manoeuvres intended to disturb the conjugal felicity of the royal pair were harmless against the honest fidelity of the king, the graceful affection of the queen, and the firm confidence of each in the other. The people generally felt that the influence which it was now notorious that the queen did exert on public affairs was a salutary one; and great satisfaction was expressed when it became known in the autumn that the usual visit to Fontainebleau was given up, partly as being costly, and therefore undesirable while the nation had need to concentrate all its resources on the effective prosecution of the war, and partly that the king might be always within reach of his ministers in the event of any intelligence of importance arriving which required prompt decision.
Her letters to her mother at this time show how entirely her whole attention was engrossed by the war; and, at the same time, with what wise earnestness she desired the re-establishment of peace. Even some gleams of success which had attended the French arms in the West Indies, where the Marquis de Bouille, the most skillful soldier of whom France at that time could boast, took one or two of the British islands, and the Count d'Estaing, whose fleet of thirty-six sail was for a short time far superior to the English force in that quarter, captured one or two more, did not diminish her eagerness for a cessation of the war. Though it is curious to see that she had become so deeply imbued with the principles of statesmanship with which M. Necker, the present financial minister, was seeking to inspire the nation, that her objections to the continuance of the war turned chiefly on the degree in which it affected the revenue and expenditure of the kingdom. She evidently sympathizes in the disappointment which, as she reports to the empress, is generally felt by the public at the mismanagement of the admiral, M. d'Orvilliers, who, with forces so superior to those of the English, has neither been able to fall in with them so as to give them battle, nor to hinder any of their merchantmen from reaching their harbors in safety. As it is, he will have spent a great deal of money in doing nothing.[12] And a month later she repeats the complaints.[13] The king and she have renounced the journey to Fontainebleau because of the expenses of the war; and also that they may be in the way to receive earlier intelligence from the army. But the fleet has not been able to fall in with the English, and has done nothing at all. It is a campaign lost, and which has cost a great deal of money. What is still more afflicting is, that disease has broken out on board the ships, and has caused great havoc; and the dysentery, which is raging as an epidemic in Brittany and Normandy, has attacked the land force also, which was intended to embark for England ... 'I greatly fear,' she proceeds, 'that these misfortunes of ours will render the English difficult to treat with, and may prevent proposals of peace, of which I see no immediate prospect. I am constantly persuaded that if the king should require a mediation, the intrigues of the King of Prussia will fail, and will not prevent the king from availing himself of the offers of my dear mamma. I shall take care never to lose sight of this object, which is of such interest to the whole happiness of my life.' So full is her mind of the war, that four or five words in each letter to report that 'her daughter is in perfect health,' or that 'she has cut four teeth,' are all that she can spare for that subject, generally of such engrossing interest to herself and the empress; while, before the end of the year, we find her taking even the domestic troubles of England into her calculations,[14] and speculating on the degree in which the aspect of affairs in Ireland may affect the great preparations which the English ministers are making for the next campaign.
The mere habit of devoting so much consideration to affairs of this kind was beneficial as tending to mature and develop her capacity. She was rapidly learning to take large views of political questions, even if they were not always correct. And the acuteness and earnestness of her comments on them daily increased her influence over both the king and the ministers, so that in the course of the autumn Mercy could assure the empress[15] that 'the king's complaisance toward her increased every day,' that 'he made it his study to anticipate all her wishes, and that this attention showed itself in every kind of detail,' while Maurepas also was unable to conceal from himself that her voice always prevailed 'in every case in which she chose to exert a decisive will,' and accordingly 'bent himself very prudently' before a power which he had no means of resisting. So solicitous indeed did the whole council show itself to please her, that when the king, who was aware that her allowance, in spite of its recent increase was insufficient to defray the charges to which she was liable, proposed to double it, Necker himself, with all his zeal for economy and retrenchment, eagerly embraced the suggestion; and its adoption gave the queen a fresh opportunity of strengthening the esteem and affection of the nation, by declaring that while the war lasted she would only accept half the sum thus placed at her disposal.
The continuance of the war was not without its effect on the gayety of the court, from the number of officers whom their military duties detained with their regiments; but the quiet was beneficial to Marie Antoinette, whose health was again becoming delicate, so much so, that after a grand drawing-room which she held on New-year's- eve, and which was attended by nearly two hundred of the chief ladies of the city, she was completely knocked up, and forced to put herself under the care of her physician.
Meanwhile the war became more formidable. The English admiral, Rodney, the greatest sailor who, as yet, had ever commanded a British fleet, in the middle of January utterly destroyed a strong Spanish squadron off Cape St. Vincent; and as from the coast of Spain he proceeded to the West Indies, the French ministry had ample reason to be alarmed for the safety of the force which they had in those regions. It was evident that it would require every effort that could be made to enable their sailors to maintain the contest against an antagonist so brave and so skillful And, as one of the first steps toward such a result, Necker obtained the king's consent to a great reform in the expenditure of the court and in the civil service; and to the abolition of a great number of costly sinecures. We may be able to form some idea of the prodigality which had hitherto wasted the revenues of the country, from the circumstance that a single edict suppressed above four hundred offices; and Marie Antoinette was so sincere in her desire to promote such measures, that she speaks warmly in their praise to her mother, even though they greatly curtailed her power of gratifying her own favorites.
'The king,' she says, 'has just issued an edict which is as yet only the forerunner of a reform which he designs, to make both in his own household and in mine. If it be carried out, it will be a great benefit, not only for the economy which it will introduce, but still more for its agreement with public opinion, and for the satisfaction it will give the nation.' It is impossible for any language to show more completely how, above all things, she made the good of the country her first object. And she was the more inclined to approve of all that was being done in this way from her conviction that Necker was both honest and able; an opinion which she shared with, if she had not learned it from, her mother and her brother, and which was to some extent justified by the comparative order which he had re-established in the finance of the country, and by the degree in which he had revived public credit. She was not aware that the real dangers of the situation had a source deeper than any financial difficulty, a fact which Necker himself was unable to comprehend. And she could not foresee, when it became necessary to grapple with those dangers, how unequal to the struggle the great banker would be found.
It may, perhaps, be inferred that she did suspect Necker of some deficiency in the higher qualities of statesmanship when, in the spring of 1780, she told her mother that 'she would give every thing in the world to have a Prince Kaunitz in the ministry;[16] but that such men were rare, and were only to be found by those who, like the empress herself, had the sagacity to discover and the judgment to appreciate such merit.' She was, however, shutting her eyes to the fact that her husband had had a minister far superior to Kaunitz; and that she herself had lent her aid to drive him from his service.
CHAPTER XV. Anglomania in Paris.-The Winter at Versailles.-Hunting.-Private Theatricals.- Death of Prince Charles of Lorraine.-Successes of the English in America.-Education of the Duc d'Angouleme.- Libelous Attacks on the Queen.-Death of the Empress.-Favor shown to some of the Swedish Nobles.-The Count de Fersen.-Necker retires from Office.-His Character.
It is curious, while the resources of the kingdom were so severely taxed to maintain the war against England, of which every succeeding dispatch from the seat of war showed more and more the imprudence, to read in Mercy's
