oss, and she came
of a good house, being cousin to one of the King's Ministers, M. de
Finckenstein, and sister of a President of the Chamber. "This beauty,
who to my mind is very ugly," wrote Mirabeau, "is a mixture of prudery
and cynicism, of affectation and ingenuousness; she has a natural wit
of a kind, some schooling, manias rather than desires, a gaucherie
which she strives to cover by an appearance of _naivete_.... All her
charm lies in her complexion, and even that I find wan rather than
white; a very beautiful neck. It was this mixture of unique licence,
they say, which she combined with the airs of innocent ignorance and
vestal severity, that captivated the Prince."

VII.

Frederick William was one of those complex libertines who find in
clever resistance a whet to their passion and a solace to their
scruples. The siege of Mademoiselle de Voss lasted nearly two years.
The outs and ins of this strange romance were the common talk of the
Court. It had not yet reached its denouement when Frederick the
Great's death stopped its course for several weeks. King from August
17, 1786, onwards, Frederick William seemed to forget everything but
affairs of State. But Mirabeau affirms, after September 8, "the
fervour of the novice began to abate." Mademoiselle de Voss, he added,
was on the point of yielding. The King, to make her comfortable, had
set up an establishment for his daughter Frederica; Mademoiselle de
Voss did the honours. The year passed, however, without the vestal's
surrendering. She loved the King, but the honour of the family still
weighed more with her than love. She set rigorous conditions to her
capitulation: a left-handed marriage, the written consent of the
Queen, and the removal of the titular mistress, Madame Rietz. On this
last point the King was inflexible; he gave in on the other two. The
Queen gave her consent, with the stipulation that there should be no
real divorce or public separation; she kept her title of Queen and her
position as lawful wife. The rest, it appears, was of no great
interest to her. It only remained to conclude the marriage, but, under
the circumstances, that was a delicate and ticklish business.

By hook or by crook a precedent had to be found: the Prussian
Consistory proved amenable, and authorized the marriage. The marriage
was celebrated in July, 1787, in the Chapel Royal of Charlottenburg.
Mademoiselle de Voss took the title of Countess of Ingenheim. Her
happiness