With unfaltering fondness and resolution she clung to her through the
sack which filled the palace with ruins and blood; through the
tedious and brutal examinations in the Assembly; and through the
fearful imprisonment in the Temple, until the jailers violently tore
her from the arms of her sobbing friend. In vain the ferocious
wretches in power strove to wring from her something prejudicial to
the queen. The brave and beautiful woman preferred death; and was
delivered over to the crowd to be murdered. Madame de Lebel, to whom
the princess had been very kind, was going to inquire after the fate
of her beloved benefactress, when she heard the howls of an
approaching procession. She ran into the shop of a hairdresser; and
was quickly followed by one of the mob, who ordered the master of the
shop to dress the head of Madame de Lamballe. The princess was
celebrated for the length and richness of her fine, golden locks. At
this very moment, concealed among their bright, clustering masses,
was found the letter from Antoinette, quoted above. The barber took
the poor, disfigured head into his hands, cleansed the face from
blood, and arranged and powdered the ringlets. The ruffian said,
"Antoinette will recognize it now;" and, replacing it on the point of
his pike, moved forward with the mob to the prison of the unhappy
queen, before whose windows they elevated the appalling trophy, at
the same time shrieking to her to look on it. After this experience,
and others scarcely less revolting, we may well believe that the
high-souled daughter of Maria Theresa welcomed the executioner's axe
as a blessed relief. We see her, clad in the pale royalty of her
personal beauty and grief, refusing insult, moving, in the death-
cart, through the yelling masses of the populace, to her doom, like a
goddess, incapable of degradation, borne in a car above an infuriated
herd of apes, who vainly struggle to drag her down to themselves.
Madame Salvage de Faverolles had a passionate faculty of admiration.
She was fascinated with Madame Weamer, who was not much drawn to her,
though she always treated her with kindness. Her unclaimed affection
at length found its home in Queen Hortense, the daughter of
Josephine, and the mother of Louis Napoleon. She was inseparable from
her, and was called, with a touch of satire or humor, her body-guard.
She identified herself with every enterprise, hope, or thought of her
friend; accompanied her on every journey; wa