CHAPTER V.

At the period of his grandfather's death, Louis XVI. began to be
exceedingly attached to the Queen. The first period of so deep a mourning
not admitting of indulgence in the diversion of hunting, he proposed to
her walks in the gardens of Choisy; they went out like husband and wife,
the young King giving his arm to the Queen, and accompanied by a very
small suite. The influence of this example had such an effect upon the
courtiers that the next day several couples, who had long, and for good
reasons, been disunited, were seen walking upon the terrace with the same
apparent conjugal intimacy. Thus they spent whole hours, braving the
intolerable wearisomeness of their protracted tete-a-tetes, out of mere
obsequious imitation.

The devotion of Mesdames to the King their father throughout his dreadful
malady had produced that effect upon their health which was generally
apprehended. On the fourth day after their arrival at Choisy they were
attacked by pains in the head and chest, which left no doubt as to the
danger of their situation. It became necessary instantly to send away the
young royal family; and the Chateau de la Muette, in the Bois de Boulogne,
was selected for their reception. Their arrival at that residence, which
was very near Paris, drew so great a concourse of people into its
neighbourhood, that even at daybreak the crowd had begun to assemble round
the gates. Shouts of "Vive le Roi!" were scarcely interrupted for a
moment between six o'clock in the morning and sunset. The unpopularity the
late King, had drawn upon himself during his latter years, and the hopes
to which a new reign gives birth, occasioned these transports of joy.

A fashionable jeweller made a fortune by the sale of mourning snuff-boxes,
whereon the portrait of the young Queen, in a black frame of shagreen,
gave rise to the pun: "Consolation in chagrin." All the fashions, and
every article of dress, received names expressing the spirit of the
moment. Symbols of abundance were everywhere represented, and the
head-dresses of the ladies were surrounded by ears of wheat. Poets sang of
the new monarch; all hearts, or rather all heads, in France were filled
with enthusiasm. Never did the commencement of any reign excite more
unanimous testimonials of love and attachment. It must be observed,
however, that, amidst all this intoxication, the anti-Austrian party never
lost sight of the young Queen, but kept on the wat