ts, bred of humanity or disdain, severe and affectionate at the
same time towards his sister the queen of France, whose extravagance he
found fault with during the trip he made to Paris in 1777, he was now
pressing her to act on his behalf in the fresh embarrassments which his
restless ambition had just excited in Europe. The mediation of King
Louis XVI. between the emperor and the Dutch, as to the navigation of the
Scheldt, had just terminated the incident pacifically: the king had
concluded a treaty of defensive alliance with Holland. The minister of
war, M. de Segur, communicated to the queen the note he had drawn up on
this important question. "I regret," he said to Marie Antoinette, "to be
obliged to give the king advice opposed to the desire of the emperor."
"I am the emperor's sister, and I do not forget it," answered the queen;
"but I remember above all that I am queen of France and mother of the
dauphin." Louis XVI. had undertaken to pay part of the indemnity imposed
upon Joseph II.; this created discontent in France. "Let the emperor pay
for his own follies," people said; and the ill-humor of the public openly
and unjustly accused the queen.

This direful malevolence on the part of public opinion, springing from a
few acts of imprudence and fomented by a long series of calumnies, was
about to burst forth on the occasion of a scandalous and grievous
occurrence. On the 15th of August, 1785, at Mass-time, Cardinal Rohan,
grand almoner of France, already in full pontificals, was arrested in the
palace of Versailles and taken to the Bastille. The king had sent for
him into his cabinet. "Cardinal," said Louis XVI. abruptly, "you bought
some diamonds of Bcehmer?" "Yes, Sir." "What have you done with them?"
"I thought they had been sent to the queen." "Who gave you the
commission?" (The cardinal began to be uneasy.) "A lady, the Countess de
la Motte Valois, . . . she gave me a letter from the queen; I thought
I was obliging her Majesty. . . . "The queen interrupted. She had
never forgiven M. de Rohan for some malevolent letters written about her
when she was dauphiness. On the accession of Louis XVI. this intercepted
correspondence had cost the prince his embassy to Vienna. "How, sir,"
said the queen, "could you think, you to whom I have never spoken for
eight years, that I should choose you for conducting this negotiation,
and by the medium of such a woman?" "I was mistaken, I see; the desire I
f