epeated for her. Then
followed a _coup de theatre_. On the 15th of August 1785, Assumption
day, when the whole court was awaiting the king and queen in order to go
to the chapel, the cardinal de Rohan, who was preparing to officiate,
was arrested and taken to the Bastille. He was able, however, to destroy
the correspondence exchanged, as he thought, with the queen, and it is
not known whether there was any connivance of the officials, who did not
prevent this, or not. The comtesse de Lamotte was not arrested until the
18th of August, after having destroyed her papers. The police set to
work to find all her accomplices, and arrested the girl Oliva and a
certain Reteaux de Villette, a friend of the countess, who confessed
that he had written the letters given to Rohan in the queen's name, and
had imitated her signature on the conditions of the bargain. The famous
charlatan Cagliostro was also arrested, but it was recognized that he
had taken no part in the affair. The cardinal de Rohan accepted the
parlement of Paris as judges. A sensational trial resulted (May 31,
1786) in the acquittal of the cardinal, of the girl Oliva and of
Cagliostro. The comtesse de Lamotte was condemned to be whipped, branded
and shut up in the Salpetriere. Her husband was condemned, in his
absence, to the galleys for life. Villette was banished.

Public opinion was much excited by this trial. It is generally believed
that Marie Antoinette was stainless in the matter, that Rohan was an
innocent dupe, and that the Lamottes deceived both for their own ends.
People, however, persisted in the belief that the queen had used the
countess as an instrument to satisfy her hatred of the cardinal de
Rohan. Various circumstances fortified this belief, which contributed to
render Marie Antoinette very unpopular--her disappointment at Rohan's
acquittal, the fact that he was deprived of his charges and exiled to
the abbey of la Chaise-Dieu, and finally the escape of the comtesse de
Lamotte from the Salpetriere, with the connivance, as people believed,
of the court. The adventuress, having taken refuge abroad, published
_Memoires_ in which she accused the queen. Her husband also wrote
_Memoires_, and lived until 1831, after having, it is said, received
subsidies from Louis XVIII.

See M. Tourneux, _Marie Antoinette devant l'histoire: Essai
bibliographique_ (2nd ed., Paris, 1901); Emile Campardon, _Marie
Antoinette et le proces du collier_ (Paris, 1863); P.