Devereux — Complete by Baron Edward Bulwer Lytton Lytton (best free novels txt) 📖

remembrances awaited me; no private regrets were associated with its scenes, and no public penalties with its political institutions. And although I had not yet received any token of Louis’s remembrance, in the ordinary routine of court favours expectation as yet would have been premature; besides, his royal fidelity to his word was proverbial; and, sooner or later, I indulged the hope to profit by the sort of promise he had insinuated to me. I declined, therefore, with all due respect, the offers of the Chevalier, and continued to live the life of idleness and expectation, until Lord Bolingbroke returned to Paris, and accepted the office of secretary of state in the service of the Chevalier. As he has publicly declared his reasons in this step, I do not mean to favour the world with his private conversations on the same subject.

A day or two after his return, I went with him to a party given by a member of the royal family. The first person by whom we were accosted—and I rejoiced at it, for we could not have been accosted by a more amusing one—was Count Anthony Hamilton.

“Ah! my Lord Bolingbroke,” said he, sauntering up to us; “how are you?—delighted to see you again. Do look at Madame la Duchesse d’Orleans! Saw you ever such a creature? Whither are you moving, my Lord? Ah! see him, Count, see him, gliding off to that pretty duchess, of course; well, he has a beautiful bow, it must be owned; why, you are not going too?—what would the world say if Count Anthony Hamilton were seen left to himself? No, no, come and sit down by Madame de Cornuel: she longs to be introduced to you, and is one of the wittiest women in Europe.”

“With all my heart! provided she employs her wit ill-naturedly, and uses it in ridiculing other people, not praising herself.”

“Oh! nobody can be more satirical; indeed, what difference is there between wit and satire? Come, Count!”

And Hamilton introduced me forthwith to Madame de Cornuel. She received me very politely; and, turning to two or three people who formed the circle round her, said, with the greatest composure, “Messieurs, oblige me by seeking some other object of attraction; I wish to have a private conference with my new friend.”

“I may stay?” said Hamilton.

“Ah! certainly; you are never in the way.”

“In that respect, Madame,” said Hamilton, taking snuff, and bowing very low, “in that respect, I must strongly remind you of your excellent husband.”

“Fie!” cried Madame de Cornuel; then, turning to me, she said, “Ah! Monsieur, if you could have come to Paris some years ago, you would have been enchanted with us: we are sadly changed. Imagine the fine old King thinking it wicked not to hear plays, but to hear players act them, and so making the royal family a company of comedians. Mon Dieu! how villanously they perform! but do you know why I wished to be introduced to you?”

“Yes! in order to have a new listener: old listeners must be almost as tedious as old news.”

“Very shrewdly said, and not far from the truth. The fact is, that I wanted to talk about all these fine people present to some one for whose ear my anecdotes would have the charm of novelty. Let us begin with Louis Armand, Prince of Conti; you see him.”

“What, that short-sighted, stout, and rather handsome man, with a cast of countenance somewhat like the pictures of Henri Quatre, who is laughing so merrily?”

“O Ciel! how droll! No! that handsome man is no less a person than the Duc d’Orleans. You see a little ugly thing like an anatomized ape,—there, see,—he has just thrown down a chair, and, in stooping to pick it up, has almost fallen over the Dutch ambassadress,—that is Louis Armand, Prince of Conti. Do you know what the Duc d’Orleans said to him the other day? ‘Mon bon ami,’ he said, pointing to the prince’s limbs (did you ever see such limbs out of a menagerie, by the by?) ‘mon bon ami, it is a fine thing for you that the Psalmist has assured us “that the Lord delighteth not in any man’s legs.”’ Nay, don’t laugh, it is quite true!”

It was now for Count Hamilton to take up the ball of satire; he was not a whit more merciful than the kind Madame de Cornuel. “The Prince,” said he, “has so exquisite an awkwardness that, whenever the King hears a noise, and inquires the cause, the invariable answer is that ‘the Prince of Conti has just tumbled down’! But, tell me, what do you think of Madame d’Aumont? She is in the English headdress, and looks triste a la mort.”

“She is rather pretty, to my taste.”

“Yes,” cried Madame de Cornuel, interrupting the gentle Antoine (it did one’s heart good to see how strenuously each of them tried to talk more scandal than the other), “yes, she is thought very pretty; but I think her very like a fricandeau,—white, soft, and insipid. She is always in tears,” added the good-natured Cornuel, “after her prayers, both at morning and evening. I asked why; and she answered, pretty simpleton, that she was always forced to pray to be made good, and she feared Heaven would take her at her word! However, she has many worshippers, and they call her the evening star.”

“They should rather call her the Hyades!” said Hamilton, “if it be true that she sheds tears every morning and night, and her rising and setting are thus always attended by rain.”

“Bravo, Count Antoine! she shall be so called in future,” said Madame de Cornuel. “But now, Monsieur Devereux, turn your eyes to that hideous old woman.”

“What! the Duchesse d’Orleans?”

“The same. She is in full dress to-night; but in the daytime you generally see her in a riding habit and a man’s wig; she is—”

“Hist!” interrupted Hamilton; “do you not tremble to think what she would do if she overheard you? she is such a terrible creature at fighting! You have no conception, Count, what an arm she has. She knows her ugliness, and laughs at it, as all the rest of the world does. The King took her hand one day, and said smiling, ‘What could Nature have meant when she gave this hand to a German princess instead of a Dutch peasant?’ ‘Sire,’ said the Duchesse, very gravely, ‘Nature gave this hand to a German princess for the purpose of boxing the ears of her ladies in waiting!’”

“Ha! ha! ha!” said Madame de Cornuel, laughing; “one is never at a loss for jokes upon a woman who eats salade au lard, and declares that, whenever she is unhappy, her only consolation is ham and sausages! Her son treats her with the greatest respect, and consults her in all his amours, for which she professes the greatest horror, and which she retails to her correspondents all over the world, in letters as long as her pedigree. But you are looking at her son, is he not of a good mien?”

“Yes, pretty well; but does not exhibit to advantage by the side of Lord Bolingbroke, with whom he is now talking. Pray, who is the third personage that has just joined them?”

“Oh, the wretch! it is the Abbe Dubois; a living proof of the folly of the