Litchfield enquirer., 1872-02-01

and another ready furnished rose in it's Epsace The salons in which these sup Ipers were eaten were adorned with all that
 was exquisite in nature and art the dish
 es were interspered with vases filled with
 the rarest aRd most beautiful flowers the
 walls were covered with the finest paint
 ings; statuary was everywhere :; every ar-
 tiele of furniture was model of beauty. Licentious aS these brilliant reunions | were, they still form favorable contrast
 to the coarse drunken giuttony that char
 acterized the English feeds of the time,
 which were equally sensual and far more
 brutish. La Pompadour was the first l who introduced those refnements and el-
 egances of the table which so obtain at
 the present day.
 distinction of the tab0uret and the honors of duchess, which conferred the privi-
 lege of sitting in the presence of the ! queen. A pension of 4, 4,OO0 Eyres a month
 had been settled upon her, independent
 of the large gifts of money which were l constantly bestowed by her royal lover.
 For the purchase of the magnificent hotel
 of the Count D'Evreux, in the Champs Elysees, she received 8OO,OOO ivres. Among other estates she owned the lands 1 of Crecy, of Montretout, of La Celle, of 1 d'Aulnay, of de St. Remy, and the hotels
 of Compiegne, Fontainbleau, and Yer
 sailles. In the archives at Versailles are preserved an account of her expenses du-
 ring her nineteen-years's reign. The sum total is 40, COG, 900 ivres. A note in her
 own handwriting states that out of this 1 enormous sum she had given to the poor 1 15O. 600 ivres F A heart disease, constantly aggravated by life of restless, anxious excitement, impaired her personal charms at an early age, and during the latter years of her life her connection with the king was a purely platOnic one. Louis was indolent | and hated business, and upon this weak
 ness she founded a new empire. She plunged into state affairs, and in time be-
 came his chief political adviser ministers
 were appointed and displaced at her pleas
 ure foreign affairs, home affairs, even
 war affairs, all came under her influence. While the king amused himself at a printing press, or with some other trifing she would be drawing out plans of cam paIgn. Incapable ministers, incapable
 officers, peculations, iobbery, monopolies,
 and ruinous taxation were the results of
 this influence.
 But both at home and abroad her pow
 CT was omnipotent. Even the naughty Marie Therese condescended to smile up on her-tn address her as ssdear cousin !' Ana It was to aVengo the contempt and abuse that Frederick of Prussia unoeas- ingly heaped upon her that she so eagerly 1 advocated the Austrian alliance. which
 was ultimately concluded.
 But these political labors were light ] compared to those of another task with which the necessities of her position bur dened her. From his earliest youth Louis
 had been afflicted with profound melan- choly and an almost unconquerable ennui;
 to this temperament, ratler than to in- nate vices, may be attributed that utter moral corruption into which he ultimate
 ly fell. To soothe this melancholy, to di- vert this esssssss by an unceasing round of
 novel amusements and dissipations, was
 the task which Pompadodr undertook, and | was the means by which she held her en- pire over her fckle lover until the last day of her life: The secret of that en- pire IS contained in sentence-she resa-
 dered herseJ indispensable to his mode l 0f life. Upon these diversions were law lshed millions wrung from starving peo- pie. To provide entertainments, the in- | genuity of poets and artists was put con- tinually upon the rack; each one was
 more curious and costly than its prede- cessor; but the king had no taste for art or literature, and the novelty of the thing ! once exhausted, it became wearisome to him. To diverthis melancholy Belle Vue l was built, private theatre was establish ed at Versailles, balls, feasts, petit sost- pers were given and still the demon with in him craved for new food Intellectual ! and artistic pleasures were soon exhaust l ed, and then diversion had to be found in
 vice vice, not only as it luxuriated in courts and in the beau monde, but as it festered in the gutters and alleys. In one of the suburbs of Paris there was a low
 tavern, kept by one Ramponneau, whose
 convivial disposition and coarse wit at tracted an enormous custom Go his house.
 By and by his celebrity reached even to the court. Eureka new pleasure to divert the royal spleen Nobles, princes
 of the blood, even ladies of the court, dis
 guised themselves, and paid visits to the l gay cGbGretier, to listen to his gross anec-
 dotes, his ribaldry, his obscene wit, and to carry them away for the deIectation of their royal master. Far from desiring to conceal their relish for such uncourtly pleasures, they openly blazoned it to the 1 world, and the c0b0retier, for a season,
 became the fashion-the rage. His songs and sayings were in every noble mouth, male and female, e,-his name was given to every new fashion, n,-elothes, furniture,
 sauces, dishes,-and they alone were looked upon as worthy of ridicule who
 had nothing c lG ROnsponueou And I when the piquancy of Romponneau was exhausted, scouts were sent out at night
 to SCOUT the human, sewers of Paris, to collect their filth, to collect stories of de-
 bauch, and vile anecdotes for the kings morning amusement
 When her faded charms. rendered her
 no longer an object of passion, and the wretched woman was pursued, night and day, by the tornenting fear of rival sup planting her, she resorted to the horrible iexpedieat of seeking out for her loverne I mistresses, carefully selecting them from
 an inferior rank of society, and those
 whose influence could only be transitory. 1 Then came the establishment of the Pare I aux Cerfs, that most hideous scandal of I 8 scandalous reign. The daughters of the citizens, some scarcely more than l children, were continually abducted and l brought to this place, where the King, as Q pretended Polish noble Ga relative of
 the Queenl, visited them. No young girl
 possessing any claims to beauty was safe from the raids of his panders, who were
 ever in search of new victims.
 Think of the life of this woman, busy
 ing herself in every affair of state, ever lacking her brain to invent new diversions, new vices for an incurable essssssi, and ever pursued by the phantom of a coming i- 1 val who should deprive her of the fruits of her tolls. Ambition and retribution divided her soul between them. We'll
 might she say, My life has been per l petual fight.
 The esassass of Louis XV. is said to have cost the nation one hundred million hvres! This sum is perhaps an exaggerated one; but even an approximation to it is terrible to think of. For besides these costly
 pleasures, there were the burthens i'm posed by years of ruinous war. The ef-
 fects of this enormous expenditure upon
 the condition of the people is thus ter \ ril1iy d0SgrihAd in ono nf &ho ssNor+ NFo