Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1874-01-14
THE TRIANON PALACES.


The Summer Residence of the Kings of
H 1#. .. France.
Standing on the upper terrace in the
rear of the quaint old chateau of Yer
sailles, the traveller is apt to linger
enamored with the magnificent panora-
ma spread out before him. He has
perhaps Just finished a run over the
many saloons and galleries of the pal
ace, and his mind is confused mass
of paintings, frescoes, sculptures, rare
old gilded furniture and historical re-
lies innumerable. He cannot hope to
retain anything but feeble, Fragment
tary impression of all these; but the
superb landscape that now bursts upon
him is a single ravishing picture
where the genius of man seems to
have made Nature his Slave of the
Lamp, and he tries to grasp it and fix
it indelibly in his memory.
Looking directly west, straight
through the grounds from the centre
of the terrace, the eye meets first two
oblong basins bordered with twenty
four magnificent groups in bronze.
From the centre of each basin rise
jots of water forming fountains in the
shape of a basket; little beyond is
the Basin OF LatOna, presenting five
circular tables in red marble, rising
pyramidically one above the other, and
surmounted by Latona imploring the
Vengeance of Jupiter against the Lii
byans, who had refused to give her
water. The prayer is answered, and
there are the poor Lybans, some half,
some wholly, metamorphosed into
frogs, fishes, tortoises, seated on
the edges of the tables, each mouth
a fountain throwing water on Latona
from every direction. On either side
of the pyramid is column of water
thirty feet high, falling into the basin.
Beyond this is long ribbon of lawn
(the Tapis Vert) ornamented with vases
and statues; then comes the Basin of
Apollo, with a magnificent fountain of
tritons, nereids, dolphlns and sea-
monsters; and then the long arm of
the Grand Canal, which is in the shape
of a cross, each arm about two hundred
feet wide. And these are only the
principle objects seen in one straight
line. Everywhere there are lovely
walks, parterres of flowers, vases, col
onades, fountains, statues, groves and
beautiful avenues, bordered with long
lines of evergreen trees forced by the
pruning-knife to grow into fantastic
shapes.
The two Trianons are but royal sum-
warehouses; in these superb gardens.
They are both located on the right Of
the Grand Canal, and separated only
by 8 few rods of the gardens belonging
to the Grand Trianon built by Louis
XIV. in 1871 for Madame de Mantle
non, who was then nearly forty years
of age. The king was three years
younger. For nearly eleven years he
had been reconstructing the palace Of
Versailles, charging and identifying
the royal parks and gardens, some
times impressing thirty thousand SOL
diers at once into the work, which cost
France a thousand millions of francs
at least. The Fountain of Apollo alone
cost million and half. The building
of the terrace was gigantic work in
itself, while the water for the foun-
tains is all brought from the Seine,
some miles distant, and it costs from
two to four thousand dollars every time
the grd'ads e0alc are set in motion;
this was every day in the time of the
Grand Monarch, but at present only
the first Sunday afternoon of each
month.
The respondent court of Versailles,
at its zenith in the time of Louis XIV,
with it's gorgeous costumes, display
and ceremony, failed to wholly satisfy
the purely human needs of the king,
and the Trlanon was built as an escape
from the onerous fatigues of greatness.
Here, in the company of choice favor
ties, the monarch played that he was
only a man, loved and caressed for his
own sake like the simplest of his sub
iects. Louis XIV. was also fond of
his brusque bonhomie, walked through
its gardens, frightening the birds with
his loud laughter, and making the
flowers tremble under his elephantine
tread" Marie Antoinette, his queen,
is especially associated with the place;
she has left everywhere the "ineffable
trace of the foot of the rustic god
dess." Whether as the Inundated
wife, the triumphant mother, or the
unpopular queen, we see her always in
imagination the presiding genius Of
this Eden in the gardens of Versailles,
unless, indeed, this picture is effaced
by that of her tragic fate.
The Trianon gardens suffered a COM
plete change in the reign of Louis XIV,
who, becoming greatly interested in
botany, gave to the study and culture
of flowers and trees what tune he
could spare from his laborious and
sterile secret correspondence" the
frivolous monument of a frivolous
reign" He built the Petit Tr1anon for