The Grange advance. [volume] (Red Wing, Minn.) 1873-1877, 1877-01-17

With this view Of the case he found
himself in another dilemma when he
found he had to make an oath, in TAX
ing out the license that neither of
them were married! It puzzled him
for some time, but he finally took the
medicine, and as he left the Office stat
ed that he did not care how often the
license was published, that he had had
enough trouble trying to keep his mar
riage a secret to do him a lifetime.
->1>
Marie Antoinette.
Such was Marie Antoinette in the
flower OF her youth, while she basked
in the Summer sun OF life before the
tempest gathered in darkness around
her. She had some amiable and good
| qualities; her intellect, had it been
properly trained, was above the ordin-
| airy level of her sex; she was not in
capable of firm resolves, and we dis
credit what a thousand slanderous
tongues have said of her good name
and her conjugal faith. But she was,
not the less that unpleasing contrast,
! fair woman with little discretion;
and, while with a disposition almost
untutored, she was impetuous and
light in thought and act, nature had
made her some what imperious and
hard, fond of self-indulgence and
eager for power, Sent, as she was,
from Vienna while still child, placed
in the perilous sphere of Versailles,
and with the associations that sur
rounded her life, it is not surprising
that, with such a character, she should
have committed many and grievous
errors that she should readily have
listened to Austrian counsels should
have launched giddily into wild extav-
| agance, should have scorned old ways,
and become the centre of circle of
favorites and bad flatterers; should
| have fashioned to her will feeble
husband should have rashly meddled
| with affairs Of state, and have acted
recklessly in this position.
10 judge Marie Antoionette fairly,
even at this period of her career, we
| must consider not only her essential
qualities, but the peculiarities Of her
situation in France it is because they
have not done this that so many French
writer's have been unjust to her and
when the examination has been right
ly made, we find in her, indeed, much
that is tlawed and imperfect, many
blemishes that offend the sight, yet
much too, that is really pleasant and
attractive. Yet it is not strange that
this Inflated princess should have
seemed almost prodigy of evil to the
thousands among the generation of
Frenchmen who had grown up to man.
hood in 1889. 1t was the singular mis-.
fortune of Marie Antoinette that she
made numerous and unrelenting enc.
mics in almost every sphere where
opinion was formed and the reports
against her which spread from Yer
sailles, especially as her own conduct
gave color to them, were eagerly
caught up in the observant capital and
thence penetrated far into the nation.
w hat must have been the feeling of
the better class of Frenchmen when
they heard that a light and designing
woman was making France mere tool
OF Austria, was keeping the King in a
state OF bondage, had blighted the
hopes of the realm by Diminishing Tur-
got! What must Marie Antoinette
have seemed in the eyes of those who,
week after week, read that her lovers
rioted on the public wealth, and that
her life was round of gilded sin, and
who could note how this fine lady made
herself superior, as it were, to royalty,
trailed it's state through the mire with
gay lnsolence, exposed it's weaknesses
to the prying multitude!
What must have been the thoughts
OF the starving crowds which gathered
in the streets and ways of Paris, when
they were told that what would relieve
their misery was wasted by crowned
harlot at Versailles; when they beheld
the Queen parading her state, indiffer.
ent apparently to their life of suffer.
ing We cannot wonder, therefore,
that Marie Antoinette should have
been name of evil in France. even
before 1908 and it is less strange.
perhaps, that ever since she has found
numerous censors in French opinion.
TO those who have no part in the for.
tunes of France, to whom her annals
are merely a strange drama, the hero.
ism Of the woman in the hour of trial.
and her constancy in enduring aflic.
ton, may seem to efface her MANY
faults, and in their eyes tragic and
cruel death may transform her into a
suffering martyr. But the French peo-
pie can not lightly forget the part
played by Marie Antoinette in what
was for them crisis Of fate thew |