Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1878-08-27
A Funny Old Woman.

L ~
Duke of Orleans, brother Of Louis XIV,
and took up his residence in France
The Duchess spent many hours every
day in writing letters to her German
friends about the French court-the
King, his mistress and illegitimate chill
dren. Eight hundred of her letters to
the Princess Charlotte Wilhelmine, of
| Wales, and the Duke of Brunswick
were found among the papers of the
Duchess Elizabeth, of Brunswick, in
1867. The Duchess wrote in q free and
easy style, like that of Peregrine Pickle,
or Humphrey Clinker. She calls
spade spade, and is often singular and
audacious; an honest, unsophisticated
German woman evidently, and thor
oughly disgusted with the manners of
the French courtin her time. She gen.
orally speaks of Maintenon as "that old
Malntenon," or "that arful hussy,n or
that pious old hypocrite.n The King
she admired and loved. He evidently
liked her. Such q woman must have
been refreshing to the Grand Monaroae
in contrast with Montespan, Maintenon,
and the rest of that extraordinary crowd
of women which gathered under the
gilded ceilings of Versailles and Marty.
The Duchess writes thus of the King:
ut cannot be denied that Louis XIV.
was the finest man in the kingdom. No
person had better appearance-his fig
ure was agreeable, his legs we'll made,
his feet small. his voice pleasant; he
was lusty in proportion; in short, no
fault can be found with his person. -
At the same time he was ignorant, his
education having been neglected, owing
to the troubles of the Fronde. Cape.
tigue seems to regard his deficiency in
literature as an advantage, "as there are
always letters enough in governments.
In conversation he was, according to
Malntenon, 'the most agreeable man
in France The Duchess of Orleans
is OF this opinion, and tell us he had a
certain way of saying things that was
Irresistible, D'Anguetil, who wrote
very clever book about Louis, regards
him as well educated. He was doubtless
misinformed, for the Duchess of Or
leans, who knew him intimately and
held him in high regard, tells us he was
$50 ignorant he could hardly read or
write" Capefgue says he read moth
ing but Spanish romances." His
mother, Anne of Austria, was Span
ish woman, and devoted all her life to
her native land. He must have read
don Quixoten and other Spanish nov
els of the age, which, perhaps, may ac-
count for the grand Spanish manner by
which he was distinguished above all
his contemporaries, and his munificence
to the objects of his esteem.
His wife, Maria Teresa, of Spain, ap-
pears TO have been an excellent woman
yet she told the Duchess she had never
known happy day since she was mar
rled. Such was the result of all that
brilliant cortege led by the famous
GrammOut from the gates of Paris down
through the old historic provinces of
France to the Pyroneean frontier, thence
| to the FontasabiauX pass through the
antique and mystical band of Spain to
Madrid. GrammOut's description of
this expedition to Spain to bring home
| the future Queen of France is one of
| the most picturesque pieces of word
painting in French history.
| The Duchess says Madam de Montes-
pan was dirty in her person, but so witty
and amusing you could not help laugh
ing with her. Montespan was OF the
Mortemart family, renowned for several
generations for certain kind of wit,
styled by the Parisians pesprit de Morte-
| mart.
The present generation can have but
a faint conception of the state of society
in France in the time of Louis XIV.
and that OF the Regent, and during the
reign of Louis XIV. During campaign
in Flanders one summer Louis XIV.
went to that country with the Queen
and two of his mistresses. A grand re-
view of the army was held. The Queen
and the mistresses came on the field in
the same carriage, and the rustics of the
vicinage called out to their acquaint-
ances with the inquiry "Have you
seen the three Queens?n Yet at this
very time Bossuet was laundering in
Notre Dame on total depravity, infant
damnation, and eternal perdition to all
the human race without the pale of the
''true church ~ the excellent Fenelon
was Archbishop of Cambray, and Mas
sillon was preaching to crowded audi
ences those sermons which are still re-
garded as models of pulpit eloquence !;
Racine and Molliere were writing dra-
mas which the whole civilized world
still reads with delight. and the great
/ Colbert administering the finances with
the ability of Hamilton or Gallatin.
With what marvellous vitality must the
J French have been endowed to have sur
vived all the corruptions of the old
monarchy and the regency, all the ras-
, calities of the revolution, all the expen-
, ditures of the wars of Napoleon l., and
all the frivolities and follies of Napoleon
III. and his silly wife. That woman
has done more to demoralize her sex in
both hemispheres by creating in them
a fttrore for the pomp and vanities OF
outward adornment, regardless of ex-
pense," than any woman who has lived
since the birth of modern millinery.