The Washington herald., 1916-05-15
YOUR WEDDING DAY
The Famous Men and Women Who
Have Shared It.
May l5-Louis XVI and Marie
Antoinette.
By MARY Marshall


Never since marriages came into
Iashion have the festivities of any
wedding called forth SO much criticjsn,
as .wSn the dauphin Louis married
marie Antoinette, a hundred and fortv-
one years ago today. Never had French
wedding festivities been so costly or
so elaborate. The court ladies and at
tenoants wore gowns literally covered
win diamonds. The gardens ar yer-
ssilles were ablaze with illuminate tions
Literary millions of lamps were light
Gu costing a kings ransom each night.
IL is said that thirty thousand skv
rockets were set Off at one nash Tbs
starving French populace bore II IN
that each one of these thirty thousand
rockets cost three livres
Ihe little hfteen-year-old Austrian
archduchess, in whose honor ALI iris
e1FaVagance occurred. brought a light
neart ana a Vivacious disposition with
her when she came to France, Her
Deauty was compared to that OF the
venus de Medici by the connoisseurs
who admired so much her auburn Sair
and brilliant complexion. As a mat
Ter OF fact. her rather heavy underlip
and 90 high forehead, Characteristics
OF the Hapsburg family, would have
olsQualined her as a model for Venus
naturally enough the union between
the French dauphin who was later
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette was
arranged purely for state reasons That
their married life together was not
one OF unalloyed happiness Is not at
all surprising. But the reasons for
this rowal lnfelicity are not those that
are usually put down in the records
or kings and queens. For Louis XVI
had no use for the alluring charms ~
the court beauties. It is said. even
that for the first FIVE years Of his mar
ried life he was almost indifferent to
the charms Of his own lovely consort,
All the indiscretions that were com
mitted were those Of Marie Antoinette
herself. Although the pages Of com
temporary memoirs are crowded wjth
tales of her intrigues with handsome
foreigners, nowadays 1t seems to be
the opinion that her indiscretions were
all those Of a vivacious, pleasure-Iov-
ing girl, spurred on to her harmless
nirtations by the coldness and tnattsn-
tion Of her husband
Marie Antoinette first shocked tn.
French court the day of her wedding
ana what normal-minded, independent
girI OF nfteen would not have done the
same? A marvellous Lsvilion had b.an
set up near Kehl, on the French from
tier, where, according to the French
custom, the young bride was to be en-
tirely divested of the clothes she had
brought from Austria. This was NO
doubt regarded by the ladies of the
French court as an impressive symbol
OF the future loyalty that was expected
from the young princess. This cere-
monial took place in the presence OF a
score or more of French women whom
the princess had never seen before
1t was the privilege of one of these
women to pull of the princess under. =.
linen; another divested her of her
royal hosiery: still others escorted her
to her bath. Then one, by special per-
mission, squeezed the royal sponge
down her back. another eagle-eyed
French noblewoman rubbed her down
with a towel while apother-and the
young princess must have been relieved
at this-held up a sheet before her.
In Austria, before she dreamed of
being the prospective queen of France,
Marie Antoinette had been permitted TO
take her bath as she chose, and she
possessed a normal amount of maidenly
modesty. To her there was no beau
tiful symbolism in this denuding pro-
cess and she frankly told her attend
ants what she thought of the custom.
Whatever mars the happiness of the
early married life OF Louis XVI and
his queen the final test of their deyo-
ton and love could not have been more
triumphant. For in the last days of
imprisonment before they went to their
execution at the hands of the enraged
populace, divested of all the trappings
and false standards of royalty, they
devotion that are the common lot of
all who regard marriage as a God
given institution.
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