The Boys Life of Lafayette 3

The Boys Life of Lafayette 3

Of course, not everybody was corrupt, even at court. There were people

who could not possibly be classed as fortune-hunters. Even to these

the fact that the young heir was tall and silent and awkward, not

especially popular at school, and not likely to shine in a society

whose standards were those of dancing-school manners and lively wit,

did not weigh for a moment against the solid attraction of his wealth.

To fathers and mothers of marriageable daughters both his moral and

material qualifications appealed. He was barely fourteen years old

when proposals of marriage began to be made in the careful French

way, which assumes that matrimony is an affair to be arranged between

guardians, instead of being left to the haphazard whim of young people.

An early letter of Lafayette's written about this time was partly

upon this subject. It might have been penned by a world-wise man of

thirty. The Comte de la Rivière appears to have been the person to

whom these proposals were first addressed. He, and possibly the Abbé

Feyon, discussed them with Lafayette in a business-like way; and the

young man, not being in love, either with a maid or with the idea

of matrimony, listened without enthusiasm, suggesting that better

matches might be found among the beauties of Auvergne. New duties and

surroundings engrossed him. He had left Du Plessis for the Military

Academy at Versailles, where there was more army and less cloister in

his training; where he spent part of his money upon fine horses and

[Pg 15]lent them generously to friends; and where, for amusement in his

hours of leisure, he could watch the pageant of court life unrolling at

the very gates of the academy. Matrimony could wait.

 

Among those more interested in providing a wife for him than he was in

finding one for himself was the lively Duc d'Ayen, a rich and important

nobleman, the father of five daughters. The eldest of these was fully a

year younger than Lafayette, while the others descended toward babyhood

like a flight of steps. Even in that day of youthful marriages it

seemed early to begin picking out husbands for them. But there were

five, and the duke felt he could not begin better than by securing

this long-limbed boy for a son-in-law. He suggested either his eldest

daughter, Louise, or the second child, Adrienne, then barely twelve,

as a future Marquise de Lafayette. He did not care which was chosen,

but of course it must be one of the older girls, since the bridegroom

would have to wait too long for the others to grow up. The match was

entirely suitable, and was taken under favorable consideration by the

bridegroom's family; but when it occurred to the duke to mention the

matter to his wife, he found opposition where it was least expected.

Madame d'Ayen absolutely refused her consent. These two were quite

apt to hold different views. The husband liked the luxury of the

court and chuckled over its shams. His wife, on the contrary, was of

a most serious turn of mind and had very little sense of humor. The

frivolities of court life really shocked her. She looked upon riches as

[Pg 16]a burden, and fulfilled the social duties of her position only

under protest as part of that burden. The one real joy of her life lay

in educating her daughters. She studied the needs of their differing

natures. She talked with them much more freely than was then the

custom, and did all in her power to make of them women who could live

nobly at court and die bravely when and wherever their time came.

 

She had no fault to find with young Lafayette. Her opposition was a

matter of theory and just a little selfish, for her married life had

not been happy enough to make her anxious to see her girls become wives

of even the best young men. As for this Motier lad, she thought him

particularly open to temptation because of his youth and loneliness and

great wealth. He had lacked the benefit of a father's training. So, for

that matter, had her own children. Their father was almost always away

from home.

 

The duke's airy manner hid a persistent spirit, and, in spite of his

worldliness, he esteemed the good character of the boy. The discussion

lasted almost a year and developed into the most serious quarrel of

their married life. No wonder, under the circumstances, that the duke

did not, as his daughter expressed it, "like his home." The little

girls knew something was wrong, and shared their mother's unhappiness

without guessing the cause. The duke's acquaintances, on the other

hand, to whom the cause was no secret, looked upon the contest of wills

as a comedy staged for their benefit. One of them said in his hearing

that no woman of Madame d'Ayen's strength of character, who had gone

[Pg 17]so far in refusal, would ever consent to the marriage. At this

the duke warmly rushed to the defense of his wife and answered that a

woman of her character, once convinced that she was wrong, would give

in completely and utterly.

 

That was exactly what happened. After months of critical observation

she found herself liking Lafayette better and better. The duke assured

her that the marriage need not take place for two years, and that

meantime the young man should continue his studies. She gave her

consent and took the motherless boy from that moment into her heart;

while the little girls, sensitive to the home atmosphere, felt the joy

of reconciliation without even yet knowing how nearly it concerned them.

 

It was decided among the elders that Adrienne, the second daughter, was

to become Madame Lafayette, because the young Vicomte de Noailles, a

cousin to whom Louise had been partial from babyhood, had made formal

proposals for her hand. This cousin was a friend and schoolfellow of

Lafayette's, and during the next few months the youths were given the

opportunity of meeting their future wives apparently by chance while

out walking, and even under the roof of the duke; but for a year

nothing was said to the girls about marriage. Their mother did not

wish to have their minds distracted from their lessons or from that

important event in the lives of Catholic maidens, their first communion.

 

Two months before her marriage actually took place Louise was told

that she was to be the bride of Noailles; and at the time of that

wedding Adrienne was informed of the fate in store for her. She found

[Pg 18]nothing whatever to question in this. It seemed altogether

delightful, and far simpler than deciding about the state of her own

soul. The truth was that her heart had already begun to feel that love

for Gilbert de Motier which was to grow and become the controlling

factor of her life. Girl-like, her head was just a little turned by

the momentous news of her engagement. Her mother tried to allay her

excitement, but she also took care to let Adrienne know how much she

liked the young man and to repeat to her all the good things she had

found out about him. And to her joy, Adrienne found that Lafayette felt

for the elder lady "that filial affection" which also grew as the years

went on.

 

How he felt about marriage as the day approached we do not know;

neither do we know the details of the wedding which must have been

celebrated with some splendor on the 11th of April, 1774. The bride was

not yet fifteen, the groom was sixteen. He was given leave of absence

from his regiment, and the newly wedded pair took up their residence in

the wonderful Paris home of Adrienne's family, the Hotel de Noailles.

Although not far from the Tuileries, in the very heart of the city, it

possessed a garden so large that a small hunt could be carried on in

it, with dogs and all. John Adams is authority for this. He visited the

Lafayettes there some time later, and found it unbelievably vast and

splendid.

 

 

[Pg 19]III

 

A NEW KING

 

 

Less than a month after their marriage these young people were dressed

in black, as was all the rest of fashionable Paris. The gay spring

season had been brought to a premature and agitated end by the news

that the king lay dead of smallpox, the loathsome disease he most

dreaded.

 

Smallpox was distressingly common in those days before vaccination had

been discovered; but courageous people protected themselves against it

even then by deliberately contracting the disease from a mild case and

allowing it to run its course under the best possible conditions. It

was found to be much less deadly in this way, though the patients often

became very ill, and it required real courage to submit to it.

 

The old king had never been at all brave. He feared discomfort in this

life almost as much as he dreaded hell in the next; so he had fled the

disease instead of courting it, and in time it came to have special

terrors for him. He had been riding through the April woods with a

hunting party and had come upon a sad little funeral procession--a very

[Pg 20]humble one. Always curious, he stopped the bearers and asked

who they were carrying to the grave. "A young girl, your Majesty."

The king's watery old eyes gleamed. "Of what did she die?" "Smallpox,

Sire." In terrified anger the monarch bade them begone and bury the

corpse deep; then he dismissed the hunt and returned to the palace. Two

days later he was stricken. The disease ran its course with amazing

virulence, as though taking revenge for his misspent life. Some of the

courtiers fled from Versailles. Others, to whom the king's displeasure

seemed a worse menace than smallpox, remained. His favorites tried

to keep the truth from the public. Daily bulletins announced that he

was getting better. When it was learned that he might die the people

crowded the church of Ste.-Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris,

kissing the reliquary and raising sobs and prayers for his recovery.

When he died, on the 10th of May, his body was hastily covered with

quicklime and conveyed, by a little handful of attendants who remained

faithful, to St.-Denis, where the kings of France lie buried. It was

done without ceremony in the dead of night. Forty days later his bones

were laid in the tomb of his ancestors with all possible funeral pomp.

There was decorous official mourning for the customary length of time;

but the old king had never been an inspiring figure and most of his

subjects were secretly glad he was out of the way.

 

During July and August of that year Lafayette was "in service" with

the Black Mousquetaires. In September, when his period of active duty

[Pg 21]was over and he could do as he chose, he had himself exposed to

smallpox, and he and his wife and mother-in-law shut themselves up in a

house at Chaillon, hired for the occasion, where during his illness and

convalescence Madame d'Ayen devoted herself to her new son night and

day.

 

Even while the rafters of Ste.-Geneviève were echoing to sobs and

prayers for the old king's recovery, people whispered under their

breath what they really thought of him; and by the time Lafayette

and his wife could take their places in the world again Louis XV had

been systematically forgotten. His grandson, the new king, was a

well-meaning young man, only three years older than Lafayette. One of

the king's intimates said that the chief trouble with Louis XVI was

that he lacked self-confidence. Marie Antoinette, his queen, was fond

of pleasure, and for four long years, ever since their marriage, they