Mademoiselle Genet told me: “I used to read to her for five hours a day and my voice frequently betrayed the exhaustion of my lungs. The Princesse would then prepare for me eau sucre, place it before me and apologise for making me read so long. She did it, she said, because she had pre scribed a course of reading for herself. She wanted to read the histories of countries for she believed that when she entered her convent she would only be allowed to read religious works.

One morning she disappeared and I learned she had gone to the Convent of St. Denis. “

“Were you sad. Mademoiselle?”

“I was very sad, Madame. I loved Madame Louise. She was …”

I looked at her slyly. I knew she was on the point of saying Madame Louise was the most reasonable, the most sane, of the aunts; but of course she stopped herself in time.

“Go on,” I commanded.

“Madame Adelaide was angry. When I told her Madame Louise had gone she said, ” With whom has she gone? ” She thought she had run away with a lover.”

“Madame Adelaide would. She likes everything to be dramatic; and it is far more dramatic to run away with a lover than to a convent. It was less work for you, though.”

“I was afraid that Madame Victoire would follow her example.” I nodded. Already my little lectrice  had made it clear to me that of all the three aunts Victoire was her favourite.

“I told her I feared it and she laughed and said she would never leave Versailles. She was too fond of food and her couch.”

It was tiresome that Mademoiselle Genet and the Abbe. Vermond took a dislike to each other. Still, I determined to keep her with me, and perhaps one day snatch her away from the aunts altogether and make her entirely my servant. But that was for later.

And so life went on during those months at Versailles. My friendship with the Princesse de Lamballe was strengthening; letters from my mother arrived regularly. My hours with the Abbe when he tried to improve my mind; my interviews with Mercy when he tried to improve my conduct; my intimacy with my aunts; my friendship with the King; my coquetries with Amis; all this continued, and in addition there was a growing affection for my husband. But we were so much in the public eye, and so aware of being watched at every turn, that our situation did not have much chance of changing.

Even meals were taken in public—a custom I hated; but no one else seemed to mind, and of course the people expected it.

They would come in from Paris to watch us at our meals. We were like animals in highly gilded cages.

When it was time for dinner the people would come to watch my husband and me take our soup and then hurry away to see the Princes eat their bouilli; and after that they had to run until they were out of breath to witness Mesdames at their dessert. We were a peepshow for the people.

The King’s special feat at table was the clever way in which he could knock the top off an egg with one stroke of his fork; and this was talked about throughout Versailles and Paris. He was therefore condemned to eating eggs constantly so that those who had come to see him perform this feat should not be disappointed. Although he refused to go to Paris to see his people they came to Versailles to see him—or perhaps it was merely his trick with the egg they came to see.

He performed so dexterously; but to me the amazing part of the performance was that he behaved as though he were entirely alone—like an actor on a stage totally unaware of the spectators.

There was a rumour in the Court that Adelaide had once had a child who appeared in the Princesses’ apartments and was made much of by the royal sisters and reminded people of Louis XV in his youth. This affair, the loss of her good looks, and the King’s contempt for her which had replaced his affection, had no doubt had their effect on Adelaide’s character and turned her into the eccentric she had become.

There was an even uglier rumour that the King had loved her incestuously. Perhaps this was why she put on an air of great knowledge and wanted me to know that she could advise me as to how I should behave towards my husband.

I did not need their advice. I knew that my husband did not dislike me; in fact he was pleased with me. I was admired for my appearance, my grace and my charm; and these qualities were constantly referred to. My husband liked to see Artois in attendance on me; the only trouble was that he could not caress me or pay me compliments without acute embarrassment. When he was in his hunting clothes or workshop overalls he appeared to be a man;

he looked tall and upright then, unconscious of himself; but as soon as he put on the clothes of the court gallant he became awkward and shuffling. I tried to understand the things he was interested in.

Though I loved to ride I hated to see animals suffer, so I had never cared for hunting; in any case I was still not allowed to ride a horse. I went into his workshop and he tried to explain to me what he was doing with the lathe there, but I could not understand and I found it difficult to stifle my yawns.

When he became ill with a slight indisposition—he had over-eaten at table—a habit of his, for he would come in very hungry from the hunt or the workshop—he had slept in a separate room in order not to disturb me. This had caused amusement in some quarters and consternation in others, for it was well known what was happening. The most embarrassing part of the whole affair was that everyone was watching and all our actions were commented on, interpreted and often misconstrued. For a sensitive boy, aware of his affliction, this was a very delicate situation indeed.

But our affection was growing. He no longer looked away from me.

Sometimes he would take my hand and kiss it—or even kiss my cheek. I asked him if he were disappointed in me and he said that he was very content.

Then one day he said: “Do not imagine that I am ignorant of the duties of marriage. I will prove it to you … soon.”

I was excited. Everything was going to be all right. I only bad to wait. It was true that we were both too young.

Waiting was rewarding, for when we were alone in our apartments—it was just as I was going to visit my aunts-he whispered to me:

“Tonight I shall come back to our bed.” I looked at him in astonishment and he took my hand in his clumsy way and kissed it with real affection. I said to him: “Louis … do you rather like me?”

“How can you doubt it?” he asked. I love you sincerely, and I esteem you more. “

It was hardly the impassioned declaration of a lover, but it was the nearest he had ever come to it; and I went to the aunts in a state of great excitement, which was foolish of me for they recognised at once that something had happened.

“You have just left Poor Berry,” said Adelaide.

“Has something happened?”

“He is going to sleep with me tonight Adelaide embraced me. and Victoire and Sophie looked at me in a startled fashion.

“Yes,” I announced triumphantly, he has told me so. “

“In a very short time you will be telling us some exciting news,” said Adelaide archly.

“I am sure of it.”

“I hope so. Oh, how I hope so.”

How foolish I was! Before the day was out the whole Court was buzzing with the news: “The Dauphin is going to sleep with the Dauphine.

Tonight is the night. ” Those cynical courtiers like Richelieu, that old roue, were laying bets on the success of our encounter.

“Will he?

Won’t he? ” There was whispering everywhere. Worst of all, Adelaide summoned Louis to her apartment because she wanted to ” Advise’ him.

That night I lay waiting for my husband. He did not appear. I should not have been surprised. My reckless talk had spoilt it.

Although the matter was now causing the gravest concern, I doubt that the King would have bestirred himself but for my mother. She was constantly writing to the King and begging him to do something. The truth about the Dauphin must be disclosed, and if there was a remedy it must be found.

Because of my mother’s importuning, the King sent for my husband and there was a long consultation; as a result Louis agreed to submit to an examination by the King’s physician, Monsieur Lassone, who reported that the Dauphin’s inability to consummate our marriage was due to nothing else but a physical defect which the knife could rectify. If the

Dauphin would submit to this operation all would be well.

Everyone was discussing the operation but Louis did not say whether he would submit to it. We slept in the same bed and he behaved like a lover; but our lovemaking always failed to reach that climax which we both so earnestly sought; and after a while we both found this state exhausting and humiliating.

There was no more talk of the operation. The King shrugged his shoulders; it was left to Louis to decide, and it became clear to me that he had decided against it. He was desperately trying to prove that he did not need it; but he did.

I cannot imagine why he would not submit to the opera-don at this time. He was no coward; but I suppose the whole business sickened him as it did me. If we had been an ordinary couple we should have seeded the matter in a very short time; but we were not; we were Dauphin and Dauphine of France. His impotence was discussed in the Court and in the Army. Our most intimate servants were constantly questioned, and when we discovered that the Spanish Ambassador had bribed one of the bedroom servants to examine the sheets and let him know the state of them, it seemed the last straw. Although we continued to occupy the same bed, Louis would retire early and be fast asleep by the time I went there; and when I awoke in the morning it would be to find him already gone.

This state of affairs continued, while I received angry letters from my mother, who cared much more than I did about the humiliation of my position.

And as I entered the second year of my marriage another controversy arose which made everyone forget the tragedy of our bedchamber.

My quarrel with Madame du Barry had been brewing ever since the aunts had told me of her true position at Court. I did not understand then that I should have been wiser to form an alliance with her than with the aunts. They, unknown to me, had resented my coming from the first.

They had been strongly against the Austrian alliance and were no real friends to me, whereas this woman of the people, vulgar as she might have been, had a good heart, and although Choiseui had arranged the marriage, and he was her enemy, she bore no animus towards me. Had I shown her the slightest friendliness she would have returned it doubly. But I was foolish. Egged on by the aunts, I continued to ignore her; I used my gift of mimicry and gave Hide imitations of her which caused a great deal of amusement and which, naturally, were reported to her. I could imitate her mannerisms, her vulgar laughter, her silly lisp and I did, exaggerating them ever so slightly to increase the amusement.

It did not occur to me that she must be wiser than I to have climbed to the top place at Court from the streets of Paris. The King doted on her; he allowed her to perch on the aim of his chair at a council meeting, to snatch papers from him when she wanted his attention, to call him “France’ in an insolently familiar way. All this he found amusing, and if anyone criticised her he would say, ” She is so pretty and she pleases me and that ought to be enough for you. ” So everyone realised that if they wished to remain in die King’s good graces they must please Madame du Barry. But I was in his good graces. I did not have to con form to ordinary standards so I thought and I made up my mind that I would never seek the friendship of a street-woman, no matter if she was the King’s mistress. So I behaved as though I could not see her. Often she would seek the opportunity to present herself before me but she could not speak to me until I spoke to her etiquette for bade it, and even she had to bow the knee to etiquette. So every time, I ignored her.

Although she was not a woman to bear rancour she was no respecter of persons either. She gave me the nickname of Little Austrian Carrots, and as this was taken up by others I grew very angry, and increased my imitations of her crudities and continued to look through her every time we met. This snubbing because so obvious that soon the whole Court was talking of it, and Madame du Barry became so incensed that she told the King she could endure it no longer and that Little Carrots should be ordered to speak to her.