la Vauguyon flattered himself that he was already assured.  Under these circumstances Marie Antoinette behaved with consummate prudence, as far at least as her enemies were concerned.  She despised the efforts made to lower her in the general estimation so completely that she seemed wholly unconscious of them.  She did not even allow herself to be provoked into treating the authors of the calumnies with additional coldness; but gave no handle to any of them to complain of her, so that the critical and anxious eyes of Mercy himself found nothing to wish altered in her conduct toward them.[14] And throughout the winter she pursued the even tenor of her way, making herself chiefly remarkable by almost countless acts of charity, which she dispensed with such judgment as showed that they proceeded, not from a heedless disregard of money, but from a thoughtful and vigilant kindness, which did not think the feelings any more than the necessities of the poor beneath her notice.

Circumstances to which she contributed only indirectly enhanced her popularity and weakened the effects of the mistress’s hostility.  Versailles had not been so gay for many winters, and the votaries of mere amusement, always a strong party at every court, rejoiced at the addition to the royal family to whom the gayety was owing.  Louis roused himself to gratify the young princess, who enlivened his place with the first respectable pleasures which it or he had known for years.  When he saw that she liked dramatic performances, he opened the private theatre of the palace twice a week.  Because she was fond of dancing, he encouraged her to have a weekly ball in her own apartments, at which she herself was the principal attraction, not solely by the elegance of her every movement, but still more by the graciousness with which she received and treated her guests, having a kind smile and an affable word for all, apparently forgetting her rank in the frankness of her condescension, yet at the same time bearing herself with an innate dignity which prevented the most forward from presuming on her kindness or venturing on any undue familiarity.[15]

The winter of 1770 was one of unusual severity; and she found resources for a further enlivenment of the court in the frost itself.  Sledging on the snow was an habitual pastime at Vienna, where the cold is more severe than at Paris; nor in former years had sledges been wholly unknown in the Bois de Boulogne.  And now Marie Antoinette, whose hardy habits made exercise in the fresh air almost a necessity for her, had sledges built for herself and her attendants; and the inhabitants of Versailles and the neighborhood, as fond of novelty as all their countrymen, were delighted at the merry sledging-parties which, as long as the snow lasted, explored the surrounding country, while the woods rang with the horses’ bells, and, almost as loudly and still more cheerfully, with the laughter of the company.