“To an impolitic act of the Dauphine herself may be in part ascribed the unwonted virulence of the jealousy and resentment of Du Barry.  The old dotard, Louis XV., was so indelicate as to have her present at the first supper of the Dauphine at Versailles.  Madame la Marechale de Beaumont, the Duchesse de Choiseul, and the Duchesse de Grammont were there also; but upon the favourite taking her seat at table they expressed themselves very freely to Louis XV. respecting the insult they conceived offered to the young Dauphine, left the royal party, and never appeared again at Court till after the King’s death.  In consequence of this scene, Marie Antoinette, at the instigation of the Abbe Vermond, wrote to her mother, the Empress, complaining of the slight put upon her rank, birth, and dignity, and requesting the Empress would signify her displeasure to the Court of France, as she had done to that of Spain on a similar occasion in favour of her sister, the Queen of Naples.

“This letter, which was intercepted, got to the knowledge of the Court and excited some clamour.  To say the worst, it could only be looked upon as an ebullition of the folly of youth.  But insignificant as such matters were in fact, malignity converted them into the locust, which destroyed the fruit she was sent to cultivate.

“Maria Theresa, old fox that she was, too true to her system to retract the policy, which formerly, laid her open to the criticism of all the civilised Courts of Europe for opening the correspondence with De Pompadour, to whose influence she owed her daughter’s footing in France—­a correspondence whereby she degraded the dignity of her sex and the honour of her crown—­and at the same time suspecting that it was not her daughter, but Vermond, from private motives, who complained, wrote the following laconic reply to the remonstrance: 

“‘Where the sovereign himself presides, no guest can be exceptionable.’

“Such sentiments are very much in contradiction with the character of Maria Theresa.  She was always solicitous to impress the world with her high notion of moral rectitude.  Certainly, such advice, however politic, ought not to have proceeded from a mother so religious as Maria Theresa wished herself to be thought; especially to a young Princess who, though enthusiastically fond of admiration, at least had discretion to see and feel the impropriety of her being degraded to the level of a female like Du Barry, and, withal, courage to avow it.  This, of itself, was quite enough to shake the virtue of Marie Antoinette; or, at least, Maria Theresa’s letter was of a cast to make her callous to the observance of all its scruples.  And in that vitiated, depraved Court, she too soon, unfortunately, took the hint of her maternal counsellor in not only tolerating, but imitating, the object she despised.  Being one day told that Du Barry was the person who most contributed to amuse Louis XV., ‘Then,’ said she, innocently, ’I declare myself her rival; for I will try who can best amuse my grandpapa for the future.  I will exert all my powers to please and divert him, and then we shall see who can best succeed.’