But this love had turned away from her forever; and whatever Marie Antoinette might now do to exhibit her candid wishes, her devotedness was not trusted in by the people, who looked upon her as an enemy, no longer Queen of France, but simply an Austrian.

Even on this day of universal joy, on the day of the opening of the States-General, there was no desire to hide from the queen the hatred felt against her, but there was the resolve to show her that France, even in her hour of happiness, ceased not to make opposition to her.

The opening of the States-General was to be preceded in Versailles by divine service.  In solemn procession the deputies arrived; and the people who had streamed from Paris and from the whole region round about, and who in compact masses filled the immense square in front of the palace, and the whole street leading to the Church of St. Louis, received the deputies with loud, unbroken shouts, and met the princes and the king with applause.  But no sooner was the queen in sight, than the people remained dumb; and then, after this appalling pause, which petrified the heart of the queen, the women with their true instinct of hatred began to cry out, “Long live the Duke d’Orleans!  Long live the people’s friend, the good Duke d’Orleans!”

The name of the duke thus derisively thrown in the face of the queen—­for it was well known that she hated him, that she had forbidden him to enter into her apartments—­this name at this hour, thrown at her by the people, struck the queen’s heart as the blow of a dagger; a deathly pallor overspread her cheeks, and nearly fainting she had to throw herself into the arms of the Princess de Lamballe, so as not to sink down. [Footnote:  See “Count Mirabeau,” by Theodore Mundt.  Second edition, vol. iii., p. 234.]

With the opening of the States-General, as already said, began the first act of the great drama which France was going to represent before the eyes of Europe terrified and horrified:  with the opening of the States-General the revolution had begun.  Every one felt it; every one knew it; the first man who had the courage to express it was Mirabeau—­Mirabeau, the deputy of the Third Estate, the count who was at enmity with all those of his rank, who had solemnly parted with them to devote himself to the people’s service and to liberty!

On the day of the opening, as he entered the hall in which the States-General were convened, he gazed with scrutinizing and flaming eyes on the representatives of the nobility, on those brilliant and proud lords who, though his equals in rank, were now his inveterate enemies.  A proud, disdainful smile fluttered athwart his lips, which ordinarily were pressed together with a sarcastic and contemptuous expression.  He then crossed the hall with the bearing of a conqueror, and took his seat upon those benches from which was launched the thunderbolt which was to dash to pieces the throne of the lilies.