The colonel’s lady and Judy O’Grady
    Are sisters under their skins;

and so the Austrian woman of 1776 and the Spanish woman of 1856 found amusement in very similar ways.  They plunged into a sea of strange frivolity, such as one finds to-day at the centers of high fashion.  Marie Antoinette bedecked herself with eccentric garments.  On her head she wore a hat styled a “what-is-it,” towering many feet in height and flaunting parti-colored plumes.  Worse than all this, she refused to wear corsets, and at some great functions she would appear in what looked exactly like a bedroom gown.

She would even neglect the ordinary niceties of life.  Her hands were not well cared for.  It was very difficult for the ladies in attendance to persuade her to brush her teeth with regularity.  Again, she would persist in wearing her frilled and lace-trimmed petticoats long after their dainty edges had been smirched and blackened.

Yet these things might have been counteracted had she gone no further.  Unfortunately, she did go further.  She loved to dress at night like a shop-girl and venture out into the world of Paris, where she was frequently followed and recognized.  Think of it—­the Queen of France, elbowed in dense crowds and seeking to attract the attention of common soldiers!

Of course, almost every one put the worst construction upon this, and after a time upon everything she did.  When she took a fancy for constructing labyrinths and secret passages in the palace, all Paris vowed that she was planning means by which her various lovers might enter without observation.  The hidden printing-presses of Paris swarmed with gross lampoons about this reckless girl; and, although there was little truth in what they said, there was enough to cloud her reputation.  When she fell ill with the measles she was attended in her sick-chamber by four gentlemen of the court.  The king was forbidden to enter lest he might catch the childish disorder.

The apathy of the king, indeed, drove her into many a folly.  After four years of marriage, as Mrs. Mayne records, he had only reached the point of giving her a chilly kiss.  The fact that she had no children became a serious matter.  Her brother, the Emperor Joseph of Austria, when he visited Paris, ventured to speak to the king upon the subject.  Even the Austrian ambassador had thrown out hints that the house of Bourbon needed direct heirs.  Louis grunted and said little, but he must have known how good was the advice.

It was at about this time when there came to the French court a young Swede named Axel de Fersen, who bore the title of count, but who was received less for his rank than for his winning manner, his knightly bearing, and his handsome, sympathetic face.  Romantic in spirit, he threw himself at once into a silent inner worship of Marie Antoinette, who had for him a singular attraction.  Wherever he could meet her they met.  To her growing cynicism this breath of pure yet ardent affection was very grateful.  It came as something fresh and sweet into the feverish life she led.