The Salon of Timepieces.
IN THAT LARGE HALL of the palace of Versailles which was called the Salon of Timepieces, a young man walked slowly up and down, with his arms hanging and his head bent forward. He appeared to be about seventeen years of age, was of a fair complexion, and his eyes were mild in their expression; but it must be acknowledged that there was a slight degree of vulgarity in his demeanor. On his breast sparkled a diamond star, rendered more brilliant by the dark violet-colored velvet of his coat; and his white satin waistcoat, embroidered with silver, was crossed by the blue ribbon supporting the cross of St. Louis.
None could mistake in this young man the profile so expressive of dignity and kindliness which formed the characteristic type of the elder branch of the House of Bourbon, of which he was at once the most striking and most exaggerated image. In fact, Louis Auguste, duke de Berry, dauphin of France (afterward Louis XVI.), had the Bourbon nose even longer and more aquiline than in his predecessors. His forehead was lower and more retreating than Louis XV. ‘s, and the double chin of his grandfather was so remarkable in him, that although he was at the time we speak of young and thin, his chin formed nearly one-third of the length of his face.
Although well made, there, was something embarrassed in the movement of his legs and shoulders, and his walk was slow and rather awkward. Suppleness, activity, and strength seemed centered only in his arms, and more particularly in his fingers, which displayed, as it were, that character which in other persons is expressed on the forehead, in the mouth, and in the eyes. The dauphin continued to pace in silence the Salon of Timepieces — the same in which, eight years before, Louis XV, had given to Madame de Pompadour the decree of the parliament exiling the Jesuits from the kingdom — and as he walked he seemed plunged in reverie.
At last, however, he seemed to become impatient of waiting there alone, and to amuse himself he began to look at the timepieces, remarking, as Charles V, had done, the differences which are found in the most regular clocks. These differences are a singular but decided manifestation of the inequality existing in all material things, whether regulated or not regulated by the hand of man. He stopped before the large clock at the lower end of the salon — the same place it occupies at present — which, by a clever arrangement of machinery, marks the days, the months, the years, the phases of the moon, the course of the planets — in short, exhibiting to the still more curious machine called man, all that is most interesting in his progressive movement through life to death.
The prince examined this clock with the eye of an amateur, and leaned now to the right, now to the left, to examine the movement of such or such a wheel. Then he returned to his place in front, watching how the second-hand glided rapidly on, like those flies which, with their long slender legs, skim over the surface of a pond without disturbing the liquid crystal of its waters. This contemplation naturally led him to think that a very great number of seconds had passed since he had been waiting there. It is true, also, that many had passed before he had ventured to send to inform the king that he was waiting for him.
All at once the hand on which the young prince’s eyes were fixed stopped as if by enchantment., the wheels ceased their measured rotation, the springs became still, and deep silence took possession of the machine, but a moment before so full of noise and motion. No more ticking, no more oscillations, no more movement of the wheels or of the hands. The timepiece had died.
Had some grain of sand, some atom, penetrated into one of the wheels, and stopped its movements? or was the genius of the machine resting, wearied with its eternal agitation? Surprised by this sudden death, this stroke of apoplexy occurring before his eyes, the dauphin forgot why he had come thither, and how long he had waited. Above all, he forgot that hours are not counted in eternity by the beating of metal upon metal, nor arrested even for a moment in their course by the hindrance of any wheel, but that they are recorded on the dial of eternity, established even before the birth of worlds by the unchangeable hand of the Almighty. He therefore opened the glass door of the crystal pagoda, the genius of which had ceased to act, and put his head inside to examine the timepiece more closely. But the large pendulum was in his way; he slipped in his supple fingers, and took it off. This was not enough; the dauphin still found the cause of the lethargy of the machine hidden from him. He then supposed that the person who had the care of the clocks of the palace had forgotten to wind up this timepiece, and he took down the key from a hook and began to wind it up like a man quite accustomed to the “business. But he could only turn it three times — a proof that something was astray in the mechanism. He drew from his pocket a little file, and with the end of it pushed one of the wheels; they all creaked for half a second, then stopped again.
The malady of the clock was becoming serious; the dauphin, therefore, began carefully to unscrew several parts of it, laying them all in order on a console beside him. Then, drawn on by his ardor, he began to take to pieces still more and more of the complicated machine, and to search minutely into its most hidden and mysterious recesses. Suddenly he uttered a cry of joy — he discovered that a screw which acted on one of the springs had become loose, and had thus impeded the movement of the motive wheel.
He immediately began to screw it; and then, with a wheel in his left hand, and his little file in his right, he plunged his head again into the interior of the clock.
He was busy at his work, absorbed in contemplation of the mechanism of the timepiece, when a door opened, and a voice announced, “The king!”
But the dauphin heard nothing but the melodious sound of that ticking, which his hand had again awakened, as if it were the beating of a heart which a clever physician had restored to life.
The king looked around on all sides, and it was some minutes before he discovered the dauphin, whose head was hidden in the opening, and whose legs alone were visible. He approached, smiling, and tapped his grandson on the shoulder.
“What the devil are you doing there?” said he. The dauphin drew out his head quickly, but, at the same time, with all the care necessary to avoid doing any harm to the beautiful object which he had undertaken to mend.
“Sire — your majesty sees,” replied the young man, blushing at being surprised in the midst of his occupations, “I was amusing myself until you came.”
“Yes, in destroying my clock — a very pretty amusement!”
“Oh no, sire! I was mending it. The principal wheel would not move; it was prevented by this screw. I have tightened the screw, and now it goes.”
“But you will blind yourself with looking into that thing. I would not put my head into such a trap for all the gold in the world.”
“Oh, it will do me no harm, sire — I understand all about it. I always take to pieces, clean and put together again, that beautiful watch which your majesty gave me on my fourteenth birthday.”
“Very well; but stop now, if you please, and leave your mechanics. You wish to speak to me?”
“I, sire?” said the young man, coloring again.
“Of course, since you sent to say you were waiting for me.”
“It is true, sire,” replied the dauphin, with downcast eyes.
“Well, what is it? Answer me — if it is of no importance I must go, for I am just setting off for Marly.” Louis XV, as was his custom, already sought to escape.
The dauphin placed his wheel and his file on a chair, which indicated that he had really something important to say, since he interrupted his important work for it.
“Do you want money!” asked the king, sharply. “If so, I shall send you some;” and he made a step toward the door.
“Oh no, sire; I have still a thousand crowns remaining of the sum I received last month.”
“What economy!” said the king; “and how well Monsieur de la Vauguyon has educated him! I think he has precisely all the virtues I have not.”
The young prince made a violent effort over himself. “Sire,” said he, “is the dauphiness yet very far distant?”
“Do you not know as well as I how far off she is?” replied the king.
“I?” stammered out the dauphin.
“Of course — you heard the account of her journey read yesterday. Last Monday she was at Nancy, and she ought to be now about forty-five leagues from Paris.”
“Sire, does not your majesty think her royal highness travels very slowly?”
“By no means,” replied the king; “I think she travels very fast for a woman. And then, you know, there are the receptions and the rejoicings on the road. She travels at least ten leagues every two days, one with another.”
“I think it very little, sire,” said the dauphin, timidly.
Louis XV. was more and more astonished at the appearance of impatience, which he had been far from suspecting.
“Come, come,” said he, smiling slyly, “don’t be impatient; your dauphiness will arrive soon.”
“Sire, might not these ceremonies on the road be shortened?” continued the dauphin.
“Impossible; she has already passed through two or three towns, where she should have made a stay, without stopping.”
“But these delays will be eternal; and then, sire, I think besides—” said the dauphin, still more timidly.
“Well, what do you think? Let me hear it; speak!”
“I think that the service is badly performed.”—” How? — what service?”
“The service for the journey.”
“Nonsense! I sent thirty thousand horses to be ready on the road, thirty carriages, sixty wagons — I don’t know how many carts. If carts, carriages, and horses were put in file, they would reach from this to Strasbourg. How can you say, then, there is bad attendance on the road?”
“Well, sire, in spite of all your majesty’s goodness, I am almost certain that what I say is true; but perhaps I have used an improper term, and instead of badly performed, I should have said badly arranged.”
The king raised his head, and fixed his eyes on the dauphin; he began to comprehend that more was meant than met the ear, in the few words which his royal highness had ventured to utter.
“Thirty thousand horses,” he repeated, “thirty carriages, sixty wagons, two regiments. I ask you, M. Philosopher, have you ever heard of a dauphiness entering France with such an attendance as that before?”
“I confess, sire, that things have been royally done, and as your majesty alone knows how to do them. But has your majesty specially recommended that these horses and carriages should be employed solely for her royal highness and her train?”
The king looked at his grandson for the third time. A vague suspicion began to sting him, a slight remembrance to illuminate his mind, and a sort of confused analogy between what the dauphin was saying and a disagreeable circumstance of late occurrence began to suggest itself to him.
“A fine question!” said he. “Certainly, everything has been ordered for her royal highness, and for her alone, and therefore, I repeat, she cannot fail to arrive very soon. But why do you look at me in that way?” added he, in a decided tone, which to the dauphin seemed even threatening. “Are you amusing yourself in studying my features as you study the springs of your mechanical works?”
The dauphin had opened his mouth to speak, but became silent at this address.
“Very well,” said the king, sharply; “it appears you have no more to say — hey? Are you satisfied now? Your dauphiness will arrive soon; all is arranged delightfully for her on the road; you are as rich as Croesus with your own private purse. And now, since your mind is at ease, be good enough to put my clock in order again.”
The dauphin did not stir.
“Do you know,” said the king, laughing, “I have a great mind to make you the principal watchmaker for the palace, with a good salary?”
The dauphin looked down, and, intimidated by the king’s look, took up the wheel and the file which he had laid on the chair. The king, in the meantime, had quietly gained the door.
“What the devil,” said he, looking at him, “did he mean with his badly arranged service? Well, well! I have escaped another scene, for he is certainly dissatisfied about something.”
In fact, the dauphin, generally so patient, had stamped with his foot as the king turned away from him.
“He is commencing again,” murmured the king, laughing; “decidedly, I have nothing for it but to fly.” But just as he opened the door, he saw on the threshold the Duke de Choiseul, who bowed profoundly.