MARIE DE MEDICIS.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 5336, 21 March 1879, Page 3

MARIE DE MEDICIS.

(FROM " OLD PARIS," BY LADY JACKSON.) It was the 14tli May, 1610. Workmen to the number of eight hundred, or more, were employed in decorating the old city of Paris for a grand state pageant, arranged to take place on the 16th. Marie de Medicis, the second wife of Henry IV., was then to make her public entry into the capital as the newly-crowned Queen of France. Her coronation, so long earnestly desired, so long delayed, she had , prevailed on the King, after ten ;years of scolding and coaxing, threatening and entreating, to consent to. The cherished wish of her heart was obtained, and she had been crowned with the utmost pomp and solemnity, on the previous day, at St. Denis, by Cardinal Joyeuse. Little or no sympathy existed between Marie de Mddicis and her husband. His mistresses— less by their beauty than by gaiety and good humour— held an influence over him which probably she herself might have acquired could she have curbed her violenttemper. Bufnot only did she rave, and rage, and assail him with angry words, it was even sometimes necessary to restrain her fr6m the free use of her hands. And her blows were far from being light ones, for, as Henry once justly said, she was " terribly ' robust." From time to time whispers , had reached her of the King's intention to. i seek a divorce, on the ground that a proI xnise of marriage given in years gone by /* to the Marquise de Verneuil invalidated any subsequent union contracted by him. 'Henry had not a very scrupulous conscience, but these whispered reports originated solely with the intriguing Marquise. He entertained, at heart, a kindly feeling towards Marie, notwithstanding her attacks upon him, and publicly paid her the renpect due to the ■ mother of the daughter of France. But her brow had cleared since it had been graced by a crown. She was radiant with delight ; for she had achieved a real triumph— one especially gratifying to the feelings of a woman of her violent and vindictive character— the Marquise de Verneuil, the King's mistr-ess, and the Princess Marguerite de France, his divorced wife, having both been compelled to witness that triumph, ;and even to enhance it, by joining the train of ladies appointed by Henry to fqrrn^ her cortege. . Her dark Italian eyes, which so often flashed with angry indignation on her * faithless spouse, were then lighted up with a gleam of proud satisfaction that but few had observed in them before — —Henry, never. The King had taken no part in the ceremony ; he was present merely as a spectator. But when the Royal procession passed up the nave of . the old cathedral, preceded by archbishops and bishops in their richest vestments ; the Queen, surrounded by the noblest and fairest ladies of her Court, and arrayed in splendid robes and sparkling gems that well become her florid complexion and portly figure (she was in her thirty-seventh year), and wearing with dignity the royal mantle — which, heavily embroidered in fleurs-de-lis of gold and pearls, was borne by pages of honor — Henry turning towards his Minister andjfriend De Sully, exclaimed, in an animated i tone, "Ventre Saint Gris ! — Qu'elle est belle ! "