Chapter 36 - Page 2

bathing, had mutually exchanged their own observations, critical remarks,
and the discussion of matters personal - the fugitive journal of that
period, of which no one now remembers anything, not even by the waves,
the witnesses of what went on that day - themselves now sublimed into
immensity, as the actors have vanished into eternity.

A crowd of people swarming upon the banks of the river, without reckoning
the groups of peasants drawn together by their anxiety to see the king
and the princess, was, for many minutes, the most disorderly, but the
most agreeable, mob imaginable. The king dismounted from his horse, a
movement which was imitated by all the courtiers, and offered his hat to
Madame, whose rich riding-habit displayed her fine figure, which was set
off to great advantage by that garment, made of fine woolen cloth
embroidered with silver. Her hair, still damp and blacker than jet, hung
in heavy masses upon her white and delicate neck. Joy and health
sparkled in her beautiful eyes; composed, yet full of energy, she inhaled
the air in deep draughts, under a lace parasol, which was borne by one of
her pages. Nothing could be more charming, more graceful, more poetical,
than these two figures buried under the rose-colored shade of the
parasol, the king, whose white teeth were displayed in continual smiles,
and Madame, whose black eyes sparkled like carbuncles in the glittering
reflection of the changing hues of the silk. When Madame approached her
horse, a magnificent animal of Andalusian breed, of spotless white,
somewhat heavy, perhaps, but with a spirited and splendid head, in which
the mixture, happily combined, of Arabian and Spanish blood could be
readily traced, and whose long tail swept the ground; and as the princess
affected difficulty in mounting, the king took her in his arms in such a
manner that Madame's arm was clasped like a circlet of alabaster around
the king's neck. Louis, as he withdrew, involuntarily touched with his
lips the arm, which was not withheld, and the princess having thanked her
royal equerry, every one sprang to his saddle at the same moment. The
king and Madame drew aside to allow the carriages, the outriders, and
runners, to pass by. A fair proportion of the cavaliers, released from
the restraint etiquette had imposed upon them, gave the rein to their
horses, and darted after the carriages which bore the maids of honor, as
blooming as so many virgin huntresses around Diana, and the human
whirlwind, laughing, chattering, and noisy, passed onward.

The king and Madame, however, kept their horses in hand at a foot-pace.
Behind his majesty and his sister-in-law, certain of the courtiers –
those, at least, who were seriously disposed or were anxious to be within