lish fashions had been confined to filling our
drawing-rooms with young men in English frock-coats, instead of the French
dress, good taste and commerce might alone have suffered; but the
principles of English government had taken possession of these young
heads. Constitution, Upper House, Lower House, national guarantee,
balance of power, Magna Charta, Law of Habeas Corpus,--all these words
were incessantly repeated, and seldom understood; but they were of
fundamental importance to a party which was then forming.

The first sitting of the States took place on the following day. The King
delivered his speech with firmness and dignity; the Queen told me that he
had taken great pains about it, and had repeated it frequently. His
Majesty gave public marks of attachment and respect for the Queen, who was
applauded; but it was easy to see that this applause was in fact rendered
to the King alone.

It was evident, during the first sittings, that Mirabeau would be very
dangerous to the Government. It affirmed that at this period he
communicated to the King, and still more fully to the Queen, part of his
schemes for abandoning them. He brandished the weapons afforded him by
his eloquence and audacity, in order to make terms with the party he meant
to attack. This man played the game of revolution to make his own
fortune. The Queen told me that he asked for an embassy, and, if my
memory does not deceive me, it was that of Constantinople. He was refused
with well-deserved contempt, though policy would doubtless have concealed
it, could the future have been foreseen.

The enthusiasm prevailing at the opening of this assembly, and the debates
between the Tiers Etat, the nobility, and even the clergy, daily increased
the alarm of their Majesties, and all who were attached to the cause of
monarchy. The Queen went to bed late, or rather she began to be unable to
rest. One evening, about the end of May, she was sitting in her room,
relating several remarkable occurrences of the day; four wax candles were
placed upon her toilet-table; the first went out of itself; I relighted
it; shortly afterwards the second, and then the third went out also; upon
which the Queen, squeezing my hand in terror, said to me: "Misfortune
makes us superstitious; if the fourth taper should go out like the rest,
nothing can prevent my looking upon it as a sinister omen." The fourth
taper went out. It was remarked to the Queen that the four tapers h