for some
time very doubtful, till the people were dragged with violence from about
her, that she might have air. On her recovering, the King was the first
person who told her that she was the mother of a very fine Princess.

"'Well, then,' said the Queen, 'I am like my mother, for at my birth she
also wished for a son instead of a daughter; and you have lost your
wager:' for the King had betted with Maria Theresa that it would be a
son.

"The King answered her by repeating the lines Metastasio had written on
that occasion.

"'Io perdei: l'augusta figlia
A pagar, m'a condemnato;
Ma s'e ver the a voi somiglia
Tutto il moudo ha guadagnato.'"

[The Princesse de Lamballe again ceased to be constantly about the Queen.
Her danger was over, she was a mother, and the attentions of
disinterested friendship were no longer indispensable. She herself about
this time met with a deep affliction. She lost both of her own parents;
and to her sorrows may, in a great degree, be ascribed her silence upon
the events which intervened between the birth of Madame and that of the
Dauphin. She was as assiduous as ever in her attentions to Her Majesty
on her second lying-in. The circumstances of the death of Maria Theresa,
the Queen's mother, in the interval which divided the two accouchements,
and Her Majesty's anguish, and refusal to see any but De Lamballe and De
Polignac, are too well known to detain us longer from the notes of the
Princess. It is enough for the reader to know that the friendship of Her
Majesty for her superintendent seemed to be gradually reviving in all its
early enthusiasm, by her unremitting kindness during the confinements of
the Queen, till, at length, they became more attached than ever. But, not
to anticipate, let me return to the narrative.]

"The public feeling had undergone a great change with respect to Her
Majesty from the time of her first accouchement. Still, she was not the
mother of a future King. The people looked upon her as belonging to them
more than she had done before, and faction was silenced by the general
delight. But she had not yet attained the climax of her felicity. A
second pregnancy gave a new excitement to the nation; and, at length, on
the 22nd October, 1781, dawned the day of hope.

"In consequence of what happened on the first accouchement, measures were
taken to prevent similar disasters on the second. The number admitted
into the apartment was circumscribed. The silen