ons as those which had hitherto
sullied his life, wounded his reputation, and endangered his eternal
welfare.

Pure as Madame de Maintenon was, the devotion of the king to her was
so marked that her reputation began to suffer. She felt the unjust
imputations cast upon her very keenly. The king at last resolved that
it should be so no longer. Having come to a decision, he acted very
promptly. It was a cold night in January, 1686. A smothering
snow-storm swept the streets of Paris. At half past ten o'clock a
court messenger entered the archiepiscopal palace with a sealed
packet, requesting the archbishop to repair immediately to Versailles
to perform the marriage ceremony. The great clock of the Cathedral was
tolling the hour of eleven as the prelate entered his carriage in the
darkness and the storm. At half past twelve he reached the gate of the
chateau. Here Bontems, the first valet de chambre of the king,
conducted the archbishop to the private closet of his majesty. Madame
de Maintenon was there in full dress. Louis XIV. stood by her side.
In the same apartment were the Marquis de Montechevreuil and the
king's confessor, Pere la Chaise.

Miss Pardoe thus describes the scene that ensued:

"As the eye of the king rested upon the archbishop, he exclaimed, 'Let
us go.' Taking the hand of the lady, he led her forward through the
long suite of rooms, followed by the other actors in this
extraordinary scene, who moved on in profound silence, thrown for an
instant into broad light by the torch carried by Bontems, and then
suddenly lost in the deep darkness beyond its influence. Nothing was
to be heard as the bridal party proceeded save the muffled sound of
their footsteps, deadened by the costly carpets over which they trod.
But it was remarked that as the light flashed for an instant across
the portraits of his family which clothed the walls, Louis XIV.
glanced eagerly and somewhat nervously upon them, as though he dreaded
the rebuke of some stern eye or haughty lip for the weakness of which
he was about to become guilty."

The marriage ceremony was performed by the Archbishop of Paris. There
were eight persons present as witnesses, most of them of high
distinction. The king was in the forty-eighth year of his age, and
Madame de Maintenon in her fifty-second. The marriage was celebrated
with all the established ceremonies of the Church, the solemnization
of the mass, the exchange of marriage rings, and the pronouncing