stroyed the most. "But nature," says Lord Mahon, who visited Chantilly with a reverent enthusiasm, "does not yield so readily to the violence of man, and knows how to repair his ravages. Not long ago, (in September, 1841,) I could still find scope to admire the wild recesses of that unpruned forest, those limpid and gushing streams, those light green Arbele poplars, which have taken root amongst the ruins of the Grand Château, and which now surround it with their quivering shade; those mossy paths, and those hawthorne bowers; those gardens restored with care, and where the most beautiful orange trees and the most brilliant flowers are once more shedding their fragrance." In the midst of this luxuriant beauty stood formerly two palaces, the Grand Chateau and the Petit Chateau, as they were called. Of these, the former, as I have already said, was long since destroyed. The indiscriminate ravages of the Revolution were fatal to its preservation. Its useless splendor, and the accumulations of ornament and art which it contained, found no favor in the sight of the republicans of '92. Besides, the princely halls of Chantilly were reminiscences of the old régime, a perpetual souvenir of the hated Bourbons, a monument of a doomed aristocracy and a dethroned race. Its destruction was complete; a palace once, and now a ruin-such is its short history. But though thus blotted from almost any traces of existence, the associations that surround the decaying walls are neither few nor insignificant. It was here that an heroic career attained the summit of its grandeur in that calm retirement, which is the crown of a successful life. After thirty-five years of action and renown, it was here that Condé, in the enjoyment of kind companionship, the recollection of an eventful life, and the practice of congenial pursuits, solaced and enlivened his old age. Looking back from this quiet retreat upon the scenes of his past career, checquered by every variety of fortune, the retrospect can hardly have failed to astonish even himself. We can imagine the veteran hero retracing the steps by which he had mounted, through half a century of toil, to the eminence of his fame; and it would be hard to find a picture more varied by the lights and shadows of destiny, than that which such a contemplation would afford. A quiet prelude to the after years of incessant activity and intrigue, were his school days, in the old provincial city of Bourges, where, under the charge of La Boussiere, and "stern Father Pelletier," and "kind Father Goutier," he learned the rudiments, and carried off the palm amongst the crowd of scholars; where, too, on the old Gothic balustrade of Jacques Cœurs's mansion, he read, and perhaps adopted as his own, the inspiring motto, "A vaillants Cœurs, rien impossible." From this opening scene, the events of his life follow in quick succession. The rash generalship of the armies of Picardy and Champagne confided to him, an inexperienced youth of twenty, less from any ability already displayed, than from the obsequious policy of Mazarin, then fresh in his dangerous authority, and anxious to strengthen his new ministry by a league with the princes of the blood; followed by that tremendous victory in the forests of Rocroy, which made him the first captain of the age, and the strongest support of the ambitious Regency of Anne of Austria; the successive perils and triumphs of Thionville and Fribourg; the campaign of the Rhine; the sieges of Dunkirk and Lerida; the battle of Lens, celebrated as one of the most glorious which the reign of Louis XIV. could boast; these were only the first fruits of a harvest of renown. The dark, unnatural wars of the Fronde; the subtle intrigues of the Louvre, ending in Condé's disgrace, defeat, and year of painful imprisonment, whose rigors were heightened by a knowledge of the perils of his friends, and the tortures of a long suspense, follow this brilliant period like an eclipse; lightened only by the heroic exertions of Clémence de Maillé for the rescue of her husband, as admirable and as successful at last, and as worthy of praise, as his ingratitude and cold neglect, and final abandonment of her, are worthy of censure and odium. The release and rebellion of the hero; his brilliant exploits at the head of the Spanish armies, beginning with the siege of Arras, and ending with the battle of the Downs; the final peace of the Pyrenees, and his restoration to court confidence and favor, merited by his last campaigns, fought, like his first, for the glory of France, complete the catalogue of the achievements and vicissitudes of his life. The Gascon was not so far from the truth, who, when the penurious Duke d'Enghien, (Condé's son,) offered a reward of a thousand crowns for the best inscription on the victories of his father, presented the following: "Pour célébrer tant de vertus. After so turbulent a career, the retirement of Chantilly was to Condé an Elysium of repose. By a secret article in the Treaty of the Pyrenees, it had been stipulated that these domains should be given up to the king upon his paying a just compensation for their value; and Louis XIV., whose liking for Chantilly was almost as great as that of Condé himself, once asserted his rights, and threatened to dispossess his favorite. "Sire," said Condé, "You are the master, but I have a favor to ask of your majesty-it is to leave me at Chantilly as your bailiff!" The king understood the answer, and had the generosity and good sense to give up his claim. After this, he visited the veteran in his retreat. The fêtes in honor of this mark of royal condescension, are recorded as displays of unrivalled magnificence, worthy of description as minute and glowing as that in which Scott has immortalized the Elizabethan festivities of Kenilworth. During their progress, occurred the well-known catastrophe of Vatel, the most heroic of cooks. The story is well told by Madame de Sévigné, and deserves a record as one of the most authentic of the memorabilia of Chantilly. "The king arrived at Chantilly on Thursday evening; the promenade and the collation served in spots carpetted with jonquils-all this went off perfectly. They supped; there were several tables at which the roast was wanting, in consequence of more dinners being required than had been expected. This had a great effect upon Vatel. He exclaimed several times, My honor is gone! Here is an affront which I cannot bear!" He said to Gourville, My head swims; for twelve nights I have not slept; pray assist me in giving the orders.' Gourville consoled him as well as he could. The roast which had been wanting, not at the king's ble, but at the twenty-fifth, was always recurring to his thoughts. Gourville informed Monsieur le Prince of his state of mind. Monsieur le Prince went as far as Vatel's own chamber, and said to him, Vatel, all is going on well; nothing could be finer than the king's supper.' Monseigneur, replied he, 'your kindness overpowers me. I know that the roast was wanting at two of the tables.' Not at all,' said the prince; 'all is going on perfectly well; do not distress yourself." Midnight comes. The fireworks did not succeed; they are covered by a cloud; they cost sixteen thousand francs. At four o'clock in the morning, Vatel goes about everywhere; he finds every one asleep; he meets a little boy who is bringing two loads of sea-fish; he inquires of him, Is this all?' Yes, sir,' replied the other, not knowing that Vatel had sent to all the sea-port towns. Vatel waits some time; the other purveyors do not come: he becomes wildly excited; he thinks there will be no further supply: he finds Gourville, and says to him, Sir, I shall never survive this affront.' Gourville laughs at him. Vatel goes up to his room, places his sword against the door, and runs it through his heart; but it was only at the third stroke, for he gave himself two which were not mortal; he falls to the ground dead. The sea-fish, however, arrive from all sides; Vatel is wanted to distribute them; they go to his room; they knock; they break open the door; they find him bathed in his own blood; they rush to the prince, who is in despair. * * * He mentions it mournfully to the king; they say it is to be attributed to too high a sense of honor, according to his views; they applaud his character; some praise, and others blame his courage."* After this royal visit, there was little to disturb the quiet of Chantilly during the last years of Condé's life. On his death, which happened the 11th of December, 1686, his son, the Duke d'Enghien, became its proprietor. He enlarged and embellished the Petit Chateau, which stood at a little distance from the Grand Chateau, and still remains. It is by no means insignificant in its proportions, notwithstanding its appellation, which was given it only to distinguish it from its larger neighbor. It is surrounded by the waters of a little lake, in whose clear depths its quaint, elaborate architecture is fancifully reflected. The old state rooms in the interior look rather dingy and desolate, but there are many souvenirs of Condé still remaining to give them an interest, apart from their carving. and gilding, and Louis Quatorze furniture. Of these the most conspicuous is the great ivory hilted sword of the hero, a weapon of most formidable dimensions, a silent memento, not only of the courage of Condé, but of the daring and chivalry of centuries. In the long gallery of pictures, representing the exploits of the great Condé, is a curious one, of which Lord Mahon gives the history, as follows: "The Duke d'Enghien did not choose to omit in the pictures, which by his orders were painted, representing the history of his father, any of the great actions which Condé had performed at the head of the Spanish armies. On the other hand, he would not venture to expose to the eyes of all France, the exploits which had been directed against herself. The painter could not find any means for reconciling the wishes of the Duke with his scruples. Enghien himself, supplied a very happy device for this object. The Muse of History is represented as tearing with indignation, and flinging far from her, the leaves of a book which she holds in her hands. On these leaves are written, the Relief of Cambray; - the Relief of Valenciennes, -the Retreat from before Arras;'-while in the centre of the picture Condé is seen to stand, using all his efforts to impose silence on Fame, who, with a trumpet in her hand, persists in publishing his other exploits against France." Chantilly is now, (or was, before the Revolution of February,) the property of the Duke d'Aumale, the third son of Lonis Philippe. In a suite of apartments, fitted up in the utmost luxuriance and comfort which modern taste could devise, contrasting strangely with the bare splendor of the old saloons and galleries, hang the trophies of the present heroic proprietor, won in the bloody Algerian campaigns, and exhibited by way of set-off against the more ponderous relics of the great captain. The enthusiastic tourist contemplates in close proximity the sabre of Condé and the pistols and holsters of Monsieur le duc d'Aumale! The present ownership of Chantilly is a mystery. How came this fair domain, with all its souvenirs of greatness, its precious heir-looms of more than royal worth, into the hands of an uncongenial and remote possessor? the wealth of a Condé the inheritance of a younger son of the house of Orleans, a bourgeois duke, the son of an accidental king? The answer to this question involves a dark enigma, difficult to solve, perhaps never to be solved, and a story of calamity, perhaps of crime. A story, whose * Letter of Madame de Sévigné, of April 26, 1671. (Mahon's Life of Condé, ii., 123. 124.) 1 sombre details, its minutiæ of certain horror and conjectural guilt, fit it to be told in the deepest recesses of the tangled forest, that within sight of the grand château lists its dark crest against the sky. There, in some wild solitude, cavernous with damp shade, and spectral with misshapen forms of nature, might be whispered the tale which I am about to relate, and which includes the tragic catastrophe of the house of Condé, and shows the title deeds of Chantilly, as many think, stained with the blood of an innocent victim. LOUIS JOSEPH HENRI DE BOURBON, Prince de Condé, the last of the Condés, was born at Paris the 13th of April, 1756. His father, a zealous supporter of the throne and its prerogatives, still survived when the Revolution of '90 made a prisoner of the King and vagabonds of the noblesse. Both father and son emigrated. The latter fought on the side of legitimacy, and during the campaign of '93 was wounded at the attack of Berscheim. In 1800 he went to England, and there awaited the Restoration. During this interval of exile, he received, in 1804, the news of the cruel condemnation and execution of his only son, the Duke d'Enghien, that unfortunate youth, the memory of whose tragic fate hangs like a curse over the dark walls and ramparts of Vincennes. It was thus that this unhappy man witnessed the extinction of his race, and foresaw, in his own death, the end of the most illustrious branch of the Bourbons. On returning to France, his estates and rank were restored, and the aged prince divided his residence between his hotel in Paris, and his châteaux at St. Leu and Chantilly, living in quiet and inaction, taking no part in the politics of the day, or in publie affairs of any sort. Upon this life of tranquillity and repose, broke the storm of the Revolution of 1830. The old man, a royalist at heart, and whose whole career had borne witness to his loyalty, but now infirm and inactive, was unequal in this crisis, even to an avowal of his opinions; he was uncertain, undecided, irresolute, and the people had conquered and the King fled, before he had recovered from the first surprising and confusing shock. But not entirely owing to the feebleness of age or the listlessness of ennui was his irresolution. In spite of the facts that " an Orleans had voted for the death of Louis XVI., and another Orleans had fought under the flag of Dumouriez," he had become strangely bound, against his inclinations and contrary to the whole spirit of his life, to this family, the descendants of the abhorred Egalité, whom the events of July and the ruin of the Bourbons were to make sovereign. The affections of Condé were in the right place, for we must still reckon amongst the virtues the loyalty that endures reproach, and survives disgrace; his sympathies were with the dethroned monarch and his abandoned family: the name of Charles X. brought sadness to his heart, and tears to his eyes, and the mournful exclamation to his lips-" I have lived long enough; to behold two Revolutions-it is too much!" But destiny, often two-fold, held him in fetters of necessity from open opposition to the new dynasty; paralyzed his purposes; defeated his will; and the last of the Condés, whose place in the moment of danger was at the side of his king, was chained to a spiritless inaction through the artful intrigues of a cunning and unscrupulous woman. For a long time the old Prince de Condé had been governed by that absolute and tyrannical sway which commences in the abandonment of passion, and is fixed by the force of habit. The Baronesse de Feuchères, a woman of rare beauty, ready wit, and a resolute spirit, had obtained this empire over * In the narrative that follows, I have drawn largely from the details given in the Causes Celebres in the case of Madame de Feuchères; and also from the Histoire des Dix Ans. by Louis Blanc, who devotes the greater part of a chapter to the investigation of this mysterious affair, Vol. ii p. 25. In his affections and his will. Of English parents, but of obscure and doubtful origin, from a second or third rate actress at Covent Garden, she had risen to this position of fortune and influence. Such instances are not rare. our own day we have seen a ballet dancer hissed from the boards of the Grand Opera, to reappear the reigning star of the most refined court of the continent. Failing of the applauses of the pit, by some brilliant coups d'essai, these meritless daughters of the stage captivate the hearts of princes, and usurp the prerogatives of queens. The Baronesse de Feuchères was one of the most successful, and wiser than many of her class. Not unmindful of the fickleness of passion, and the caprices of fortune, she had turned to the best account the complaisance of her lover. A legacy of the domains of Saint Leu and Boissy, in 1824, and of various other sums in the next year, amounting in the whole to a million of francs, were the substantial proofs of his regard. But the limit of the baroness' expectations was not reached by this princely munificence. The revenues of the Forest of Enghien, besides other estates, of greater or less value, were the next demands upon the resources and the good nature of her lover. But in the midst of this successful career, a small but threatening cloud appeared on the horizon of her prospects. The Princes de Roban, the next heirs of the Duke de Bourbon, already looked with a jealous eye on the rapid encroachments which this ambitious woman was making upon their vested rights. Little by little, the inheritance of the Condés was being shorn of some of its most lucrative dependencies, and bid fair to come down despoiled of its most substantial features. The opposition of these expectant heirs to the validity of the legacies in her favor was too apparent an intention to escape the notice of the baroness. Forewarned she was forearmed. A woman, a coquette, an intrigante; with wit, and an established position, and still unwasted charms, she was not easily to be driven from the field by these opponents, whose rights were all contingent, and whose resources were only in expectancy. She sat about devising means for her permanent security. What were these means and what their success, we shall presently see. Between the Duke de Bourbon and the Duke of Orleans, Louis Philippe, (Comte de Neuilly of the present date, ci-devant Roi des Français,) there existed little sympathy or friendship. The latter was separated from his kinsman by virtue of his dissimilar career, and his opposite ideas, associations and expectations, and a formal intercourse only was maintained between the two families. As to Madame de Feuchères, she was not so much as received at the Palais Royal, the residence of Louis Philippe. Scrupulous in the practice of domestic virtues, this irreproachable père de famille had regarded as a scandal her unconcealed ascendency at the little court of St. Leu, and had refused to admit her into the correct, though punctilious circle of which he was the centre. But of what avail are the rules of a conventional morality against the considerations of absorbing interest? This same Madame de Feuchères, frowned on and repulsed in 1822, excluded fron, the saloons of the Palais Royal, or the less restrained familiarities of Neuilly, becomes, in 1829, the friend and confidante of the exemplary Duke, and the pious Duchess of Orleans! The paths that seemed so widely separated before, suddenly unite, and the formidable differences of rank are merged in a common ambition. The explanation of this riddle is easy. Alarmed by the apprehensions alluded to, and anxious to guaranty her doubtful expectations, and provide against fatal emergencies, no safer or wiser plan could be devised than that to which Madame de Feuchères had recourse. It was nothing less than this: to secure the favor of the most influential family in France, and their strong support of her interests, in the nature of |