Thus, amid trials which renewed themselves daily, the months passed
by. The queen had no longer any hope. She had given up every thing,
even the hope of an honorable end, of a death such as becomes a
queen, proud and dignified beneath the ruins of a palace laid low by
an exasperated populace. She knew that the king would never bring
himself to meet such a death, that his weakness would yield to all
humiliation, and his good-nature resist all measures that might
perhaps bring help. She had sought in vain to inspire him with her
zeal. Louis was a good man, but a bad king; his was not a nature to
rule and govern, but rather to serve as the scape-goat for the sins
of his fathers, and to fall as a victim for the misdeeds which his
ancestors had committed, and through which they had excited the
wrath of the people, the divine Nemesis that never sleeps.
The queen knew and felt this, and this knowledge lay like a mourning
veil over her whole thought and being, filling her at times with a
moody resignation, and at times with a swiftly-kindling and wrathful
pain.
"I am content that we be the victims," cried she, wringing her
hands, "but I cannot bear to think that my children too are to be
punished for what they have not committed."
This thought of her children was the pillar which always raised the
queen up again, when the torture of her daily life cast her to the
ground.
Pages:
452
453
454
455
456
457
458
459
460
461
462
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476