George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 7, 4th edition.

[32] swords for precedence in a dance at court, than to

Chap. I.} 1774. May.

protect the honor of their future queen. From her arrival in France, Marie Antoinette was hated by the opponents of the Austrian alliance; and even while she was receiving the homage of the court during her first years at Versailles, a faction in the highest ranks calumniated her artless impulsiveness as the evidence of crime.

On this scene of a degenerate nobility and popular distress; of administrative corruptness and ruined finances; of a brave but luxurious army and a slothful navy; of royal authority, unbounded, unquestioned, and yet despised; of rising deference to public opinion in a nation thoroughly united and true to its nationality, Louis the Sixteenth, while not yet twenty years old, entered as king. When, on the tenth of May, 1774, he and the still younger Marie Antoinette were told that his grandfather was no more, they threw themselves on their knees, crying, ‘We are too young to reign;’ and prayed God to direct their inexperience. The city of Paris was delirious with joy at their accession. ‘It is our paramount wish to make our people happy,’ was the language of the first edict of the new absolute prince. ‘He excels in writing prose,’ said Voltaire, on reading the words of promise; ‘he seems inspired by Marcus Aurelius; he desires what is good and does it. Happy they, who, like him, are but twenty years old, and will long enjoy the sweets of his reign.’ Caron de Beaumarchais, the sparkling dramatist and restless plebeian adventurer, made haste to solicit the royal patronage of his genius for intrigue. ‘Is there,’ said he through De Sartine, the head of the police, ‘any ’