long for the others to grow up. The match was entirely suitable, and was taken under favorable consideration by the bridegroom's family; but when it occurred to the duke to mention the matter to his wife, he found opposition where it was least expected. Madame d'Ayen absolutely refused her consent. These two were quite apt to hold different views. The husband liked the luxury of the court and chuckled over its shams. His wife, on the contrary, was of a most serious turn of mind and had very little sense of humor. The frivolities of court life really shocked her. She looked upon riches as a burden, and fulfilled the social duties of her position only under protest as part of that burden. The one real joy of her life lay in educating her daughters. She studied the needs of their differing natures. She talked with them much more freely than was then the custom, and did all in her power to make of them women who could live nobly at court and die bravely when and wherever their time came.

She had no fault to find with young Lafayette. Her opposition was a matter of theory and just a little selfish, for her married life had not been happy enough to make her anxious to see her girls become wives of even the best young men. As for this Motier lad, she thought him particularly open to temptation because of his youth and loneliness and great wealth. He had lacked the benefit of a father's training. So, for that matter, had her own children. Their father was almost always away from home.

The duke's airy manner hid a persistent spirit, and, in spite of his worldliness, he esteemed the good character of the boy. The discussion lasted almost a year and developed into the most serious quarrel of their married life. No wonder, under the circumstances, that the duke did not, as his daughter expressed it, "like his home." The little girls knew something was wrong, and shared their mother's unhappiness without guessing the cause. The duke's acquaintances, on the other hand, to whom the cause was no secret, looked upon the contest of wills as a comedy staged for their benefit. One of them said in his hearing that no woman of Madame d'Ayen's strength of character, who had gone so far in refusal, would ever consent to the marriage. At this the duke warmly rushed to the defense of his wife and answered that a woman of her character, once convinced that she was wrong, would give in completely and utterly.

That was exactly what happened. After months of critical observation she found herself liking Lafayette better and better. The duke assured her that the marriage need not take place for two years, and that meantime the young man should continue his studies. She gave her consent and took the motherless boy from that moment into her heart; while the little girls, sensitive to the home atmosphere, felt the joy of reconciliation without even yet knowing how nearly it concerned them.

It was decided among the elders that Adrienne, the second daughter, was to become Madame Lafayette, because the young Vicomte de Noailles, a cousin to whom Louise had been partial from babyhood, had made formal proposals for her hand. This cousin was a friend and schoolfellow of Lafayette's, and during the next few months the youths were given the opportunity of meeting their future wives apparently by chance while out walking, and even under the roof of the duke; but for a year nothing was said to the girls about marriage. Their mother did not wish to have their minds distracted from their lessons or from that important event in the lives of Catholic maidens, their first communion.

Two months before her marriage actually took place Louise was told that she was to be the bride of Noailles; and at the time of that wedding Adrienne was informed of the fate in store for her. She found nothing whatever to question in this. It seemed altogether delightful, and far simpler than deciding about the state of her own soul. The truth was that her heart had already begun to feel that love for Gilbert de Motier which was to grow and become the controlling factor of her life. Girl-like, her head was just a little turned by the momentous news of her engagement. Her mother tried to allay her excitement, but she also took care to let Adrienne know how much she liked the young man and to repeat to her all the good things she had found out about him. And to her joy, Adrienne found that Lafayette felt for the elder lady "that filial affection" which also grew as the years went on.

How he felt about marriage as the day approached we do not know; neither do we know the details of the wedding which must have been celebrated with some splendor on the 11th of April, 1774. The bride was not yet fifteen, the groom was sixteen. He was given leave of absence from his regiment, and the newly wedded pair took up their residence in the wonderful Paris home of Adrienne's family, the Hotel de Noailles. Although not far from the Tuileries, in the very heart of the city, it possessed a garden so large that a small hunt could be carried on in it, with dogs and all. John Adams is authority for this. He visited the Lafayettes there some time later, and found it unbelievably vast and splendid.

III
A NEW KING

Less than a month after their marriage these young people were dressed in black, as was all the rest of fashionable Paris. The gay spring season had been brought to a premature and agitated end by the news that the king lay dead of smallpox, the loathsome disease he most dreaded.

Smallpox was distressingly common in those days before vaccination had been discovered; but courageous people protected themselves against it even then by deliberately contracting the disease from a mild case and allowing it to run its course under the best possible conditions. It was found to be much less deadly in this way, though the patients often became very ill, and it required real courage to submit to it.

The old king had never been at all brave. He feared discomfort in this life almost as much as he dreaded hell in the next; so he had fled the disease instead of courting it, and in time it came to have special terrors for him. He had been riding through the April woods with a hunting party and had come upon a sad little funeral procession—a very humble one. Always curious, he stopped the bearers and asked who they were carrying to the grave. "A young girl, your Majesty." The king's watery old eyes gleamed. "Of what did she die?" "Smallpox, Sire." In terrified anger the monarch bade them begone and bury the corpse deep; then he dismissed the hunt and returned to the palace. Two days later he was stricken. The disease ran its course with amazing virulence, as though taking revenge for his misspent life. Some of the courtiers fled from Versailles. Others, to whom the king's displeasure seemed a worse menace than smallpox, remained. His favorites tried to keep the truth from the public. Daily bulletins announced that he was getting better. When it was learned that he might die the people crowded the church of Ste.-Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris, kissing the reliquary and raising sobs and prayers for his recovery. When he died, on the 10th of May, his body was hastily covered with quicklime and conveyed, by a little handful of attendants who remained faithful, to St.-Denis, where the kings of France lie buried. It was done without ceremony in the dead of night. Forty days later his bones were laid in the tomb of his ancestors with all possible funeral pomp. There was decorous official mourning for the customary length of time; but the old king had never been an inspiring figure and most of his subjects were secretly glad he was out of the way.

During July and August of that