Diary of the times of Charles II/Volume 1/Mr. Savile to Mr. Sidney, August 28
MR. SAVILE[1] TO MR. SIDNEY.
I was at St. Germains the last post day, and am just now going to Fontainbleau, which are the reasons why I shall write short now. This King and Court went thither on Saturday, and Thursday next will be the ceremony of the marriage, which will be in every thing else splendid to the same degree of my being in clothes of two hundred pistoles. This may make you laugh, but it makes me cry, and lament that I am not in the modest garb of the head of my family, a plain band.
The last news-book tells you of the death of the Cardinal de Retz; and the next will tell you, that the Princess Sophia, known by the name of Duchess of Osnaburgh, is arrived at Maubuisson, with her sister: where Madame immediately went to see her, and the reception did favour more of the heartiness of Germany than the gentleness of France. This day is expected here the Duke of Pastrana; he makes his entry at Fontainbleau, on the 8th of the next month. Sir Harry Gotherick came hither last Saturday, and will stay but two days before he pursue his journey towards Madrid, to be there before the hurry of that Court's setting out to meet their new Queen disturb the gravity of his march. Fail not to pity my suffering self, in the midst of all the gaudy fools I shall see for a fortnight before my return hither. In the mean time, what is either worth your entertainment or your information, I shall send you from thence.
If the report of this King's setting out thirty or forty sail of ships be got as far as you, you may comfort yourself it was only an alarum to fright the Danes into that peace which we count upon here as concluded; Monsieur Mayer Groom being, I am told, resolved to sign all that will be offered him the last of this month, and prepared to agree to the matter of Holstein, as it is required here. Colonel Macarty is come here for his pleasure; I wish his stay may be for mine. Colonel Algernon is, I hear, chosen a Member of Parliament: I did not think I should ever have so good a reason to wish to be so too, as to hear how he will behave himself. Farther news from hence there is none, and so I take my leave of you, wishing you a thousand happinesses.
- ↑ Ambassador at Paris. The marriage he alludes to in this letter was that of Marie Louise d'Orleans, the daughter of Philip of Orleans, whom the Marquis de Los Balbazos came to demand in the name of his master, the King of Spain, "Cet Ambassadeur fit son entrée publique à Paris le 11 de Juin, et reçut ensuite son audience du Roi à St. Germain en Laye avec les cérémonies accoutumées. Ayant obtenu sa demande, le mariage fut célébré au mois d'Aout dans la grande chapelle du château, où le Cardinal de Bouillon en fit la bénédiction. Le Roi et la Reine et toute la Cour y assisterent, et la fête dura plusieurs jours."—Mezeray's Hist. de France, iv. 400.