Produced by David Widger
Being Secret Memoirs of Madame du Hausset,Lady's Maid to Madame de Pompadour,and of an unknown English Girland the Princess Lamballe
[From the time that the Princesse de Lamballe saw the ties between theQueen and her favourite De Polignac drawing closer she became lessassiduous in her attendance at Court, being reluctant to importune thefriends by her presence at an intimacy which she did not approve. Shecould not, however, withhold her accustomed attentions, as the period ofHer Majesty's accouchement approached; and she has thus noted thecircumstance of the birth of the Duchesse d'Angouleme, on the 19th ofDecember, 1778.]
"The moment for the accomplishment of the Queen's darling hope was now athand: she was about to become a mother.
"It had been agreed between Her Majesty and myself, that I was to placemyself so near the accoucheur, Vermond,
[Brother to the Abbe, whose pride was so great at this honour conferredon his relative, that he never spoke of him without denominating himMonsieur mon frere, d'accoucher de sa Majeste, Vermond.]
as to be the first to distinguish the sex of the new-born infant, and ifshe should be delivered of a Dauphin to say, in Italian, 'Il figlio enato.'
"Her Majesty was, however, foiled even in this the most blissful of herdesires. She was delivered of a daughter instead of a Dauphin.
"From the immense crowd that burst into the apartment the instant Vermondsaid, The Queen is happily delivered, Her Majesty was nearly suffocated.I had hold of her hand, and as I said 'La regina e andato', mistaking'andato' for 'nato', between the joy of giving birth to a son and thepressure of the crowd, Her Majesty fainted. Overcome by the dangeroussituation in which I saw my royal mistress, I myself was carried out ofthe room in a lifeless state. The situation of Her Majesty was for sometime very doubtful, till the people were dragged with violence from abouther, that she might have air. On her recovering, the King was the firstperson who told her that she was the mother of a very fine Princess.
"'Well, then,' said the Queen, 'I am like my mother, for at my birth shealso wished for a son instead of a daughter; and you have lost yourwager:' for the King had betted with Maria Theresa that it would be ason.
"The King answered her by repeating the lines Metastasio had written onthat occasion.
"'Io perdei: l'augusta figlia
A pagar, m'a condemnato;
Ma s'e ver the a voi somiglia
Tutto il moudo ha guadagnato.'"
[The Princesse de Lamballe again ceased to be constantly about the Queen.Her danger was over, she was a mother, and the attentions ofdisinterested friendship were no longer indispensable. She herself aboutthis time met with a deep affliction. She lost both of her own parents;and to her sorrows may, in a great degree, be ascribed her silence uponthe events which intervened between the birth of Madame and that of theDauphin. She was as assiduous as ever in her attentions to Her Majestyon her second lying-in. The circumstances of the death of Maria Theresa,the Queen's mother, in the interval which divided the two accouchements,and Her Majesty's anguish, and refusal to see any but De Lamballe and DePolignac, are too well known to detain us longer from the notes of thePrincess. It is enough for the reader to know that the friendship of HerMajesty for her superintendent seemed to