new position, on which she was about to enter, would be full of nothing
but glory and happiness, it was inevitable that they should be, as they
were, deeply agitated at so complete a separation. And, if we may believe
the testimony of witnesses who were at Vienna at the time,[3] the grief of
the mother, who was never to see her child again, was shared not only by
the members of the imperial household, whom constant intercourse had
enabled to know and appreciate her amiable qualities, but by the
population of the capital and the surrounding districts, all of whom had
heard of her numerous acts of kindness and benevolence, which, young as
she was, many of them had also experienced, and who thronged the streets
along which she passed on her departure, mingling tears of genuine sorrow
with their acclamations, and following her carriage to the outermost gate
of the city that they might gaze their last on the darling of many hearts.

Kehl was the last German town through which she was to pass, Strasburg was
the first French city which was to receive her, and, as the islands which
dot the Rhine at that portion of the noble boundary river were regarded as
a kind of neutral ground, the French monarch had selected the principal
one to be occupied by a pavilion built for the purpose and decorated with
great magnificence, that it might serve for another stage of the wedding
ceremony. In this pavilion she was to cease to be German, and was to
become French; she was to bid farewell to her Austrian attendants, and to
receive into her service the French officers of her household, male and
female, who were to replace them. She was even to divest herself of every
article of her German attire, and to apparel herself anew in garments of
French manufacture sent from Paris. The pavilion was divided into two
compartments. In the chief apartment of the German division, the Austrian
officials who had escorted her so far formally resigned their charge, and
surrendered her to the Comte de Noailles, who had been appointed
embassador extraordinary to receive her; and, when all the deeds necessary