magnificence as to allow of inviting strangers to them; and almost all the
visitors from Paris were boarded at the expense of the Court.

The personal frugality of the unfortunate Prince who sank beneath the
weight of the national debts thus favoured the Queen's predilection for
her Petit Trianon; and for five or six years preceding the Revolution the
Court very seldom visited Marly.

The King, always attentive to the comfort of his family, gave Mesdames,
his aunts, the use of the Chateau de Bellevue, and afterwards purchased
the Princesse de Guemenee's house, at the entrance to Paris, for
Elisabeth. The Comtesse de Provence bought a small house at Montreuil;
Monsieur already had Brunoy; the Comtesse d'Artois built Bagatelle;
Versailles became, in the estimation of all the royal family, the least
agreeable of residences. They only fancied themselves at home in the
plainest houses, surrounded by English gardens, where they better enjoyed
the beauties of nature. The taste for cascades and statues was entirely
past.

The Queen occasionally remained a whole month at Petit Trianon, and had
established there all the ways of life in a chateau. She entered the
sitting-room without driving the ladies from their pianoforte or
embroidery. The gentlemen continued their billiards or backgammon without
suffering her presence to interrupt them. There was but little room in
the small Chateau of Trianon. Madame Elisabeth accompanied the Queen
there, but the ladies of honour and ladies of the palace had no
establishment at Trianon. When invited by the Queen, they came from
Versailles to dinner. The King and Princes came regularly to sup. A
white gown, a gauze kerchief, and a straw hat were the uniform dress of
the Princesses.