When the news reached the Duke of York that the ceremony had been performed, he was talking to a circle of friends in the drawing-room. "Then I am a married man!" he exclaimed, and that night sent word to his daughter, Mary "that he had provided a playfellow for her." The duke had given his ambassador instructions to bring his bride to England with as little parade and as few foreign attendants as possible; but she screamed and cried in such a way when preparations for her journey were being made that her mother was obliged to promise to accompany her to England, and her brother to go part of the way. Three Italian ladies of the highest rank were permitted among her bed-chamber appointments. They were Madame Molza, Madame Montecuculi, and her daughter, Anna, a young girl of seventeen. A lady named Turenie, who had been governess to the princess from her infancy, was added to the list also. These four ladies proved devoted friends, and followed Mary Beatrice throughout her life. It had been a trial for the young Duchess of York to bid farewell to her native place; but when, two days later, she had to part with the brother who shared her joys and sympathized with her sorrows almost from her cradle, her burden of grief seemed greater than she could bear. Forgetting the dignity that her station demanded, or the presence of the formidable array of English and Italian nobles, she remembered only that she was losing, perhaps forever, {250}the little brother whom she loved better than any one in the world. She pressed him to her heart again and again, and burst into an agony of tears when the youthful prince was led away. It was a consolation, at least, that her mother was to continue with her, and her mind was soon diverted by the welcome she received at the hands of the several princes of Italy, through whose dominions she passed with her attendants. On arriving at the French border the bridal train was met by officers of Louis XIV., who defrayed all the expenses, and conducted them to Paris. They were lodged at the Arsenal, and magnificently entertained. All that remains of this building shows what a splendid one it must have been, but the storms of revolution have passed over it and left it almost in ruins.