How amusing are the descriptions of these _entrées de ballet_, circumstantially bequeathed us by the memoirs of the regency of Anne of Austria! The cardinal himself took part in them; but the chief performers were the young King, his brother Gaston d'Orleans, and the maids of honour, figuring as Apollo and the Muses, or Hamadryads adoring some sylvan divinity. Who has not sympathized in the joy of Madame de Sevigné, at seeing her fair daughter exhibit among the _coryphées_! Who has not felt interested in the _jetées_ and _pas de bourrées_ of the _ancien régime_, when accomplished at court by Condés, Contis, Montpensiers, Montmorencys, Rohans, Guises! The Marquis de Dangeau first recommended himself to the favour of the royal master whose courts he was destined to journalize for posterity, by the skill of his _pas de basques_; and long before the all but conjugal influence of the lovely La Vallière commenced over the heart of the _grand monarque_, his early love, and more especially his passion for the beautiful niece of the Cardinal, may be traced to the rehearsals and _rondes de jambes_ of Maitz and Fontainbleau. The reign of Madame de Maintenon (_la raison même_) over his affections, declared itself by the sudden transfer of a ballet-opera, expressly composed by Rameau and Quinault for the beauties of the court, to the public theatre of the Palais Royal. No more noble figurantes at Versailles! Louis le Pirouettiste's occupation was gone; and the _maître des ballets du roi_ arrayed himself in sackcloth and ashes. But, lo! the glories of his throne took wing with the loves and graces; ballets and victories being effaced on the same page from the annals of his reign. During the minority of Louis XV., the same royal dansomania was renewed. The regent, Duke of Orleans, entertained the same notions of kingly education, on this head, as his predecessor the cardinal; and Louis _le Bien-aimé_, like his great-grandfather before him, was the best dancer of his realm. Such dancing as it was! such exquisite footing! In the upper story of the grand gallery at Versailles, hang several pictures representing these court ballets; Cupids in coatees of pink lustring, with silver lace and tinsel wings, wearing full-bottomed wigs and the riband of the St Esprit; or Venuses in hoops and powder, whose _minauderies_ might afford a lesson to the divinities of our own day for the benefit of the omnibus box.