the end of her life, she lived at Claremont, where her charity and piety endeared her to the many English friends of the Orleans family. Marie Amélie died at Claremont, on the 24th of March 1866. See A. Trognon, _Vie de Marie Amélie_ (1872); A. L. Baron Imbert de St Amand, _La Jeunesse de Marie Amélie_ (1891), _Marie Amélie au Palais Royal_ (1892), _Marie Amélie et la cour de Palerme_ (1891), _Marie Amélie et la cour des Tuileries_ (1892), _Marie Amélie et l'apogée de règne de Louis Philippe_ (1893), _Marie Amélie et la société française en 1847_ (1894), and _Marie Amélie et la duchesse d'Orleans_ (1893). MARIE ANTOINETTE (1755-1793), queen of France, ninth child of Maria Theresa and the emperor Francis I., was born at Vienna, on the 2nd of November 1755. She was brought up under a simple and austere régime and educated with a view to the French marriage arranged by Maria Theresa, the abbé Vermond being appointed as her tutor in 1769. Her marriage with the dauphin, which took place at Versailles on the 16th of May 1770, was intended to crown the policy of Choiseul and confirm the alliance between Austria and France. This fact, combined with her youth and the extreme corruption of the French court, made her position very difficult. Madame du Barry, whose influence over Louis XV. was at that time supreme, formed the centre of a powerful anti-Choiseul cabal, which succeeded in less than a year after the dauphin's marriage in bringing about the fall of Choiseul and seriously threatening the stability of the Austrian alliance. Thus the young princess was surrounded by enemies both at court and in the dauphin's household, and came to rely almost entirely upon the Austrian ambassador, the comte de Mercy-Argenteau, whom Maria Theresa had instructed to act as her mentor, at the same time arranging that she herself should be kept informed of all that concerned her daughter, so that she might at once advise her and safeguard the alliance. Hence arose the famous secret correspondence of Mercy-Argenteau, an invaluable record of all the details of Marie Antoinette's life from her marriage in 1770 till the death of Maria Theresa in 1780. Marie Antoinette soon won the affection and confidence of the dauphin and endeared herself to the king, but her position was precarious, and both Mercy and Maria Theresa had continually to urge her to conquer her violent dislike for the favourite and try to conciliate her.