It is needless to add that Hélène’s nurse, Mademoiselle Bathilde Toutevoix, took part in the festivities. She adorned her pretty mistress to the very best of her ability, and the poor girl’s head was so completely turned with joy that she even forgot her cockades.[7] She came down to the parlour after the bride, and modestly hid herself in a corner. Prince Charles approached her, and slipped into her hand his wedding present--an annuity of six hundred livres.[8] Hélène was much touched with this attention. “I thanked him,” she says, “by a smile and pressure of the hand, the first I had granted him.” The bride was led to the altar by her uncle, and by the Marquise Wielopolska, who took the place of her mother. The Duchesses de Choiseul, de Mortemart, de Châtillon, de la Vallière, etc., were present at the ceremony. The young Princess, exquisitely lovely in her bridal dress, fully satisfied the company by her “decent attitude, which was full of feeling” (style of that day). After receiving the congratulations of the brilliant assembly, Hélène went up to her apartment to change her costume; but, instead of returning immediately to the parlour, she quickly made her way to the choir chapel, where Madame de Rochechouart was buried, and kneeling on the tomb of the one who had been to her as a mother, she offered up to God her last girlish prayer. When she returned to the parlour she was rather pale, and her eyes showed signs of tears; but at the gates of the Abbey a post-chaise, drawn by six chafing horses, was awaiting; the postilions, in the pink and silver livery of the Prince, being scarcely able to hold them; Hélène, after a rapid farewell, was hurried into the carriage by her young husband, and they started at full gallop for Brussels. FOOTNOTES: [1] One thousand pounds sterling. [2] The Comte de Horn, a connection of the Regent through his mother, the Princess-Palatine, was condemned to death for murder. The family implored his pardon, appealing to the Regent on the ground of relationship. “When I have bad blood,” the Regent coldly replied, “I have it drawn,” and the pardon was refused. It is probable that they boasted to Hélène of the connection between the Horn and Orléans families without mentioning the Count’s crime. [3] Bel Œil was the summer residence of the Princes de Ligne, and will often be referred to later on. [4] Twelve hundred pounds sterling. [5] Large diamond earrings that were worn with the Court dress.