Carlos (the future Charles III.), who, on his side, did not forget her. Possibly a means of renewing their engagement might have been found. But the young girl died in 1734, carrying her faithful regret with her to the tomb. She was not yet twenty. The rupture of the marriage of Louis XV. was not a fortunate event. The Prince was only fifteen years old. He might easily have waited several years longer before marrying. His studies and his energy would both have been the gainers by it. Moreover, it was an evil thing to insult a great nation like Spain. It was not alone the Spanish people that were outraged, but the glorious memory of the Infanta’s great-grandfather, the grand King who had said: “There are no more Pyrenees.” A fatal lesson was given to the young sovereign when he was thus taught to violate sworn faith, and habituated from his adolescence to those culpable caprices, those egotistic desertions of which his reign was to afford more than one example. II THE MARRIAGE OF MARIE LECZINSKA In the year 1725, a poor exiled king and his family were living in a dilapidated old commandery in Wissemburg, a little town of Alsace. This king without a kingdom, this fugitive who dignified his poverty by the resignation with which he endured misfortune, was the Pole, Stanislas Leczinski, the protégé of Charles XII. of Sweden. Driven from Poland after a very short reign, Stanislas had found an asylum in France, and lived in Wissemburg in complete retirement with his mother, his wife, his daughter, and several gentlemen who had been faithful to him in misfortune. His daughter, Marie, born in Breslau, June 23, 1703, was at this time twenty-two years old. Pious, gentle, and sympathetic, she was the joy of the exiles. When they spoke to her of projected marriages, she would say to her parents: “Do not think you can make me happy by sending me away; it would be far sweeter to me to share your ill-fortune than to enjoy, at a distance, a happiness which would not be yours.” Her education had been as intelligent as it was austere. She spent the time not occupied in prayer and study in working for the poor of the city or embroidering ornaments for churches. She was a true Christian, one of those admirable young girls whose charm has in it something evangelic, and who make virtue lovable.