“_Fêtes magnifiques_” they were termed, from their surpassing in splendor anything witnessed in France since the days of _Louis le Grand_. For weeks the public rejoicings continued. On the 30th of May, they were to close with the _fête_ of the Ville de Paris, and in the evening a display of illuminations and fireworks on the Place Louis XV. (now the Place de la Concorde) which were to surpass all that had preceded them. Thousands of people filled the square and all the approaching avenues. Most unfortunately, through some mismanagement, the scaffolding supporting the fireworks took fire and burned rapidly. No means were at hand for extinguishing the flames, and the terror-stricken multitude rushed in all directions. Crushing upon each other, hundreds were suffocated by the pressure. Those that fell were trampled to death. Groans and screams, and frantic cries for help that none could render, filled the air. Nothing, in fact, could be done until the fire had burnt itself out, and the extent of the calamity was ascertained. The Dauphin and Dauphiness, distressed at so sad a disaster, gave their entire year’s allowance towards mitigating the misery that had fallen upon many poor people; and the “_fêtes magnifiques_,” with all their splendor and rejoicing, ending thus in “lamentation, mourning, and woe,” seem to have been, as it were, a foreshadowing of the career of her for whom they had been given,—the unfortunate Marie Antoinette. “It is the 10th of May, 1774,—a lovely evening following a bright spring day. The sun has sunk below the horizon; the brilliant hues of the western sky have faded into the dark shades of the advancing night, and the Château of Versailles, in its sombre grandeur, looms larger in the increasing gloom. On the terrace are saunterers in earnest conversation; carriages and horses and a throng of attendants in the marble court. A group of impatient pages, _écuyers_ booted and spurred, an escort of the household troops, eager for an order to mount,—all are watching, with anxious eyes, the flickering glare of a candle that faintly illumines the window of a chamber in the château.”