One winter’s morning, Marie Antoinette, who was partially disrobed, was just about to put on her body linen. The lady-in-waiting held it ready unfolded for her. The _dame d’honneur_ entered. Etiquette demanded that she should present the robe. Hastily slipping off her gloves, she took the garment, but at that moment a rustling was heard at the door. It was opened, and in came Madame la Duchesse d’Orleans. She must now be the bearer of the garment. But the laws of etiquette would not allow the _dame d’honneur_ to hand the linen directly to Madame la Duchesse. It must pass down the various grades of rank to the lowest, and by her be presented to the highest. The linen was consequently passed back again from one to another, till it was finally placed in the hands of the duchess. She was just upon the point of conveying it to its proper destination, when suddenly the door opened, and the Comtesse de Provence entered. Again the linen passed from hand to hand until it reached Madame la Comtesse. She, perceiving the uncomfortable position of the queen, who sat shivering with cold, without stopping to remove her gloves, placed the linen upon her shoulders. Her Majesty, however, was quite unable to restrain her impatience, and exclaimed, “How disagreeable, how tiresome!” Such was the etiquette of the court of Versailles, and its inexorable rules governed alike every action in the lives of the king and queen, while the cavaliers and _grandes dames_ observed with the greatest minuteness every punctilio of _la grande politesse et la grande galanterie_, that by so doing they might widen the gulf already existing between them and the new ideas of _liberté_ and _égalité_ which were beginning to pervade the realm. “You love flowers; I give you a bouquet of them by offering you Le Petit Trianon entirely for your own private use. There you may reign sole mistress; for the Trianons, by right, belong to you, having always been the residence of the favorites of the kings of France.” For Louis XVI. this speech was a great effort of gallantry. It delighted Marie Antoinette. Here, then, was that for which she had so often longed; a place to which she could retire from the cares of state, and throw aside the pomps and punctilios of etiquette. She loved not the grand old gardens of Versailles, with their terraces and clipped yews. She would have an English garden of the day, with its thickets, waterfalls, and rustic bridges, such as the Prince de Ligny had made at _Bel-œil_ and the Marquis de Caraman at Roissy. _Le grand simple_ is to take the place of _le grand magnifique_, and attired in white muslin, with a a plain straw hat, and followed by a single attendant, the queen roams through the gardens and groves of the Petit Trianon. Through the lanes and byways she chases the butterfly, picks flowers free as a peasant girl, and leaning over the fences, chats with the country maids as they milk the cows.