He is said to have been such a smart journeyman blacksmith, that he might, if Fate had not perversely placed a crown on his head, have earned a couple of louis every week by the making of locks and keys. Those who will, may see the workshop where he employed many useful hours; Madame Elizabeth was at prayers; meanwhile, the Queen was making pleasant parties with her ladies; Monsieur the Count d’Artois was learning to dance on the tight-rope; and Monsieur de Provence was cultivating _l’eloquence du billet_ and studying his favourite Horace. It is said that each member of the august family succeeded remarkably well in his or her pursuits: big Monsieur’s little notes are still cited. At a minuet or sillabub, poor Antoinette was unrivalled; and Charles, on the tight-rope, was so graceful and so _gentil_, that Madame Saqui might envy him. The time only was out of joint. Oh, cursed spite, that ever such harmless creatures as these were bidden to right it! A walk to the Little Trianon is both pleasing and moral: no doubt the reader has seen the pretty fantastical gardens which environ it; the groves and temples; the streams and caverns (whither, as the guide tells you, during the heat of summer, it was the custom of Marie Antoinette to retire, with her favourite, Madame de Lamballe): the lake and Swiss village are pretty little toys, moreover; and the cicerone of the place does not fail to point out the different cottages which surround the piece of water, and tell the names of the Royal masqueraders who inhabited each. In the long cottage close upon the lake dwelt the Seigneur du Village, no less a personage than Louis XV.; Louis XVI., the Dauphin, was the Bailli; near his cottage is that of Monseigneur the Count d’Artois, who was the Miller; opposite lived the Prince de Condé, who enacted the part of Gamekeeper (or, indeed, any other _rôle_, for it does not signify much); near him was the Prince de Roham, who was the Aumônier; and yonder is the pretty little dairy, which was under the charge of the fair Marie Antoinette herself.