The Female Revolutionary Plutarch (Volume 3); Containing Biographical, Historical and Revolutionary Sketches, Characters and Anecdotes (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE DUCHESS OF ANGOULEME, THE DAUGHTER OF LOUIS XVI. MARIE Theresa Charlotte, Princess Royal of France, and Duchess of Angouleme, is the sole daughter and surviving child of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, King and Queen of France and Navarre. Her Royal Highness was born at Versailles on .the 19th of December 1778; and after being baptized, received the title of Madame, Fille du Roi, though the prevailing custom has been to call her Madame Royale. The Queen's pregnancy with this daughter, the first after a marriage of eight years, was announced to the inhabitants of Paris by an act tof beneficence truly pious and royal, and which Marie Antpinette often repeated in the course of her reign. She sent to the director of the office for wet nurses, a large sum of money to be employed in procuring the liberty of unfortunate parents,.parents, imprisoned for non-payment of the lebts contracted for their children. Prayers for her .Majesty were offered up in all parts of the kingdom ; and several companies, military, religious, and municipal, displayed their loyalty in acts of devotion and benevolence. After the Queen's delivery, the preyotg of the merchants, and" the municipal officers at Paris, subscribed and collected subscriptions -sufficient to release from,prison two hundred fathers of families con- iiaed for debt, and her Majesty herself distributed other charities in a manner no less interesting than engaging.. She caused to be selected ja hundred young omen,' poor, and of good character, froin the different'parishes in Paris, to each of whom she gave five hundred livres, as a marriage portion; two hundred livres to pm chase a suit of clothes for their husbands, and .twelve livres for a wedding dinner . Such benevolent actions, and such loyal and favourable occurrence...