"
Rupert naturally declared at once for the journey to Paris.
Officers on parole were in those days treated with great courtesy,
especially if they happened to have a powerful friend. He therefore
looked forward to a pleasant stay in Paris, and to a renewal of his
acquaintance with Adele, and to a sight of the glories of
Versailles, which, under Louis XIV, was the gayest, the most
intellectual, and the most distinguished court of Europe.
Louis XIV could not be termed a good man, but he was unquestionably
a great king. He did much for France, whose greatness and power he
strove to increase; and yet it was in no slight degree owing to his
policy that, seventy years later, a tempest was to burst out in
France, which was to sweep away the nobility and the crown itself;
which was to deluge the soil of France with its best blood, to
carry war through Europe, and to end at last by the prostration of
France beneath the feet of the nations to whom she had been a
scourge.
The tremendous efforts made by Louis XIV to maintain the Spanish
succession, which he had secured for France; the draining of the
land of men; and the impoverishing of the nobles, who hesitated at
no sacrifices and efforts to enable the country to make head
against its foes, exhausted the land; while the immense
extravagance of the splendid court in the midst of an impoverished
land, ruined not only by war, but by the destruction of its trade,
by the exile of the best and most industrious of its people on
account of their religion, caused a deep and widespread discontent
throughout the towns and country of France.
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