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Maurice of Saxony and Adrian LeCouvre. Volume 1 of Famous Affinities of History. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Famous Affinities of History by Lyndon Orr.

Volume 1. Maurice of Saxony and Adrian LeCouvre. It is an old saying that to every womanly woman self-sacrifice is almost a necessity of her nature. To make herself a small account as compared with the one she loves, to give freely of herself, even though she may receive nothing in return, to suffer, and yet to feel an inner poignant joy in all this suffering. Here is a most wonderful trait of womanhood. Perhaps it is akin to the maternal instinct, for to the mother, after she has felt the throb of a new life within her,

there is no sacrifice so great, and no anguish so keen, that she will not welcome it as the outward sign and evidence of her illimitable love. in most women this spirit of self-sacrifice is checked and kept within ordinary bounds by the circumstances of their lives in many small things they do yield and they do suffer yet it is not in yielding and in suffering that they find their deepest joy there are some however who seem to have been born with an abnormal capacity for enduring hardship and mental anguish so that by a sort of contradiction they find their happiness in sorrow such women are endowed with a remarkable degree of sensibility they feel intensely in moments of grief and disappointment and even of despair there steals over them a sort of melancholy pleasure it is as if they loved dim lights and mournful music and scenes full of sad suggestion if everything goes well with them they are unwilling to believe that such good fortune will last

if anything goes wrong with them they are sure that this is only the beginning of something even worse the music of their lives is written in a minor key now for such women as these the world at large has very little charity it speaks slightingly of them as agonizers it believes that they are fond of making scenes it regards as an affectation something that is really instinctive and inevitable unless such women are beautiful and young and charming they are treated badly and this is often true in spite of all their natural attractiveness for they seem to court ill usage as if they were saying frankly come take us we will give you everything and ask for nothing we do not expect true and enduring love do not be constant or generous or even kind we know that we shall suffer but none the less in our sorrow there will be sweetness and even in our abasement we shall feel a sort of triumph in history there is one woman who stands out conspicuously as a type of her melancholy sisterhood

one whose life was full of disappointment even when she was most successful and of indignity even when she was most sought after and admired this woman was adrian famous in the annals of the stage and still more famous in the annals of unrequited or at any rate unhappy love her story is linked with that of a man no less remarkable than herself a hero of chivalry a marvel of courage of fascination and of irresponsibility adrienne le couvre her name was originally couvre was born toward the end of the seventeenth century in the little french village of damery not far from rheims where her aunt was a laundress and her father a hatter in a small way of her mother who died in childbirth we know nothing but her father was a man of gloomy and ungovernable temper breaking out into violent fits of passion in one of which long afterward he died raving and yelling like a maniac adrian was brought up at the wash-top and became accustomed to a wandering life in which she went from one town to another

What she had inherited from her mother is, of course, not known. But she had all her father's strangely pessimistic temper, softened only by the fact that she was a girl. From her earliest years she was unhappy. Yet her unhappiness was largely of her own choosing.

Other girls of her own station met life cheerfully, worked away from dawn till dusk, and then had their moments of amusement and even jollity with their companions. after the fashion of all children but adrian le couvre was unhappy because she chose to be it was not the wash-tub that made her so for she had been born to it nor was it the half-mad outbreaks of her father because to her at least he was not unkind her discontent sprang from her excessive sensibility indeed for a peasant child she had reason to think herself far more fortunate than her associates her intelligence was great

ambition was awakened in her before she was ten years of age when she began to learn and to recite poems learning them as has been said between the washtub and the ironing-board and reciting them to the admiration of older and wiser people than she even at ten she was a very beautiful child with great lambent eyes an exquisite complexion and a lovely form while she had the further gift of a voice that thrilled the listener and when she chose brought tears to every eye she was indeed a natural elocutionist knowing by instinct all those modulations of tone and varied cadences which go to the hearer's heart it was very like adrienne to memorize only such poems as were mournful just as in after life she could win success upon the stage only in tragic parts she would repeat with a sort of ecstasy the pathetic poems that were then admired and she was soon able to give up her menial work because many people asked her to their houses so that they could listen to the divinely beautiful voice charged with the emotion which was always at her command

when she was thirteen her father moved to paris where she was placed at school a very humble school in a very humble quarter of the city yet even there her genius showed itself at that early age a number of children and young people probably influenced by adrian formed themselves into a theatrical company from the pure love of acting a friendly grocer let them have an empty store-room for their performances and in this store-room adrian le couvre first acted in a tragedy by corneille assuming the part of leading woman her genius for the stage was like the genius of napoleon for war she had had no teaching she had never been inside of any theatre and yet she delivered the magnificent lines with all the power and fire and effectiveness of a most accomplished actress people thronged to see her and to feel the tempest of emotion which shook her as she sustained her path which for the moment was as real to her as life itself at first only the people of the neighbourhood knew anything about these amateur performances

but presently a lady of rank one madame de goux came out of curiosity and was fascinated by the little actress madame de goux offered the spacious courtyard of her own house and fitted it with some of the appurtenances of a theatre from that moment the fame of adrian spread throughout all paris the courtyard was crowded by gentlemen and ladies by people of distinction from the court and at last even by actors and actresses from the comedy franchise it is in fact a remarkable tribute to adrian that in her thirteenth year she excited so much jealousy among the actors of the comedy that they evoked the law against her theatres required a royal licence and of course poor little adrian's company had none hence legal proceedings were begun and the most famous actresses in paris talked of having these clever children imprisoned upon this the company sought the precincts of the temple where no legal warrant could be served without the express order of the king himself there for a time the performances still went on

finally as the other children were not geniuses but merely boys and girls in search of fun the little company broke up its success however had determined for ever the career of adrian with her beautiful face her lithe and exquisite figure her golden voice and her instinctive art it was plain enough that her future lay upon the stage and so at fourteen or fifteen she began where most actresses leave off accomplished and attractive and having had a practical training in her profession diderot in that same century observed that the truest actor is one who does not feel his part at all but produces his effects by intellectual effort and intelligent observation behind the figure on the stage torn with passion or rollicking with mirth there must always be the cool and unemotional mind which directs and governs and controls this same theory was both held and practised by the late benoit constant coquillin to some extent it was the theory of garrick and fester and edwin booth though it was rejected by the two keynes and by edwin forrest who entered so thoroughly into the character which he assumed and who let loose such tremendous bursts of passion that other actors dreaded to support him on the stage in such parts as spartacus and metamora

it is needless to say that a girl like adrienne le couvre flung herself with all the intensity of her nature into every role she played this was the greatest secret of her success for with her nature rose superior to art on the other hand it fixed her dramatic limitations for it barred her out of comedy her melancholy morbid disposition was in the fullest sympathy with tragic heroines but she failed when she tried to represent the lighter moods and the merry moments of those who welcome mirth she could counterfeit despair and unforced tears would fill her eyes but she could not laugh and romp and simulate a gaiety that was never hers adrian would have been delighted to act at one of the theatres in paris but they were close to her through jealousy she went into the provinces in the eastern part of france and for ten years she was a leading lady there in many companies and in many towns as she blossomed into womanhood there came into her life the love which was to be at once a source of the most profound interest and of the most intense agony

it is odd that all her professional success never gave her any happiness the life of the actress who travelled from town to town the crude and coarse experiences which she had to undergo the disorder and the unsettled mode of living all produced in her a profound disgust she was of too exquisite a fibre to live in such a way especially in a century when the refinements of existence were for the very few she speaks herself of obligatory amusements the insistence of men and of love affairs yet how could such a woman as adrian le couvre keep herself from love affairs the motion of the stage and its mimic griefs satisfied her only while she was actually upon the boards love offered her an emotional excitement that endured and that was always changing it was the profoundest instinct of her being and she once wrote what could one do in the world without loving still through these ten years she seems to have loved only that she might be unhappy

there was a strange twist in her mind men who were honourable and who loved her with sincerity she treated very badly men who were indifferent or ungrateful or actually base she seemed to choose by a sort of perverse instinct perhaps the explanation of it is that during these ten years though she had many lovers she never really loved she sought excitement passion and after that the mournfulness which came when passion dies thus one man after another came into her life some of them promising marriage and she bore two children whose fathers were unknown or at least uncertain but after all one can scarcely pity her since she had not yet in reality known that great passion which comes but once in life so far she had learned only a sort of feeble cynicism which she expressed in letters and in such sayings as these there are sweet errors which i would not venture to commit again my experiences all too sad have served to illumine my reason

i am utterly weary of love and prodigiously tempted to have no more of it for the rest of my life because after all i don't wish either to die or to go mad yet she also said i know too well that no one dies of grief she had had indeed some very unfortunate experiences men of rank had loved her and had then cast her off an actor van clavel would have married her but she would not accept his offer a magistrate in strassburg promised marriage and then when she was about to accept him he wrote to her that he was going to yield to the wishes of his family and make a more advantageous alliance and so she was alternately caressed and repulsed a mere plaything and yet this was probably all that she really needed at that time something to stir her something to make her mournful or indignant or ashamed it was inevitable that at last adrienne le couvre should appear in paris she had won such renown throughout the provinces that even those who were intensely jealous of her were obliged to give her due consideration

In 1717, when she was in her 25th year, she became a member of the comedy franchise. There she made an immediate and most brilliant impression. She easily took the leading place. She was one of the glories of Paris, for she became the fashion outside the theatre. For the first time, the great classic plays were given, not at the monotonous sing-song,

which had become a sort of theatrical convention, but with all the fire and naturalness of life. Being the fashion, Mademoiselle Lecouvre elevated the social rank of actors and of actresses. Her salon was thronged by men and women of rank. Voltaire wrote poems in her honor. To be invited to her dinners was almost like receiving a decoration from the king.

She ought to have been happy, for she had reached the summit of her profession and something more. Yet, still, she was unhappy. In all her letters one finds a plaintive tone, a little mourning sound that shows how slightly her nature had been changed. No longer, however, did she throw herself away upon dullards and brutes. An English peer, Lord Peterborough, not realizing that she was different from other actresses of that loose-lived age, said to her coarsely at his first introduction, Come now, show me lots of wit and lots of love.

The remark was characteristic of the time. Yet Adrien had learned at least one thing, and that was the discontent which came from light affairs. She had thrown herself away too often. If she could not love with her entire being, if she could not give all that was in her to be given, whether of her heart or mind or soul, then she would love no more at all.

At this time there came to Paris a man remarkable in his own century, and one who afterward became almost a hero of romance. This was Maurice Comte de Saxe, as the French called him, his German name and title being Maurits Graf von Saxon, while we usually term him, in English, Marshal Saxe. maurice the sax was now in seventeen twenty one entering his twenty-fifth year already though so young his career had been a strange one and it was destined to be still more remarkable he was the natural son of duke augustus the second of saxony who later became king of poland and who is known in history as augustus the strong augustus was a giant in stature and in strength handsome daring unscrupulous and yet extremely fascinating his life was one of revelry and fighting and display

when in his cups he would often call for a horse-shoe and twist it into a knot with his powerful fingers many were his mistresses but the one for whom he cared the most was a beautiful and high-spirited swedish girl of rank aurora von she was descended from a rough old field-marshal who in the thirty years war had slashed and sacked and pillaged and plundered to his heart's content from him aurora von koenig's mark seemed to have inherited a high spirit and a sort of lawlessness which charms the stalwart augustus of poland their son maurice de saxe inherited everything that was good in his parents and a great deal that was less commendable as a mere child of twelve he insisted on joining the army of prince eugene and had seen rough service in a very strenuous campaign two years later he showed such daring on the battlefield that prince eugene summoned him and paid him a compliment under the form of a rebuke young man he said you must not mistake mere recklessness for valor

before he was twenty he had attained the stature and strength of his royal father and to prove it he in his turn called for a horseshoe which he twisted and broke in his fingers he fought on the side of the russians and poles and again against the turks everywhere displaying high courage and also genius as a commander for he never lost his self-possession amid the very blackest danger but possessed as carlyle says vigilance foresight and sagacious precaution exceedingly handsome maurice was a master of all the arts that pleased with just a touch of roughness which seemed not unfitting in so gallant a soldier his troops adored him and would follow wherever he might choose to lead them for he exercised over these rude men a magnetic power resembling that of napoleon in after years in private life he was a hard drinker and fond of every form of pleasure having no fortune of his own a marriage was arranged for him with the countess von loben who was immensely wealthy but in three years he had squandered all her money upon his pleasures and had moreover got himself heavily in debt

it was at this time that he first came to paris to study military tactics he had fought hard against the french in the wars that were now ended but his chivalrous bearing his handsome person and his reckless joviality made him at once a universal favorite in paris to the perfumed courtiers with their laces and love-locks and mincing ways maurice de saxe came as a sort of knight of old jovial daring pleasure-loving even his broken fringe was held to be quite charming and to see him break a horseshoe with his fingers threw every one into raptures no wonder then that he was welcomed in the very highest circles almost at once he attracted the notice of the princess de conti a beautiful woman of the blood royal of her it has been said that she was the personification of a kiss the incarnation of an embrace the ideal of a dream of love her chestnut hair was tinted with little gleams of gold her eyes were violet black her complexion was dazzling but by the king's orders she had been forced to marry a hunchback a man whose very limbs were so weakened by disease and evil living

that they would often fail to support him and he would fall to the ground a writhing screaming mass of ill-looking flesh it is not surprising that his lovely wife should have shuddered much at his abuse of her and still more at his grotesque endearments when her eyes fell on maurice de she saw in him one who could free her from her bondage by a skilful trick he led the prince de conti to invade the sleeping-room of the princess with servants declaring that she was not alone the charge proved quite untrue and so she left her husband having won the sympathy of her own world which held that she had been insulted but it was not she who was destined to win and hold the love of maurice de saxe not long after his appearance in the french capital he was invited to dine with the queen of paris adrian saxe had seen her on the stage he knew her previous history he knew that she was very much of a soiled dove but when he met her these two natures so utterly dissimilar leaped together as it were through the indescribable attraction of opposites he was big and powerful she was small and fragile he was merry and full of quips and jests she was reserved and melancholy

each felt in the other a need supplied at one of their earliest meetings the climax came saxe was not the man to hesitate while she already in her thoughts had made a full surrender in one great sweep he gathered her into his arms it appeared to her as if no man had ever laid his hand upon her until that moment she cried out now for the first time in my life i seem to live it was indeed the very first love which in her chequered career was really worthy of the name she had supposed that all such things were past and gone that her heart was closed forever that she was invulnerable and yet here she found herself clinging about the neck of this impetuous soldier and showing him all the shy fondness and the unselfish devotion of a young girl from this instant adrian le couvre never loved another man and never even looked at any other man with the slightest interest for nine long years the two were bound together though there were strange events to ruffle the surface of their love

Maurice de Saxe had been sired by a king. He had the lofty ambition to be a king himself, and he felt the stirrings of that genius which, in after years, was to make him a great soldier, and to win the brilliant victory of Fontenoy, which, to this very day, the French are never tired of recalling. Already, Louis XV had made him a Marshal of France, and a certain restlessness came over him he loved adrian yet he felt that to remain in the enjoyment of her witcheries ought not to be the whole of a man's career

then the grand duchy of khorland at that time a vassal state of poland now part of russia sought a ruler maurice de sax was eager to secure its throne which would make him at least semi-royal and the chief of a principality he hastened thither and found that money was needed to carry out his plans the widow of the late duke the grand duchess anna niece of peter the great and later empress of russia as soon as she had met this dazzling genius offered to help him to acquire the duchy if he would only marry her he did not utterly refuse still another woman of high rank the grand duchess elizabeth of russia peter the great's daughter made him very much the same proposal both of these imperial women might well have attracted a man like maurice de had he been wholly fancy-free for the second of them inherited the high spirit and the genius of the great peter while the first was the pleasure-seeking princess resembling some of those roman empresses who loved to stoop that they might conquer She is described as indolent and sensual, and she once declared that the chief good in the world was love. Yet, though she neglected affairs of state and gave them over to favorites, she won and kept the affections of her people.

She was unquestionably endowed with the magnetic gift of winning hearts. Adrien, who was left behind in Paris, knew very little of what was going on. Only two things were absolutely clear to her. One was that if her lover secured the duchy, he must be parted from her. The other was that without money, his ambition must be thwarted, and that he would then return to her.

Here was a test to try the soul of any woman. It proved the height and the depth of her devotion. Come what might, Maurice should be Duke of Corland, even though she lost him. She gathered together her whole fortune, sold every jewel that she possessed, and sent her lover the sum of nearly a million francs. this incident shows how absolutely she was his but in fact because of various intrigues he failed of election to the ducal throne of corland and he returned to adrian with all her money spent and without even the grace at first to show his gratitude he stormed and raged over his ill-luck she merely soothed and petted him though she had heard that he had thought of marrying another woman to secure the dukedom in one of her letters she bursts out with a pitiful exclamation

i am distracted with rage and anguish is it not natural to cry out against such treachery this man surely ought to know me he ought to love me oh my god what are we what are we but still she could not give him up nor could he give her up though there were frightful scenes between them times when he cruelly reproached her and when her native melancholy deepened into outburst of despair finally there occurred an instant which is more or less obscure in parts The Duchess de Boulogne, a great lady of the court, facile, feline, licentious, and eager for delights, resolved that she would win the love of Maurice de Saxe. She set herself to win it openly and without any sense of shame. Maurice himself, at times, when the tears of Adrian proved wearisome, flirted with the Duchess. yet even so adrian held the first place in his heart and her rival knew it therefore she resolved to humiliate adrian and to do so in the place where the actress had always reigned supreme

there was to be a gala performance of racine's great tragedy phaedra with adrian of course in the title role the duchess de voulon sent a large number of her lackeys with orders to hiss and jeer and if possible to break off the play malignantly delighted with her plan the duchess arrayed herself in jewels and took her seat in a conspicuous stage-box where she could watch the coming storm and gloat over the discomfiture of her rival when the curtain rose and when adrian appeared as phaedra an uproar began it was clear to the great actress that a plot had been devised against her in an instant her whole soul was afire the queen-like majesty of her bearing compelled silence throughout the house even the hired lackeys were overawed by it

then adrian moved swiftly across the stage and fronted her enemy speaking into her very face the three insulting lines which came to her at that moment of the play i am not of those women void of shame who savouring in crime the joys of peace harden their faces till they cannot blush the whole house rose and burst forth into tremendous applause adrian had won for the woman who had tried to shame her rose in trepidation and hurried from the theatre but the end was not yet those were evil times when dark deeds were committed by the great almost with impunity secret poisoning was a common trade to remove a rival was as usual a thing in the eighteenth century as to snub a rival is usual in the twentieth not long afterward on the night of march fifteenth seventeen thirty adrian la couvre was acting in one of voltaire's plays with all her power and instinctive art when suddenly she was seized with the most frightful pains her anguish was obvious to every one who saw her and yet she had the courage to go through her path

then she fainted and was carried home four days later she died and her death was no less dramatic than her life had been her lover and two friends of his were with her and also a jesuit priest he declined to administer extreme unction unless she would declare that she repented of her theatrical career she stubbornly refused since she believed that to be the greatest actress of her time was not a sin yet still the priest insisted then came the final moment weary and revolting against this death this destiny she stretched her arms with one of the old lovely gestures toward a bust which stood near by and cried her last cry of passion there is my world my hope yes and my god the bust was one of maurice de sax and of maurice of saxony and adrian End of Volume 1 of Famous Affinities of History

by Lyndon Orr Recording by Hilara