LETTER LXXXV.

Vienna.

We had an invitation lately from Mons. de Breteuil to dine on the top of Mount Calenberg, a very high mountain in the neighbourhood of this city. Common coaches or chariots cannot be dragged up; but having driven to the bottom, we found chaises of a particular construction, calculated for such expeditions. These had been ordered by the Ambassador for the accommodation of the company, and in them we were carried to the summit, where there is a convent of Monks, from which two landscapes of very opposite natures appear. The one consists of a series of wild mountains; the other, of the town, suburbs, and environs of Vienna, with the various branches of the Danube flowing through a rich champaign of boundless extent.

The table for dinner was covered in a field near the convent, under the shade of some trees.—Every delicacy of the season was served up.—— Madame de Matignon, a very beautiful and sprightly lady, daughter of M. de Breteuil, did the honours.—Some of the finest women of Vienna, her companions, were of the company; and the whole entertainment was conducted with equal taste and gaiety.

During the dessert, some of the Fathers came and presented the company with baskets of fruit and sallad from their garden.—The Ambassador invited them to sit, and the ladies pledged them in tokay. Mons. de Breteuil had previously obtained permission for the ladies to enter the convent;—— which they accordingly did, as soon as they rose from table, attended by all the company.

You will readily believe, that the appearance of so many handsome women would be particularly interesting to a community which had never before beheld a female within their walls.—This indeed was sufficiently evident, in spite of the gravity and mortified looks of the Fathers.

One lady of a gay disposition laid hold of a little scourge which hung at one of the Fathers’ belts, and desired he would make her a present of it, for she wished to use it when she returned home, having, as she said, been a great sinner.—— The Father, with great gallantry, begged she would spare her own fair skin, assuring her that he would give himself a hearty flogging on her account that very evening;—and to prove how much he was in earnest, fell directly on his knees before a little altar, and began to whip his own shoulders with great earnestness, declaring, that when the ladies should retire, he would lay it with the same violence on his naked body; for he was determined she should be as free from sin as she was on the day of her birth.

This melted the heart of the lady.—She begged the Father might take no more of her faults upon his shoulders.—— She now assured him that her slips had been very venial, and that she was convinced what he had already done would clear her as completely as if he should whip himself to the bone.

There is something so ludicrous in all this, that you may naturally suspect the representation I have given, proceeds from invention rather than memory. I assure you, however, in downright earnest, that the scene passed nearly as described; and to prevent farther mischief, I put the scourge, which the zealous Father had made use of, in my pocket.

On my return to Vienna, I called the same evening at the Countess Walstein’s, and soon after the Emperor came there. Somebody had already mentioned to him the pious gallantry of the Father at the top of Mount Calenberg.—He asked for a sight of the whip, which he understood I had brought away:—I had it still in my pocket, and immediately showed it him.—— He laughed very heartily at the warmth of the Father’s zeal, which he supposed had been augmented by the Ambassador’s tokay.

You have often heard of the unceremonious and easy manner in which this great Prince lives with his subjects. Report cannot exaggerate on this head. The Countess Walstein had no expectations of his visiting her that evening.—— When the servant named the Emperor before he entered, I started up, and was going to retire.—The Countess desired me to remain, for nothing was more disagreeable to him than that any company should be disturbed on his entering.—The ladies kept their seats, some of them knotting all the time he remained. The men continued standing while he stood, and when he was seated, most part of them sat down also.—The Emperor put Count Mahoni, the Spanish ambassador, in mind of his gout, and made him sit, while himself remained standing.

This monarch converses with all the ease and affability of a private gentleman, and gradually seduces others to talk with the same ease to him. He is surely much happier in this noble condescension, and must acquire a more perfect knowledge of mankind, than if he kept himself aloof from his subjects, continually wrapt up in his own importance and the Imperial fur.