Descendants of the Stuarts

180 THE DESCENDANTS
rietta, who had been poisoned only a year previously.
That Elizabeth received his addresses unwillingly,
and then only in compliance with the expressed
will of her father is certain, for she says, " If my
father had loved me as well as I loved him, he'
would never have sent me into a country so dan-
gerous as Prance, to which I came through pure
obedience, and against my own inclination." This
assertion of hers is corroborated by the Due de St.
Simon, who informs us that " she always pretended
to have conferred an obligation on her husband by
marrying him." Madame de Sevigne must have
been misinformed, when she says, that Elizabeth
was " quite dazzled with her grandeur ;" though, in
fact, this lady only records it as an on dit, and not
as the result of her own personal observations. That
Philip was not the lover to captivate the aJffections
of the frank and intrepid Princess Palatine is
clear, for though handsome, brave, and not devoid
of good qualities, he was vain, weak-minded, and
effeminate ; in other words, " a good sort of a man,
notwithstanding his weaknesses," " which oftener,"
as his wife cuttingly remarks, " excited her pity
than her anger." She thus describes his personal
appearance and pursuits : " Monsieur," she says,
" without having a vulgar air is very small, his hair
and eyebrows are quite black, his eyes are dark,
his face long and narrow, his nose large, his mouth
small, and his teeth very bad ; he is fond of play,
of holding drawing-rooms, of eating, dancing, and