Chapter 16: At the Bavarian Court

May 1834

Over the next weeks, a pattern of alternating visits developed. Sometimes, Maddalena joined them, but more often, they were alone, as Maddalena became attached to Melissa and Colleen who toured the city and the surrounding countryside to view the numerous artefacts that even the small village churches boasted. Whenever his duties as Richard’s secretary did not keep him, James Palmer accompanied the young women. Every evening, Melissa returned with a few new water colours, James with pencil drawings, and Colleen with her notebook more filled. Maddalena did not produce anything, but she collected small artefacts whenever she could talk the owners out of them in return for Bavarian Guilders.

With the end of August approaching, wine festivals were held in the small villages along the river, and the Carters and their friends made the short trips by coach, sampling wine and food, and getting to know the natives. Ellen and Marie often braided their hair like the local women did, looking even more alike. They enjoyed the harmless banter of their husbands who made like they tried to kiss the wrong woman, eliciting shrieks of equally fake outrage. It was a happy time for all involved.

Nevertheless, September was approaching and a golden summer was drawing to an end. Once again, their possessions were packed in trunks and crates, and loaded on coaches. Three coaches were needed to transport the Carters, their friends and servants, and their luggage.

It took four days to travel the almost 200 miles from Wuerzburg to Munich, and the travellers were fairly rumpled when they arrived. Fortunately, Richard had been able to persuade the former ambassador, the Honorable Edward Fenemore, to sell his Munich palais to Richard. They were able to move into that house without much ado.

It was a pretty building, in the Baroque style, sitting on a fairly large patch of land outside the walled city. Fortunately, the good weather held, and little Tony enjoyed exploring the garden with Dicky at his heel.

Right in their first weeks in Munich, they had their first real exposure to the Bavarians. In the second half of September, the Oktoberfest people’s fair started, commemorating the wedding of the crown prince Ludwig to Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen that had taken place at the same site in 1810. The marriage was dwindling away with each new affair King Ludwig had, but the people’s fair was getting ever more popular, drawing thousands of visitors every evening. For sixteen days, those who could afford it and many who really couldn’t, populated the beer tents and the shooting galleries and consumed large quantities of beer from huge earthen quart-sized tankards.

Richard and Ellen and their entourage, were present when, on the first evening, the first keg of beer was tapped, and the mayor of Munich presented the first Maßkrug — Maß meaning a measure — to the King. It was on this occasion that Ellen met the Queen Therese again, but there was no chance for any talk. The Queen looked withdrawn, even on this celebration of her wedding day.

Ellen valiantly managed one of the tankards of beer, and like Marie who sat to her right, she contrived to finish the content before it became stale. Maddalena did not even try. Richard proved his manliness by finishing three of the beer mugs. The collection of dignitaries developed a decided buzz, talking animatedly, and the jests became more raucous as time went by.

Melissa was in her element. She finished her mug with ease. Whenever one of the table neighbours raised his mug for a toast, Melissa banged her own mug against the proffered tankard in the fashion of the natives. In her broken German, she voiced her appreciation for the beer, not without pointing out that her own father was a brewer of some renown.

The crowds were like nothing Ellen and Richard had ever seen. Ellen watched a skinny old man who sat two tables away. That worthy managed to down no less than seven mugs of beer in three hours without ever standing up. When he did stand, he managed to walk between the tables as straight as anybody, and Ellen guessed that he was heading for one of the numerous outhouses. He had to!

When they finally arrived at their house, Ellen could barely undress before she dropped on their bed. She slept like a log that night. Surprisingly, she felt no hangover when she awoke to the sunlight streaming into their bedroom. Richard looked a little worse for wear, but assured her that he felt tired, not nauseous.

That set the pace for the next fifteen days, until the festival ended on the first Sunday in October. Every evening, they and the other courtiers, with the notable exception of Prince Wassilij and the Princess Besuchova, joined the King for an evening of beer and laughter. As the days passed, Ellen and Richard learned quite a few German words, and they understood the gist of the tales and jokes. They also became accustomed to drinking beer, and by the end of the Oktoberfest, Ellen was able to take care of a Maßkrug without problems.

To her and Marie’s dismay, they noticed one unwelcome side effect of the beer drinking. Both had difficulties fitting into their ball dresses, having gained a few pounds since their arrival in Munich. Richard, too, had developed a decided paunch. For the rest of October, steamed vegetables and teas were the main fare at the Carter’s table, and Ellen took Maddalena on extended rides through Munich’s parks until she felt comfortable again.

For the ball season loomed ahead, and Ellen wanted to enjoy the frequent soirees and dances. For years, she had been either pregnant or travelling during the ball season. Together with Maddalena and Marie, she dragged their reluctant husbands from one dance to the next.

There were charities, too, to which Ellen tried to lent her support. She met many of the prominent citizens and their wives during those functions, and she did her best to represent her country. However, her participation in most charities was thwarted by Catholic church representatives who objected to working with a heretic. There was a municipal orphanage, though, that was not affiliated with the all-powerful church, and there, Ellen helped raise contributions from among the representatives of Protestant countries.

For Maddalena, things were even less easy. Once it transpired that she had converted from Catholicism to the Church of England, she became persona non grata for many of the salon dwellers who had important connections with the church. In Bavaria, the Catholic Church still held enormous power in all folds of social live.

Maddalena did not care too much. This was what she had expected, more or less. There was another reason for her indifference, though. She confided to Ellen that she had missed her monthlies twice, and that she was confident that she carried her first child. This was happy news indeed.

Ellen herself was not too eager to have her next child soon. This posting in Munich was new and exciting, and she did not want to be tied down soon. She had talked with Richard, and whilst they enjoyed each other in bed frequently, they did not end their sessions in a way that might cause a pregnancy.

Just in time for Christmas, the weather turned really cold in mid-December, and it started to snow. This was not the wet, clinging snow of the southern country side, nor the dirty snow, grey with the soot from hundreds of thousands of fireplaces, that they had sometimes seen in London. This was white, powdery snow that drifted in the clear air. Little Tony was ecstatic, as was Dicky, the dog. Ellen had to put her foot down to get them back into the house after the first hour. She noticed then that Tony’s shoes were not even wet inside after that hour; the dry, cold snow did not melt easily.

There was no Anglican church in Munich. However, due to a royal edict from 1806, the Lutherans were free to practise their religion in Bavaria, and just a year before, in 1833, the first “Evangelical Cathedral” of Munich was finished, close to the Sendling Gate of the inner city. In this St. Matthew’s Church, the Carters and their friends and dependants celebrated Christmas Eve. Several courtiers of King Ludwig, who were Lutheran, were in presence, too.

After church, they all went to the municipal orphanage to distribute presents. They met Lucien and Marie Perigneaux there who had attended a Catholic service, and together, they spent over an hour, listening to the Christmas carols sung by the children.

The beginning of the New Year, 1835, was celebrated in style in the Royal Palace of Nymphenburg. The motto of the New Year’s ball was trachten, meaning regional clothing styles. Whilst the Bavarian guests wore the various local garbs of their home towns and villages, Ellen and Richard were challenged to assemble the Sunday’s best of a Berkshire squire and his wife. Ellen sorely missed the availability of Elisabeth Wilson in her preparations, but with Neeta’s and Sadie’s help, she managed to be presentable, even in her own critical view.

The evening was something to tell about. The Great Hall of the palace was decorated in Blue and White, and the Carters milled around in a sea of women, wearing the form enhancing dirndl dresses, and men, wearing coarse wool cloth jackets and knee-length leather breeches.

Lucien Perigneaux appeared dressed as a Gascogne brigand, the effect of his costume enhanced, no doubt, by the eye patch he had to wear. Marie had to be the most outrageously dressed woman of the evening. Her red farm girl dress only reached the lower calves, and when she danced, the gentlemen in the hall were treated to the most rare view of female ankles. Marie received some nasty looks from matronly women, and some admiring looks from unmarried men.