I
Lola Montez had done better than "hook a prince." A lot better. She had now "hooked" a sovereign. Her ripe warm beauty sent the thin blood coursing afresh through Ludwig's sluggish veins. There it wrought a miracle. He was turned sixty, but he felt sixteen.
The conversation of Robert Burns is said to have "swept a duchess off her feet." Perhaps it did. But that of Lola Montez had a similar effect on a monarch. Under the magic of her spell, this one became rejuvenated. The years were stripped from him; he was once more a boy. With his charmer beside him, he would wander through the Nymphenburg Woods and under the elms in the Englischer Garten, telling her of his dreams and fancies. His passion for Greece was forgotten. Pericles was now Romeo.
In dem Suden ist die Liebe, Da ist Licht und da ist Glut!
that is, In the south there is love, There is light and there is heat, sang Ludwig.
Yet Lola Montez was not by any means the first who ever burst into the responsive heart of Ludwig I. She had many predecessors there. One of them was an Italian syren. But that Lola soon ousted her is clear from a poetical effort of which the royal troubadour was delivered. This begins: Tropfen der Seligkeit und ein Meer von bitteren Leiden Die Italienerin gab--Seligkeit, Seligkeit nur Lässest Du mich entzündend, begeistert, befändig empfinden, In der Spanierin fand Liebe und Leben ich nur!
A free rendering of this passionate heart throb would read very much as follows: Drops of bliss and a sea of bitter sorrow The Italian woman gave me. Bliss, only bliss, Thou gav'st my enraptured heart and soul and spirit. In the Spanish woman alone have I found Love and Life!
Ludwig had a prettier name for his inamorata than the "feminine devil" of Henry LXXII of Reuss. He called her the "Lovely Andalusian" and the "Woman of Spain." She also inspired him to fresh poetic flights. One of these ran: Thine eyes are blue as heavenly vaults Touched by the balmy air; And like the raven's plumage is Thy dark and glistening hair!
There were several more verses.
A feature of the Residenz Palace was a collection of old masters. Wanting to add a young mistress, Ludwig allotted a place of honour among them to a portrait of Lola Montez, from the brush of Josef Stieler. The work was well done, for the artist was inspired by his subject; and he painted her wearing a costume of black velvet, with a touch of colour added by red carnations in her head-dress.