Maria Theresia as Matchmaker.
I found this tale while doing research for a new novel:
“This match-making mania of the
Empress sometimes led to very awkward consequences.
Among others, she brought about a
marriage between another of the Esterhazys the good-natured Count Francis and a
very beautiful but very vicious young lady of the house of Starhemberg; who
soon after her marriage ran away to Switzerland with a most interesting lady-killer,
Count Schulemburg. The gentleman, having been claimed by the Austrian charge
d'affaires, was given up by the Swiss, and condemned to death as a seducer and adulterer.
But, wonderful to relate, the injured husband himself was foremost in obtaining
his release; and was most profuse in his expressions of gratitude towards
Schulemburg, for having rid him of a bad woman.”
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