She did, indeed, as a matter of duty, give one or two grand state balls, one of which, in which the dancers of the quadrilles were masked, and in which their dresses represented the male and female costumes of India, was long talked of for both the magnificence and the novelty of the spectacle; and she attended one or two of the opera-balls, under the escort of her brothers-in-law and their countesses; but they had begun to pall upon her, and she made repeated offers to the king to give them up and to spend her evenings in quiet with him.

But he was more inclined to prompt her to seek amusement than to allow her to sacrifice any,[9] even such as he did not care to partake of; nevertheless, he was pleased with the offer, and it was observed by the courtiers that the mutual confidence of the husband and wife in each other was more marked and more firmly established than ever.
He showed her all the dispatches, consulted her on all points, and explained his reasons when he could not adopt all her views.

As Marie Antoinette wrote to her brother, "If it were possible to reckon wholly on any man, the king was the one on whom she could thoroughly rely.[10]" So greatly, indeed, did the quarrel between Austria and Prussia engross her, that it even occupied the greater part of letters whose ostensible object is to announce prospects of personal happiness which might have been expected to extinguished every other consideration.

In one, after touching briefly on her health and hopes, she proceeds: "How kind my dear mamma is, to express her approval of the way in which I have conducted myself in these affairs up to the present time! Alas! there is no need for you to feel obliged to me; it was my heart that acted in the whole matter.

I am only vexed at not being able to enter myself into the feelings of all these ministers, so as to be able to make them comprehend how every thing which has been done and demanded by the authorities at Vienna is just and reasonable.