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70
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LA PELEGRINA,
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kings
or the queens during several generations. When, for example, in the
summer of 1660, Philip iv. of Spain brought his daughter Maria Theresa
to the frontier to be married to the young King of France, Louis XIV.,
the beautiful pearl appeared on the scene to lend its splendor to the
occasion. Mademoiselle de Montpensier, the fantastic lady who was known
in her day as la grande Mademoiselle, speaks thus of the Pele-grina and its wearer:
"
The King (Philip IV.) had on a gray coat with silver embroidery: a
great table diamond fastened up his hat from which hung a pearl. They
are two crown jewels of extreme beauty — they call the diamond the
Mirror of Portugal, and the pearl the Pelegrina."
On
this occasion the two courts of Versailles and Madrid vied with each
other in splendor, and their doings have rendered famous the little
boundary river of the Bidassoa with its Isle of the Pheasant. A modern
traveler whisking past in the train sees but little to recall the once
famous spot; a half dried-up river and a marshy
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