MARIE-THÉRÈSE-CHARLOTTE DE FRANCE (1778-1851) "Madame Royale", daughter of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette, Duchess of Angoulême. Autograph manuscript, Zaïre, 16 pages folio (large ink stain on 1st page). Rare manuscript of Madame Royale in the Temple prison. This very dense text is a copy of the first and second acts of Zaïre, Voltaire's famous tragedy (1732), set in the time of Saint Louis. The long tirades of love between the prisoner 'Zayre' and Prince Fatime made the 15-year-old princess dream of the Prince Charming who would free her. The tragedy contains allusions directly related to the sad captivity of the princess who, like Lusignan, "groans in a dungeon, deprived of light, forgotten by Asia and the whole of Europe". She must have found a deeper meaning in certain lines: "Do you no longer sigh for this freedom? [...] The rest of the world, annihilated for my sake, abandons me to the sultan who has us under his rule [...] Prisoner in these parts"... Nérestan hopes to "bring Zayre back to this happy court, where Louis des Vertus has made his home"... And Châtillon recalls "those days of bloodshed and calamity when, under the yoke of our barbarian masters, I saw these sacred walls conquered by our ancestors fall"... Lusignan exclaims: "Alas, I once saw the glory of this court. [...] But to see Paris again I must no longer aspire"... And he says to Zaïre: "My daughter [...] think of the blood that flows in your veins: It is the blood of twenty Kings [...] It is the blood of martyrs"... This is one of the rare manuscripts written by the princess in her dungeon, along with the memoir of her captivity (a facsimile of which was published in 1956) and the moving request she made to join her mother at the Conciergerie. Those who were able to visit the Temple between the princess's departure and the demolition of the prison were able to read the words engraved with the point of a needle on the paper in the anteroom of Louis XVI's daughter: "I desire Zaire, Alzire, Amenaïde". Alcide de Beauchesne relates that Gomin, the Temple warden, went up to the princess's house the day after the Dauphin's death: "she was writing, she had a book open before her eyes; this book was a volume of Voltaire's theatre, and what she was copying was the tragedy of Zaire. I have the first two acts of this tragedy, written by the hand of the young Marie-Thérèse while she was locked up in the Temple. Attached is a L.A.S. from Jeanne Madeleine Antoinette Lafontaine widow Gomin, Pontoise 2 June 1841, to Alcide de Beauchesne, bequeathing him various manuscripts and verse pieces "composed by Madame in the temple tower", and "hair of the King, the Queen, Madame Royale and Louis XVII", asking him to "keep this bequest as a souvenir of my excellent husband" (2 p. in-4, address). Plus an engraved medallion portrait of Madame Royale (London 1797, Cadel & Davies). Provenance: Alcide de Beauchesne.