The social existence of Mme. de Genlis, writes Mme. dAbrants, [115] is always a problem difficult to resolve; it is composed of a mass of contradictions, one more extraordinary than the other. Of a noble family, whose name and alliances gave her the right to be chanoinesse of the Chapter of Alix, she was called until her marriage Comtesse de Lancy. She married M. de Genlis, a man of high rank, nearly related to most of the great families in the kingdom, and yet Mme. de Genlis had never in society the attitude of a grande dame.... The important part this woman played in the destinies of France is of such a nature that one must notice it, more especially as she denies a mass of facts, the most notorious of the time in which her name is mixed up, ... pretending never to have spoken to men of whom she must not only have been an acquaintance but a friend. Long before the first outbursts of the Revolution, Mme. de Genlis helped to prepare the influence which afterwards burst like an accursed bomb, covering with its splinters even the woman who had prepared the wick and perhaps lighted the match.
ONE:
TWO:I recognised you directly in spite of your dress, your beard, your dyed hair, and false scar.
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ONE:
TWO:At last, in spite of her being unlucky or fanciful, or both, she succeeded in finding a dwelling-place, and as directly she arrived, visits and commissions began to pour upon her, she soon had plenty of money and plenty of society.
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ONE:If Louis XV. were alive all this would certainly not have happened.
TWO:[190]Eh! What! Then Athalie will never be played any more; that masterpiece will be lost to the French stage!
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TWO:Amongst others who arrived were the Duchesse de Fleury and Princesse Joseph de Monaco. The latter was a gentle, charming woman, whose devotion to her children was the cause of her death. After having escaped from France and arrived safely in Rome, she was actually foolish enough to go back to Paris with the idea of saving the remains of her fortune for her children. The Terror was in full force; she was arrested and condemned. Those who wished to save her entreated her to declare herself enceinte, by which many women had been spared. She would anyhow have gained a reprieve, and as it happened her life would have been saved, as the ninth Thermidor was rapidly approaching. But her husband was far away, and she indignantly refused, preferring death to such an alternative.
FORE:It was difficult to make the postillions stop, but after a time Darnal forced them to do so, assisted by the cries of the terrified travellers who were then passing through a village. The strange servant did nothing. They got out, and on asking how far they were from Dartford they were told twenty-two miles.Yes, Madame.
FORE:Jembrasse la gracieuse souveraine,[65] la sainte Henriette, la ridicule Adla?de la belle Victoire.
FORE:Lisette liked the Queen of Naples much better than her elder sister, the Infanta of Parma. Though less beautiful than her younger sister, Marie Antoinette, yet she bore a strong resemblance to her, and had the remains of great beauty.
FORE:
FORE:But the sufferings of the last seven years had [256] terribly injured Adriennes health, and it was not till she had a little recovered that La Fayette moved, with all his family, to Viane, a small Dutch town near Utrecht, where they settled for a time to watch the course of events.
TWO:There had, in fact, been a strong reaction against the restraint and dullness of the last few years of the reign of Louis XIV., when the magnificent, pleasure-loving King, whose victorious armies had devastated Europe, who had made princes of his illegitimate children, lavished the riches of the country upon his mistresses, and yet in his stately beauty and fascination been the idol of France; had changed into a melancholy old man, depressed and disillusioned, looking with uneasiness upon the past, with fear upon the future; while the brilliant beauties and splendid festivities of bygone days had given place to virtue, strict propriety, and Mme. de Maintenon.Joseph, Comte de Caraman, who soon after their marriage became Prince de Chimay, was the third son of the Duc de Caraman, Governor of Provence. He emigrated with the Princes, and, being an excellent musician, gained his living by his violin. He [347] established himself at Hamburg, and there gave lessons.
TWO:In art, as in everything else, it was still the age of the artificial. The great wigs and flowing drapery of the last reign had given place to powder and paint, ribbons and pompons, pink roses, and pale blue satin or velvet, la Pompadour.Above everything in France ridicule is to be avoided, he had remarked.
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TWO:MADAME SOPHIEJoseph, Comte de Caraman, who soon after their marriage became Prince de Chimay, was the third son of the Duc de Caraman, Governor of Provence. He emigrated with the Princes, and, being an excellent musician, gained his living by his violin. He [347] established himself at Hamburg, and there gave lessons.
TWO:Society was much larger here than at St. Petersburg, where it seemed almost to form one family, every one being related to each other.
TWO:He was extremely kind to Mme. Le Brun, whom he always called ma bonne amie; she was often at his house, though she did not care for the great dinners of never less than thirty people, which were always at seven oclockin those days considered a late hour.
The name, applied to Trzia, was a cruel injustice, and, with the ingratitude so often to be met with, now that she was less powerful and people were not in need of her protection, they forgot or neglected or slandered her, and that accursed name was frequently to be heard.The journeys of the court to the different country [394] palaces, Versailles, Compigne, Fontainebleau, Marly, &c., were affairs of enormous expense, and ceremony so preposterous, that, for instance, there was one sort of court dress for Versailles, and another, equally magnificent and uncomfortable, for Marly. On the 1st of January Louis XV. always arranged with care and consideration the journeys for the year to the different palaces, of which there were a great number. Mme. Campan [117] in her Mmoires, says that Marly, even more than Versailles, transported one vividly to the reign of Louis XIV.; its palaces and gardens were like a magnificent scene in an opera; fountains, pavilions, statues, marble basins, ponds and canals, thickets of shrubs, groups of tall trees, trellised walks and arbours, amongst which the ladies and gentlemen of the royal households and court walked about in full dress; plumes, paniers, jewels, and trains making any enjoyment of the country out of the question, but impressing with awe and admiration the crowds who were admitted to the gardens, and to the suppers and gambling at night. Every trace of this palace and gardens disappeared in the Revolution.Vien, who had been first painter to the King; Grard, Gros, and Girodet, the great portrait painters (all pupils of David), and her old friend Robert, were constant guests. With David she was not on friendly terms; his crimes and cruelties during the Revolution caused her to regard him with horror. He had caused Robert to be arrested, and had done all he could to increase the horrors of his imprisonment. He had also tried to circulate the malicious reports about Calonne and Mme. Le Brun, of whom he was jealous, though his real love for his art made him acknowledge the excellence of her work.She was received with delight at her house in the rue du Gros-Chenet, by M. Le Brun, her brother, her sister-in-law, and their only child, the niece who was to fill her daughters place. The house was beautifully furnished and filled with flowers, and that same evening a grand concert in her honour was given in the large salon of a house in a garden adjoining, which also belonged to M. Le Brun, who told her that he had during the [147] Revolution, when the churches were closed, lent this salon to celebrate mass.