FORE:Her husband was a miller, who had, apparently by his manipulation of contracts given him for the army and by various corrupt practices, made an enormous fortune. He and his wife wished to enter society, but not having any idea what to do or how to behave, they wanted Mme. de Genlis to live with them as chaperon and teach them the usages of the world, offering her 12,000 francs salary and assuring her that she would be very happy with them as they had a splendid h?tel in the rue St. Dominique, and had just bought an estate and chateau in Burgundy. She added that M. de Biras knew Mme. de Genlis, as he had lived on her father��s lands. He was their miller! [134]

FORE:With calmness they received the order to go to the Conciergerie, which was, they knew, their death sentence. When they were sent for, the Duchess, who was reading the ��Imitation of Christ,�� hastily wrote on a scrap of paper, ��My children, courage and prayer,�� put it in the place where she left off, and gave the book to the Duchesse d��Orl��ans to give to her daughters if her life were spared. As she said their names, for once her calmness gave way. The book was wet with her tears, which left their mark upon it always.

FORE:��You astonish me!�� said the Baronne, when the affair was explained to her; ��for at St. Petersburg we were told about it by one of your countrymen, M. L����, who said he knew you very well, and was present at the supper.��

FORE:Anonymous letters filled with abuse and threats poured in upon her; she was told the house would be set on fire in the night, she heard her name cried in the streets, and on sending out for the newspaper being sold, she saw a long story about herself and M. de Calonne, giving the history of an interview they had at Paris the preceding evening! She sent it to Sheridan, who was a friend of hers, begging him to write to the paper saying that she did not know Calonne, and had not been at Paris for many months, which he did.

FORE:

FORE:Before the coronation of Napoleon, the latter said to him, ��Make two large water-colour sketches of the procession with correct costumes, every one in their right place. I will send them to study your designs, which will be exhibited in the great [482] gallery of the Tuileries, so that there may be no confusion.��His life at Vienna was that of a grand seigneur of the most illustrious order, and on New Year��s day and on his f��te, the crowd that flocked to his house to congratulate him was so enormous that he might have been supposed to be the Emperor himself.

FORE:Thus time passed on till she was six-and-twenty, when she formed an intimate friendship with the Marquise de Fontenille, a widow who had come to live in the convent. M. Ducrest, then de Champc��ry, a good-looking man of thirty-seven, who had lately left the army, was a relation of Mme. de Fontenille, and often came to the parloir to see her. He also saw Mlle. de M��zi��res, with whom he fell in love, and whom he proposed to marry. He had a few hundreds a year, the small castle of Champc��ry, and a little property besides; while Mlle. de M��zi��res had less than two thousand pounds, her mother having seized all the rest of the fortune of her father. But such was her unnatural spite against her daughter that she refused her consent for three months, and although she was at last obliged to give it, she would give neither dot, trousseau, nor presents, all of which were provided by the good Abbess.But Pauline knew well enough that the Vicomte de Beaune would never tolerate the presence of La Fayette in his house, nor forgive her if she received them there. Having explained this to her [223] sister, she met her secretly at a little roadside inn where she knew they would stop to change horses.

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