ONE:The French Ambassador, Count dEsterhazy, said that he would come at ten and take her to djeuner with his wife, who was just then living at Czarskoiesolo. For the first time during her wandering life from court to court, Lisette felt intimidated, and trembled. This was so different from any of her former experiences. At every other court she had been en pays de connaissance. Austrian society was very like Parisian, Rome was the centre of Christendom, the sovereigns of the lesser Italian states were the near relations of her own King and Queen, their religion was the same.
JETIS - Elegant Responsive HTML5 Template
ONE:But what to Mme. Le Brun was of great importance during her stay at Antwerp was a portrait by Rubens, the famous Chapeau de Paille, then in a private collection, where she saw and was fascinated by it. The effect of light and shade caused by the arrangement of the two different lights, the ordinary [50] light and the sunlight, was what chiefly struck her, and having studied the picture with deep attention she proceeded, on returning to Brussels, to paint her own portrait with the same kind of effect: wearing a straw hat with a wreath of wild flowers, and holding a palette in her hand.* * * * *
JETIS - Elegant Responsive HTML5 Template
ONE:The Empress was not in the least like what she had imagined. Short and stout, though exceedingly dignified, her white hair was raised high above her forehead, her face, still handsome, expressed the power and genius which characterised her commanding personality, her eyes and her voice were gentle, and her hands extremely beautiful. She had taken off one of her gloves, expecting the usual [126] salute, but Lisette had forgotten all about it till afterwards when the Ambassador asked, to her dismay, if she had remembered to kiss the hand of the Empress.
JETIS - Elegant Responsive HTML5 Template
ONE:At this moment the gaoler returned, accompanied by the aide-de-camp for whom Tallien had sent.
JETIS - Elegant Responsive HTML5 Template
ONE:The family of Noailles was a large and powerful one, and, as Louis XVIII. remarks in his Mmoires, Les Noailles ... etaient unis comme chair et ongle, [53] and having been loaded with favours by Louis XIV. and Louis XV., seemed to think they had a natural right to all the best posts and highest honours. [54]Pauline took refuge with Mme. Le Rebours who was just establishing herself there with her family. She found letters from her mother and sister, a month old, telling her of the death of her great aunt, the Comtesse de la Mark, and her grandfather, the Duc de Noailles. Here she also heard of the murder of the Queen, and all these hardships and shocks made her very ill.
JETIS - Elegant Responsive HTML5 Template
