TWO:And as to Mme. de Genlis, it appears more than probable that if she had followed the advice of Mme. de Custine, as she promised to do, and remained [393] at the h?tel de Puisieux she would still have been a great literary and social success and also a better and happier woman.
TWO:Mme. Le Brun returned home, but dared not stay there, so she accepted the invitation of her brothers father-in-law, M. de Rivire, in whose house she thought she would be safe, as he was a foreign minister. She stayed there a fortnight, treated as if she were a daughter of the house, but she had resolved to get out of France before it was too late.
TWO:It is satisfactory to know that the brutal, dastardly conduct of the Versailles populace was at any rate punished, in a way they probably had not thought of. The departure of the King and court ruined the place, before so prosperous. The population shrunk to a third of its former numbers.For some years Mme. de Genlis had been dame pour accompagner la Duchesse de Chartres, though it was suggested that it was more the Duke than the Duchess whom she accompanied; but she now exchanged this designation for that of governess to the Princesses of Orlans. The Duchess, who had always longed for a daughter, was delighted with these two and Mme. de Genlis, who wished to have charge of them from the first.
TWO:Lost? Certainly not. I have only just found you, and shall not let you go. I am going to take you to dine with me, my dear Chevalier de Above everything in France ridicule is to be avoided, he had remarked.