Je nai vu luire encor que les feux du matin;The Duc de Chartres wrote to his father saying that he never wished to return to France, and wanted to get leave from the Convention to expatriate himself, but the Duke replied that there was no sense in it, and forbade him to write.
FORE:From her first arrival they set themselves against the Dauphine, they exaggerated the faults and follies which were only those of a thoughtless, wilful child of fifteen, and by their unjustifiable spite gave colour to the infamous and false reports circulated by her enemies. They tried to sow dissension between her and the Comtesse de Provence, hoping by means of his wife to engage their second nephew in a party against her. The fault was chiefly that of Madame Adla?de, for Madame Victoire was far [201] more gentle and easygoing, and Madame Sophie so dreadfully shy and nervous that she was incapable of taking a leading part in anything.In former years, before the marriage of the Queen, [113] Mme. Le Brun had seen her, as a very young girl, at the court of her grandfather, Louis XV., when she was so fat that she was called le gros Madame. She was now pale and thin, whether from the austerities of devotion she now practised, or from her grief at the misfortunes of her family and anxiety for her sister, Madame Elizabeth, and her eldest brother, the King of France.
FORE:After the death of her eldest boy, the sight of this picture so affected the Queen that she had it removed, taking care to explain to Mme. Le Brun that this was done only because she could not bear to see it, as it so vividly recalled the child whose loss was at that time such a terrible grief to her.Capital letter T
FORE:Talliens daughter, one of whose names was Thermidor, married a Narbonne-Pelet. Another daughter, the Marquise de Hallay, inherited her beauty, and was an extraordinary likeness of herself. One of her sons, Dr. Edouard Cabarrus, was with her amongst the rest when she died, and the last words she spoke to her children were in the soft caressing Spanish of her early youth.
FORE:Napoleon had insisted upon his marrying Mme. Grandt, his mistress, who had always received his guests during the loose society lately prevalent: people said that since he had done so, his salon was not nearly so amusing. She was a pretty but extremely stupid person, always making some mistake. On one occasion the celebrated traveller, M. Denon, was going to dine with them, and Talleyrand told her to be sure to talk to him about his travels, adding
FORE:The Duc dOrlans, leaving the room when she came to see them, returned, bringing his young wife, who said graciously, Madame, I have always longed to know you, for there are two things I love passionately, your pupils and your books.
FORE:No one can judge of what society in France was, wrote Mme. Le Brun in her old age, who has not seen the times when after the affairs of the day were finished, twelve or fifteen agreeable people would meet at the house of a friend to finish the evening there.
THREE:All this is not of good omen, said the King, his grandfather, and I dont know how it can have happened that I have made him Duc de Berri; it is an unlucky name. [58]
Mme. de Lawoestine, the elder one, whom she describes as an angelic creature in whom no fault could be seen, died at one and twenty in her confinement. It was a terrible shock to her, and, it appears, also to the husband, although the contents of certain tablets of his wifes, which he found and gave to Mme. de Genlis some days [408] after her death, would seem to imply that he would not be inconsolable.THE theatre was a passion with Mme. Le Brun, and all the more interesting to her from her friendships with some of the chief actors and actresses, and her acquaintance with most of them, from the great geniuses such as Talma, Mlle. Mars, and Mlle. Clairon to the dbutantes like Mlle. Rancourt, whose career she watched with sympathetic interest. For Mme. Dugazon, sister of Mme. Vestris and aunt of the famous dancer Vestris, she had an unmixed admiration; she was a gifted artist and a Royalist heart and soul. One evening when Mme. Dugazon was playing a soubrette, in which part came a duet with a valet, who sang:[214]