The life at Belle Chasse was, as she says, delicious. She had supreme authority, she was dispensed from the trouble of paying visits to any one but [403] Mme. de Puisieux; she had her mother and children to live with her; her husband and brother had posts in the household of the Duc de Chartres.
ONE:The man laughed.In Mme. de Genlis he recognised the woman who was supposed to have been concerned in the infamous libels against the Queen; and who, with the wretched galit and his children, was seen watching from the Palais Royal the procession, which, headed by the disloyal La Fayette, and surrounded by the drunken, howling ruffians, his followers, brought the royal family prisoners to Paris.
TWO:
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ONE:
TWO:Their aunt, the Marchale de Mouchy, called then the Comtesse de Noailles, was about this time appointed first lady of honour to the Archduchess Marie Antoinette of Austria, whose approaching marriage with the Dauphin was the great event of the day; and was sent with the other distinguished persons selected to meet her at the frontier. This alliance was very unpopular with the royal family and court, who disliked Austria and declared that country to be the enemy of France, to whom her interests were always opposed. Madame Adla?de especially, made no secret of her displeasure, and when M. Campan came to take her orders before setting off for the frontier with the household of the Dauphin, she said that she disapproved of the marriage of her nephew with the Archduchess, and if she had any order to give it would not be to fetch an Austrian.It speaks well for Lisette that her head was not the least turned and her reputation blameless, considering that at an age when girls in our own day are at their lessons in the schoolroom, she, young, pretty, attractive, and celebrated, was constantly thrown into a society the most corrupt and the most fascinating that has perhaps ever existed.
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ONE:He gave Lisette lessons in oil-painting for which his wife used to come and fetch her. They were so poor that on one occasion when she wished to finish a head she was painting, and accepted their invitation to stay and dine, she found the dinner consisted only of soup and potatoes.
TWO:
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TWO:Why? answered she contemptuously; because I know to what fate you condemn kings!
FORE:Jembrasse la gracieuse souveraine,[65] la sainte Henriette, la ridicule Adla?de la belle Victoire.
FORE:One night, at a masked ball, a young man accidentally in a crowd pushed against a woman, who cried out.
FORE:A fortnight after the marriage she no longer cared about her husband, and soon afterwards she caught the small-pox.The government of Fribourg had begun to annoy Mme. de Tess about her niece, objecting to her receiving her, and Pauline thought it best to go for a time to Constance. While she was [249] there the smuggler returned, having discovered Mme. de Grammont, who was safe in Franche Comt, and had with her the children of the Vicomtesse de Noailles and their faithful tutor. She had written to her father and sister on handkerchiefs sewn inside the smugglers waistcoat, and was thankful to find they were alive; but she could not, as they begged her to do, get out of France just then, as her husband was not sufficiently recovered from an illness to undertake a journey.
FORE:Very near this convent lived the sister of her father, the Marquise de Sercey, and her family, with whom she spent much of her time.
FORE:It was necessary in the next place to look for a permanent abode, and this seemed to be difficult. The apartment in the French Academy was too small, though every one who knows Rome will understand what a temptation its magnificent situation must have been to stay there.
FORE:That she persistently refused proves how much all these professions were worth, and this time she does in her memoirs blame herself for her conduct; in fact, she declares that she felt ever afterwards a remorse that never left her, and that would be eternal; as she considered herself the cause of the death of her husband. If she had gone with him as he entreated her to do and as she acknowledged that she ought to have done, she could have induced him to leave France with her, he had sufficient money to enable them to live comfortably abroad, and his life would have been saved.
FORE:Mme. dAyen had left property in the department of Seine-et-Marne to the children of the Vicomtesse de Noailles, the estate and castle of Lagrange to Mme. La Fayette, an estate between Lagrange and [257] Fontenay to the daughter of Mme. de Thsan, the old castle and lands of Fontenay to Mme. de Montagu, and an estate called Tingri to Mme. de Grammont.
TWO:The three eldest princesses, who had always remained at court, were, Louise-Elizabeth, called Madame; [59] handsome, clever, and ambitious; who was married to the Duke of Parma, Infant of Spain, [169] a younger son of Philip V., consequently her cousin. [60]
FRAN?OIS MARIE AROUET DE VOLTAIREAt a State ball she first saw again the Empress, Marie Thrse, daughter of the Queen of Naples, whom she found much changed in appearance. She had painted her portrait in 1792.Her way of living was very simple; she walked about the park summer and winter, visited the poor, to whom she was most kind and generous, wore muslin or cambric dresses, and had very few visitors. The only two women who came much to see her were Mme. de Souza, the Portuguese Ambassadress, and the Marquise de Brunoy. M. de Monville, a pleasant, well-bred man, was frequently there, and one day the Ambassador of Tippoo Sahib arrived to visit her, bringing a present of a number of pieces of muslin richly embroidered with gold, one of which she gave to Mme. Le Brun. The Duc de Brissac was of course there also, but, though evidently established at the chateau, there was nothing either in his manner or that of Mme. Du Barry to indicate anything more than friendship between them. Yet Mme. Le Brun saw plainly enough the strong attachment which cost them both their lives.In the horrible dungeon in which Trzia was shut up, she could receive no communications from without; but after a day or two she was told by the gaoler that she had leave to go down into the courtyard in the evening, after the lights were out. To whom she owed this consolation she was not told, but the first evening as she stood enjoying the fresh air, a stone fell at her feet, and on picking it up she [322] found a paper with writing fastened to it. As she could not see to read it by the light of the moon, she had to wait till after sunrise next morning, and then, although the writing was disguised, she recognised the hand of Tallien as she read these wordsAt last they heard that the Princesse de Conti was living near Fribourg, and it was arranged that she should take charge of her niece. She wrote an affectionate letter, and sent the Comtesse de Saint-Maurice-de-Pont to Bremgarten to fetch her.
TWO:
