Chapter IV: Part 4

Now we will go to Cambray, famous for its cambric and its archbishop. Buonaparte had so much respect for the memory of Fénelon, that he fixed the seat of the present Archbishopric at Cambray instead of at Lille, as had been proposed. We saw Fénelon's head here, preserved in a church. But to return from archbishops to cambrics. Our hostess at Cambray was a dealer in cambrics, and in her bale of _baptistes_ she seemed literally to have her being. She was, in spite of cambric and Valenciennes lace--of which she had a dirty superfluity on her cap lined with pink--the very ugliest of the female species I had ever beheld. We were made amends for her by a most agreeable family who kept the inn at Roye: their ancestors had kept this inn for a hundred and fifty years; the present landlord and his wife are about sixty-eight and sixty, and their daughter, about twenty, of a slight figure, vast vivacity in her mind and in all her motions; she does almost all the business of the house, and seems to love _papa et maman_ better than anything in the world, except talking. My father formed a hundred good wishes for her: first, when he heard her tell a story, she used such admirable variety of action, that he wished her on the stage: then when she waited at supper, with all the nimbleness and dexterity of a female harlequin, he wished that she was married to Jack Langan, that she might keep the new inn at Edgeworthstown: but his last and best wish for her was that she should be waiting-maid to you and Aunt Mary. He thought she would please you both particularly: for my part, I thought she would talk a great deal too much for you. However, her father and mother would not part with her for Pitt's diamond.

We saw to-day the residence of the Prince de Condé, and of a long line of princes famous for virtue and talents--the celebrated palace of Chantilly, made still more interesting to us by having just read the beautiful tale by Madame de Genlis, "Mademoiselle de Clermont;" it would delight my dear Aunt Mary, it is to be had in the first volume of the _Petits Romans_, and those are to be found by Darcy, if he be not drunk, at Archer's, Dublin. After going for an hour and a half through thick, dark forest, in which Virginia might have lived secure from sight of mortal man, we came into open day and open country, and from the top of a hill beheld a mass of magnificent building, shaded by wood. I imagined this was the palace, but I was told that these buildings were only the stables of Chantilly. The Palace, alas! is no more! it was pulled down by the Revolutionists. The stables were saved by a petition from the War Minister, stating that they would make stabling for troops, and to this use they are now applied. As we drove down the hill we saw the melancholy remains of the Palace: only the white arches on which it was built, covered with crumbled stone and mortar. We walked to look at the riding-house, built by the Prince de Condé, a princely edifice! Whilst we were looking at it, we heard a flute played near us, and we were told that the young man who played it was one of the poor Prince de Condé's chasseurs. The person who showed the ruins to us was a melancholy- looking man, who had been employed his whole life to show the gardens and Palace of Chantilly: he is about sixty, and had saved some hundred pounds in the Prince's service. He now shows their ruins, and tells where the Prince and Princess once slept, and where there _were_ fine statues, and charming walks.

We have had but one day's rain since we left you; if we had picked the weather we could not have had finer. The country through which we came from Brussels was for the most part beautiful, planted in side-scenes, after my father's manner, you know. The English who can see nothing worth seeing in this country, must certainly pass through it with huge blinkers of prejudice.

PARIS, _Wednesday._

We arrived about three o'clock, and are lodged for a few days at the Hôtel de Courlande. I forgot to tell you that we saw an officer with furred waistcoat, and furred pockets, and monstrous moustache; he looked altogether very like the Little Gibbon in Shaw's _Zoology_, only the Little Gibbon does not look as conceited as this man did.

We are now, my dear Aunt Mary, in a magnificent hotel in the fine square, formerly Place Louis Quinze, afterwards Place de la Revolution, and now Place de la Concorde. Here the guillotine was once at work night and day; and here died Louis Seize, and Marie Antoinette, and Madame Roland: opposite to us is the Seine and _La Lanterne._ On one side of this square are the Champs Élysées.

_To_ MRS. MARY SNEYD.

PARIS, RUE DE LILLE,

_Oct. 31, 1802._

I left off at the Hôtel de Courlande. We were told there was a fine view of Paris from the leads; and so indeed there is, and the first object that struck us was the Telegraph at work! The first _voiture de remise_ (job-coach in plain English) into which we got, belonged to--whom do you think?--to the Princess Elizabeth. The Abbé Edgeworth had probably been in this very coach with her. The master of this house was one of the King's guards, a Swiss. Our apartments are all on one floor. The day after our arrival M. Delessert, he whom M. Pictet describes as a French Rumford, invited us to spend the evening with his mother and sister. We went: found an excellent house, a charming family, with whom we felt we were perfectly acquainted after we had been in the room with them for five minutes. Madame Delessert, [Footnote: The benevolence of the generous Madame Delessert is said to be depicted in one of the stories in Berquin's _Ami des Enfans._] the mother, an elderly lady of about sixty, has the species of politeness and conversation that my Aunt Ruxton has: I need not say how much I like her. Her daughter, Madame Gautier, has fine large black eyes, very obliging and sensible, well dressed, not at all naked: people need not be naked here unless they choose it. Rousseau's _Letters on Botany_ were written for this lady; he was a friend of the family. She has two fine children of eight and ten, to whose education she devotes her time and talents. Her second brother, François Delessert, about twenty, was educated chiefly by her, and does her great credit, and what is better for her, is extremely fond of her: he seems the darling of his mother, _François mon fils_ she calls him every minute. In his countenance and manners he is something like Henry; he has that sober kind of cheerfulness, that ingenuous openness, and that modest, gentlemanlike ease which pleases without effort, and without bustle. Madame Gautier does not live at Paris, but at a country house at Passy, the Richmond of Paris, about two miles out of town. She invited us to spend a day there, and a most pleasant day we passed. The situation beautiful, the house furnished with elegance and good sense, the society most agreeable. M. Delessert _père_, an old sensible man, the rest of the family, and Madame de Pastoret, [Footnote: Madame de Pastoret is the "Madame de Fleury" of Miss Edgeworth's story. She first established infant schools in France.] a literary and fashionable lady, with something of Mrs. Saunderson's best style of conversation: M. de Pastoret, her husband, a man of diplomatic knowledge; Lord Henry Petty, son of Lord Lansdowne, with whom my father had much conversation; the Swiss Ambassador, whose name I will not attempt to spell; M. Dumont, [Footnote: M. Pierre Etienne Louis Dumont, tutor to Lord Henry Petty (afterwards the famous second Marquis of Lansdowne), had translated Bentham's _Traités sur la Législation_, and _Théorie des Peines et des Récompenses._ He became an intimate friend and much-valued critic of Miss Edgeworth.] a Swiss gentleman, travelling with Lord Henry Petty, very sensible and entertaining, I am sorry that he has since left Paris; M. d'Etaing, of whom I know nothing; and last, but indeed not least, the Abbé Morellet, [Footnote: The author of several works on political economy and statistics; born 1727, died 1819.] of whom you have heard my father speak. O! my dear Aunt Mary, how you would love that man, and we need not be afraid of loving him, for he is near eighty. But it is impossible to believe that he is so old when one either hears him speak, or sees him move. He has all the vivacity, and feeling, and wit of youth, and all the gentleness that youth ought to have. His conversation is delightful, nothing too much or too little; sense, and gaiety, and learning, and reason, and that perfect knowledge of the world which mixes so well but so seldom with a knowledge of books. He invited us to breakfast, and this morning we spent with him. My dearest Aunt Mary, I do wish you had been with us; I know that you would have been so much pleased. The house so convenient, so comfortable, so many inventions the same as my father's. He has a sister living with him, Madame de Montigny, an amiable, sensible woman: her daughter was married to Marmontel, who died a few years ago: she alas! is not at Paris.

My father did not present any of his letters of introduction till yesterday, because he wished that we should be masters and mistresses of our own time to see sights before we saw people. We have been to Versailles--melancholy magnificence--La petite Trianon: the poor Queen! and at the Louvre, or as it is now called, La Musée, to see the celebrated gallery of pictures. I was entertained, but tired with seeing so many pictures, all to be admired, and all in so bad a light, that my little neck was almost broken, and my little eyes almost strained out, trying to see them. We were all extremely interested yesterday seeing what are called Les Monuments Français--all the statues and monuments of the great men of France, arranged according to their dates in the apartments of the ancient Monastery des Augustins. Here we saw old Hugh Capet, with his nose broken, and King Pepin, with his nose flattened by time, and Catherine de Medicis, in full dress, but not in full beauty, and Francis I., and dear Henry IV.

We have been to the Théâtre Français and to the Théâtre Feydau, both fine houses: decorations, etc., superior to English: acting much superior in comedy; in tragedy they bully, and rant, and throw themselves into Academy attitudes too much.

R.L. EDGEWORTH _to_ MISS CHARLOTTE SNEYD.

PARIS, _Nov. 18, 1802._

Maria told you of M. and Madame de Pastoret; in the same house on another floor--for different families here have entire "apartments," you observe the word, in one house--we met M. and Madame Suard: [Footnote: M. Suard was editor of the _Publiciste._] he is accounted one of the most refined critics of Paris, and has for many years been at the head of newspapers of different denominations; at present he is at the head of _La Publiciste._ He is prudent, highly informed, not only in books, but in the politics of different states and the characters of men in all the different countries of Europe. Madame Suard has the remains of much beauty, a _belle esprit_, and aims at singularity and independence of sentiment. Would you believe it, Mr. Day paid his court to her thirty years ago? She is very civil to us, and we go to their house once a week: literati frequent it, and to each of them she has something to say.

At Madame de Pastoret's we met M. Degerando [Footnote: Marie Joseph Degerando, writer on education and philosophy, 1772-1842.] and M. Camille Jordan. Not Camille de Jourdan, the assassin, nor Camille Desmoulins, another assassin, nor General Jourdan, another assassin, but a young man of agreeable manners, gentle disposition, and much information; he lives near Paris, with his Pylades Degerando, who is also a man of much information, married to a pretty sprightly domestic woman, who nurses her child in earnest. Camille Jordan has written an admirably eloquent pamphlet on the choice of Buonaparte as first consul for life; it was at first forbidden, but the Government wisely recollected that to forbid is to excite curiosity. We three have had profound metaphysical conferences in which we have avoided contest and have generally ended by being of the same opinion. We went, by appointment, to Madame Campan's--she keeps the greatest boarding-school in France--to meet Madame Recamier, the beautiful lady who had been nearly squeezed to death in London. How we liked the school and its conductress, who professes to follow _Practical Education_, I leave to Maria to tell you. How we like Madame Recamier is easily told; she is certainly handsome, but there is nothing noble in her appearance; she was very civil. M. de Prony, [Footnote: Gaspard Clair François Marie Riche, baron de Prony, the great mathematician, 1755-1839.] who is at the head of the Engineers des Ponts et Chaussées--civil engineers--was introduced to us by Mr. Watt. I forgot to speak of him; he has just left Paris. M. de Prony showed us models and machines which would have delighted William. M. l'Abbé Morellet's niece next engaged our attention; she and her husband came many leagues to see us; and we met also Madame de Vergennes, Madame de Remusat, and Madame Nansoutit, all people of knowledge and charming manners. Madame Lavoisier and the Countess Massulski, General Kosciusko, Prince Jablounsk_i_, and Princess Jablounsk_a_, and two other Princesses, I leave to Maria. Mons. Edelcrantz, private secretary to the King of Sweden; Mons. Eisenman, a German; Mons. Geofrat, the guardian from Egypt of the Kings of Chaldea and seven Ibises; Mons. de Montmorenci--that great name: the Abbé Sicard, who dines here to-morrow; Mons. Pang, Mons. Bertrant, Mons. Milan, Mons. Dupont, Mons. Bareuil the illuminati man, and Mr. Bilsbury, I leave to her and Charlotte.

MRS. EDGEWORTH _to_ MRS. MARY SNEYD.

PARIS, _Nov. 21, 1802._

Mr. Edgeworth's summary of events closed, I believe, last Thursday. Friday we saw beauty, riches, fashion, luxury, and numbers at Madame Recamier's; she is a charming woman, surrounded by a group of adorers and flatterers in a room where are united wealth and taste, all of modern execution and ancient design that can contribute to its ornament--a strange _mélange_ of merchants and poets, philosophers and parvenus--English, French, Portuguese, and Brazilian, which formed the company; we were treated with distinguished politeness by our hostess, who concluded the evening by taking us to her box at the Opera, where, besides being in company with the most fashionable women in Paris, _we were seen_ by Buonaparte himself, who sat opposite to us in a railed box, through which he could see, but not be seen.

Saturday we saw the magnificent Salle of the Corps Legislatif, and in the evening passed some hours in the agreeable society of Madame de Vergennes and her daughters. Sunday we were very happy at home. Monday morning, just as we were going out, M. Pictet was announced; we neither heard his name nor distinctly recollected his looks, he is grown so fat and looks so well, more friendly no man can be. I hope he perceives we are grateful to him. The remainder of that day was spent in the gallery of pictures, where we met Mr. Rogers, the poet, and Mr. Abercrombie. The evening was spent with M. Pictet at his sister's, an agreeable, well-informed widow, with three handsome daughters. Tuesday we went to the National Library, where we were shown a large number of the finest cameos, intaglios, and Roman and Greek medals, and many of the antiquities brought from Egypt; and in the evening we had again the pleasure of M. Pictet's company, and of the charming Madame de Pastoret, who was so obliging as to drink tea with us. Yesterday we had the pleasure of being at home, when several learned and ingenious men called on us, and consequently heard one of the most lively and instructive conversations on a variety of topics for three hours: as I think it is Mr. Edgeworth's plan to knock you down with names, I will just enumerate those of our visitors, Edelcrantz, a Swede, Molard, Eisenman, Dupont, and Pictet the younger. After they went, we paid a short visit to the pictures and saw the Salle du Tribunat and the Consul's apartments at the Tuileries: on the dressing-table there were the busts of Fox and Nelson. At our return home we saw the good François Delessert and another man, who was the man who took Robespierre prisoner, and who has since made a clock which is wound up by the action of the air on mercury, like that which Mr. Edgeworth invented for the King of Spain. He told us many things that made us stare, and many that made us shiver, and many more that made us wish never to see him again.

In the evening we went to Madame Suard's. Don't imagine that these ladies are all widows, for they have husbands, and in many instances the husband _vaut mieux que la femme._ At Madame Suard's we met the famous Count Lally Tolendal and the Duc de Crillon. This morning Maria has gone with the Pictets to see the Abbé Sicard's deaf and dumb.

Mr. Edgeworth has not yet seen Buonaparte: he goes to-morrow to wait on Lord Whitworth as a preliminary step. It is a singular circumstance that Lord Whitworth, the new Ambassador, has brought to Paris the same horses, and the same wife, and lives in the same house as the last Ambassador did eleven years ago: he has married the widow of the Duke of Dorset, who was here then.

In England many are the tales of scandal that have been related of the Consul and all his family: I don't believe them. A lady told me it was "vraiment extraordinaire qu'un jeune homme comme lui ait de moeurs si exemplaires--et d'ailleurs on ne s'attend pas qu'un homme soit fidèle à une femme qui est plus agée que lui: mais si agée aussi! Il aime la soumission plus que la beauté: s'il lui dit de se coucher à huit heures, elle se couche: s'il faut se lever à deux heures, elle se leve! Elle est une bonne femme, elle a sauvé bien des vies."

Has Maria told you that she has had her _Belinda_ translated into French by the young Count de Segur, an amiable young man of one of the most ancient families of France, married to a grand-daughter of the Chancellor d'Aguesseau? Many people support themselves by writing for journals, and by translating English books, yet the price of literature seems very low, and the price of all the necessaries of life very high. The influx of English has, they say, doubled the price of lodgings and of all luxuries.

MARIA EDGEWORTH _to_ MRS. RUXTON.

PARIS, _Dec. 1, 1802._

I have been treasuring up for some time everything I have seen and heard which I think would interest you; and now my little head is so full that I must empty it, or it would certainly burst. All that I have seen and heard has tended to attach me more firmly to you by the double effect of resemblance and of contrast. Every agreeable person recalls you; every disagreeable, makes me exclaim, how different, etc.

I wish I could paint the different people we have seen in little William's magic-lanthorn, and show them to you. At Madame Delessert's house there are, and have been for years, meetings of the most agreeable and select society in Paris: she has the courage absolutely to refuse to admit either man or woman of whose conduct she cannot approve; at other houses there is sometimes a strange mixture. To recommend Madame Delessert still more powerfully to you, I must tell you that she was the benefactress of Rousseau; he was, it is said, never good or happy except in her society: to her bounty he owed his retreat in Switzerland. She is nobly charitable, but if it were not for her friends no one would find out half the good she does. One of her acts of beneficence is recorded in Berquin's _Ami des Enfans_, but even her own children cannot tell in which story it is. Her daughter, Madame Gautier, gains upon our esteem every day.

Turn the handle of the magic-lanthorn: who is this graceful figure, with all the elegance of court manners, and all the simplicity of domestic virtue? She is Madame de Pastoret. She was chosen preceptress to the Princess in the _ancien régime_ in opposition to the wife of Condorcet, and M. de Pastoret had I forget how many votes more than Condorcet when it was put to the vote who should be preceptor to the Dauphin at the beginning of the Revolution. Both M. and Madame de Pastoret speak remarkably well; each with that species of eloquence which becomes them. He was President of the First Assembly, and at the head of the King's Council: the four other ministers of that council all perished! He escaped by his courage. As for her, the Marquis de Chastelleux's speech describes her: "Elle n'a point d'expression sans grace et point de grace sans expression."

Turn the magic-lanthorn. Here comes Madame Suard and Monsieur, a member of the Academy: very good company at their house. Among others Lally Tolendal, who is exceedingly like Father Tom, and whose real name of Mullalagh he softened into Lally, said to be more eloquent than any man in France; M. de Montmorenci, worthy of his great name.

Push on the magic-lanthorn slide. Here comes Boissy d'Anglas: a fine head! Such a head as you may imagine the man to have who, by his single courage, restrained the fury of one of the National Assemblies when the head of one of the deputies was cut off and set on the table before him.

Next comes Camille Jordan, with great eloquence of pen, not of tongue; [Footnote: Orator and statesman, 1771-1821.] and M. de Prony, a great mathematician, of whom you don't care to know more, but you would if you heard him.

Who comes next? Madame Campan, mistress of the first boarding-school here, who educated Madame Louis Buonaparte, and who professes to keep her pupils entirely separate from servants, according to _Practical Education_, and who paid us many compliments. Teaches drawing in a manner superior to anything I had any idea of in English schools: she gave me a drawing in a gilt frame, which I shall show to you. At Madame Campan's, as my father told you, we met the beautiful Madame Recamier, and at her dinner we met the most fashionable tragic and comic poet, and the richest man in Paris sat beside Charlotte. We went to the Opera with Madame Recamier, who produces a great sensation whenever she appears in public. She is certainly handsome, very handsome, but there is much of the magic of fashion in the enthusiasm she creates.

There is a Russian Princess here, who is always carried in and out of her carriage by two giant footmen, and a Russian Prince, who is so rich that he is never able to spend his fortune, and asks advice how he shall do it. He never thinks, it seems, of _giving_ it away.

Who comes next? Kosciusko, [Footnote: The Polish patriot and leader, 1756-1817.] cured of his wounds, simple in his manners, like all truly great men. We met him at the house of a Polish Countess, whose name I cannot spell.

Who comes next? M. de Leuze, who translated the _Botanic Garden_ as well as it could be translated into Fénelon prose; and M. and Madame de Vindé, who have a superb gallery of paintings, and the best concerts in Paris, and a library of eighteen thousand volumes well counted and well arranged; and what charms me more than either the books or the pictures, a little grand-daughter of three years old, very like my sweet Fanny, with stockings exactly the same as those Aunt Mary knitted for her, and listing shoes precisely like what Fanny used to wear: she sat on my knee, and caressed me with her soft, warm little hands, and looked at me with her smiling intelligent eyes.

_Dec._ 3. Here I am at the brink of the last page, and I have said nothing of the Apollo, the Invalides, or Les Sourds et Muets. What shall I do? I cannot speak of everything at once, and when I speak to you so many things crowd upon my mind.

Here, my dear aunt, I was interrupted in a manner that will surprise you as much as it surprised me, by the coming in of Monsieur Edelcrantz, a Swedish gentleman, whom we have mentioned to you, of superior understanding and mild manners: he came to offer me his hand and heart!!

My heart, you may suppose, cannot return his attachment, for I have seen but very little of him, and have not had time to have formed any judgment, except that I think nothing could tempt me to leave my own dear friends and my own country to live in Sweden.

My dearest aunt, I write to you the first moment, as next to my father and mother no person in the world feels so much interest in all that concerns me. I need not tell you that my father,

Such in this moment as in all the past,

is kindness itself; kindness far superior to what I deserve, but I am grateful for it.

_To_ MISS SOPHY RUXTON.

PARIS, RUE DE LILLE, No. 525,

_Dec. 8, 1802._

I take it for granted, my dear friend, that you have by this time seen a letter I wrote a few days ago to my aunt. To you, as to her, every thought of my mind is open. I persist in refusing to leave my country and my friends to live at the Court of Stockholm, and he tells me (of course) that there is nothing he would not sacrifice for me except his duty: he has been all his life in the service of the King of Sweden, has places under him, and is actually employed in collecting information for a large political establishment. He thinks himself bound in honour to finish what he has begun. He says he should not fear the ridicule or blame that would be thrown upon him by his countrymen for quitting his country at his age, but that he should despise himself if he abandoned his duty for any passion. This is all very reasonable, but reasonable for him only, not for me; and I have never felt anything for him but esteem and gratitude.

* * * * *

Mrs. Edgeworth, however, writes:

* * * * *

Maria was mistaken as to her own feelings. She refused M. Edelcrantz, but she felt much more for him than esteem and admiration; she was exceedingly in love with him. Mr. Edgeworth left her to decide for herself; but she saw too plainly what it would be to us to lose her, and what she would feel at parting from us. She decided rightly for her own future happiness and for that of her family, but she suffered much at the time and long afterwards. While we were at Paris, I remember that in a shop where Charlotte and I were making some purchases, Maria sat apart absorbed in thought, and so deep in reverie, that when her father came in and stood opposite to her she did not see him till he spoke to her, when she started and burst into tears. She was grieved by his look of tender anxiety, and she afterwards exerted herself to join in society, and to take advantage of all that was agreeable during our stay in France and on our journey home, but it was often a most painful effort to her. And even after her return to Edgeworthstown, it was long before she recovered the elasticity of her mind. She exerted all her powers of self-command, and turned her attention to everything which her father suggested for her to write. But _Leonora_, which she began immediately after our return home, was written with the hope of pleasing the Chevalier Edelcrantz; it was written in a style which he liked, and the idea of what he would think of it was, I believe, present to her in every page she wrote. She never heard that he had even read it. From the time they parted at Paris there was no sort of communication between them, and beyond the chance which brought us sometimes into company with travellers who had been in Sweden, or the casual mention of M. Edelcrantz in the newspapers or scientific journals, we never heard more of one who had been of such supreme interest to her, and to us all at Paris, and of whom Maria continued to have all her life the most romantic recollection. I do not think she repented of her refusal, or regretted her decision; she was well aware that she could not have made him happy, that she would not have suited his position at the Court of Stockholm, and that her want of beauty might have diminished his attachment. It was better perhaps that she should think so, as it calmed her mind, but from what I saw of M. Edelcrantz I think he was a man capable of really valuing her. I believe that he was much attached to her, and deeply mortified at her refusal. He continued to reside in Sweden after the abdication of his master, and was always distinguished for his high character and great abilities. He never married. He was, except very fine eyes, remarkably plain. Her father rallied Maria about her preference of so ugly a man; but she liked the expression of his countenance, the spirit and strength of his character, and his very able conversation. The unexpected mention of his name, or even that of Sweden, in a book or a newspaper, always moved her so much that the words and lines in the page became a mass of confusion before her eyes, and her voice lost all power.

I think it right to mention these facts, because I know that the lessons of self-command which she inculcates in her works were really acted upon in her own life, and that the resolution with which she devoted herself to her father and her family, and the industry with which she laboured at the writings which she thought were for the advantage of her fellow-creatures, were from the exertion of the highest principle. Her precepts were not the maxims of cold-hearted prudence, but the result of her own experience in strong and romantic feeling. By what accident it happened that she had, long before she ever saw the Chevalier Edelcrantz, chosen Sweden for the scene of _The Knapsack_ I do not know, but I remember his expressing his admiration of that beautiful little piece, and his pleasure in the fine characters of the Swedish gentleman and peasants.

CHARLOTTE EDGEWORTH _to_ MRS. CHARLOTTE SNEYD.

RUE DE LILLE, CHEZ LE CITOYEN VERBER,

_Dec. 8, 1802._

MY DEAR AUNT CHARLOTTE--One of the great objects of a visit to Paris was, you know, to see Buonaparte; the review is, as you see by the papers, over, and my father has not spoken to the great man--no, he did not wish it. All of our distant friends will be I am afraid disappointed, but some here think that my father's refusal to be presented to him shows a proper pride. All the reasons for this mode of conduct will serve perhaps for debate, certainly for conversation when we return.

Madame Suard says that those societies are most agreeable where there are fewest women: if there were not women superior to her I should not hesitate to assent to her proposition, and I should with pleasure read Madame de Staël's book called _Le Malheur d'être femme._ If, on the contrary, all women were Madame de Pastorets, or Madame Delesserts, or Madame Gautiers, I think I should take up the book with the intention not to be convinced.

Some of the most horrible revolutionists were the most skilled in the sciences, and are held in the utmost detestation by numbers of sensible men who admire their ingenuity and talents. We saw one of these, a teacher at one of the chief Academies, and my father, who was standing near him, heard him, after having been talking on several most amusing and interesting subjects, give one of the deepest sighs he ever heard.

The Abbé de Lille reads poetry particularly well, his own verses in a superior manner: we heard him, and were extremely pleased. He is very old, and so blind that his wife, whom he calls "Mon Antigone," is obliged to lead him.

As you may suppose, we go as often as we can to the Gallery. I thank my dear Aunt Mary for thinking of the pleasure I should have in seeing the Venus de Medicis; she has not yet arrived, but I have seen the Apollo, who did surprise me! On our way here we had seen many casts of him, and I have seen with you some prints: I could not have believed that there could have been so much difference between a copy and the original.

_10th._ You see I am often interrupted. I will introduce you to our company last night at the Delesserts'. All soirées here begin at nine o'clock.

"Madame Edgeworth" is announced:--room full without being crowded--enough light and warmth. M. Delessert _père_ at a card-table with a gentleman who is a partner in his bank, and an elderly lady. There is a warm corner in the room, which is always large enough to contain Madame Delessert and two or three ladies and gentlemen. Madame Delessert advances to receive Madame Edgeworth, and invites her to sit beside her with many kind words and looks. Madame Gautier expresses her joy at seeing us. Now we are seated. M. Benjamin Delessert advances with his bow to the ladies. Madame Gautier, my father, and Maria, get together. M. Pictet, nephew to our dear Pictet, makes his bow and adds a few words to each. "Mademoiselle Charlotte," says Madame Delessert to me, "I was just speaking of you." I forget now what she had been saying, I have only the agreeable idea. Madame Grivel enters, a clever, good-natured little woman, wife to the partner who is at cards. Enter M. François Delessert and another gentleman. How the company divides and changes itself I am not at present supposed to know, for young M. Pictet has seated himself between my mother and me, and has a long conversation with me, in which Madame Grivel now and then joins: she is on the other side of me. Mademoiselle Lullin, our friend Pictet's sister, and his and her virtues are discussed. Physics and meta-physics ensue; harmony, astonishing power of chords in music, glass broken by vibration, dreams, Spain--its manners and government. Young M. Pictet has been there: people there have little to do, because their wants are easily supplied.

Here come tea and cakes, sweetmeats, grapes, cream, and all the goods of life. The lady who was playing at cards now came and sat beside me, amusing me for a long time with a conversation on--what do you think?--Politics and the state of France! M. François repeats some good lines very well. Laughter and merriment. Now we are obliged to go, and with much sorrow we part.

I see I never told you that we saw the Review, and we _saw_ a man on a white horse ride down the ranks; we _saw_ that he was a little man with a pale face, who seemed very attentive to what he was about, and this was all we _saw_ of Buonaparte.

MARIA EDGEWORTH to MISS SOPHY RUXTON.

PARIS, _Dec. 1802._

I add to the list of remarkables and agreeables the Count and Countess de Segur, father and mother to our well-bred translator; [Footnote: Of _Belinda_] she a beautiful grandmother, he a nobleman of the old school, who adds to agreeable manners a great deal of elegant literature. Malouet, the amiable and able councillor of the King, must also be added to your list: we met him yesterday, a fine countenance and simple manners; he conversed freely with my father, not at all afraid of _committing_ himself. In general I do not see that prodigious fear of committing themselves, which makes the company of some English men of letters and reputation irksome even to their admirers. Mr. Palmer, the great man of taste, who has lived for many years in Italy, is here, and is very much provoked that the French can now see all the pictures and statues he has been admiring, without stirring out of Paris. The Louvre is now so crowded with pictures, that many of them are seen to disadvantage. The Domenichino, my Aunt Ruxton's favourite, is not at present _visible._ Several of the finest pictures are, as they say, _sick_, and the physicians are busy restoring them to health and beauty. May they not mar instead of mending! A Raphael which has just come out of their hospital has the eyes of a very odd sort of modern blue. The Transfiguration is now in a state of convalescence; it has not yet made its appearance in public, but we were admitted into the sick-room.

Half Paris is now stark mad about a picture by Guérin of Phèdre and Hippolyte, which they actually think equal to Raphael.

Of the public buildings Les Invalides appears to me the finest; here are all the flags and standards used in battle, or won from foreign nations,--a long-drawn aisle of glory that must create ambition in the rising generation of military in France. We saw here a little boy of nine years old with his tutor, looking at Turenne's monument, which has been placed with great taste, alone, with the single word TURENNE upon the sarcophagus. My father spoke to the little boy and his tutor, who told him he had come to look at a picture in which the heroic action of one of the boy's ancestors is portrayed. We went into the hospital library, and found a circle of old soldiers, sitting round a stove all reading most comfortably. It was a very pleasing and touching sight. One who had lost both his hands, and who had iron hooks at the end of his wrists, was sitting at a table reading _Télémaque_ with great attention; he turned over the leaves with these hooks.

My aunt asks me what I think of French society? All I have seen of it I like extremely, but we hear from all sides that we see only the best of Paris,--the men of literature and the _ancienne noblesse._ _Les nouveaux riches_ are quite a different set. My father has seen something of them at Madame Tallien's (now Cabarus), and was disgusted. Madame Recamier is of quite an opposite sort, though in the first fashion, a graceful and _decent_ beauty of excellent character. Madame de Souza, the Portuguese Ambassadress, is a pretty and pleasing woman, authoress of _Adèle de Senanges_, which she wrote in England. Her friends always proclaim her title as author before her other titles, and I thought her a pleasing woman before I was told that she had pronounced at Madame Lavoisier's an eloquent eulogium on _Belinda._ I have never heard any person talk of dress or fashions since we came to Paris, and very little scandal. A scandalmonger would be starved here. The conversation frequently turns on the new _petites pièces_ and little novels which come out every day, and are talked of for a few days with as much eagerness as a new fashion in other places. They also talk a vast deal about the little essays of criticism. In yesterday's _Journal des Débats_, after a flaming panegyric on Buonaparte, "Et après avoir parlé de l'univers de qui peut-on parler? Des plus grandes des Poètes--de Racine": then follows a criticism on _Phèdre._

We saw the grand Review the day before yesterday from a window that looked out on the court of the Louvre and Place de Carousal. Buonaparte rode down the lines on a fine white Spanish horse. Took off his hat to salute various generals, and gave us a full view of his pale, thin, woebegone countenance. He is very little, but much at ease on horseback: it is said he never appears to so much advantage as on horseback. There were about six thousand troops, a fine show, well appointed, and some, but not all, well mounted. On those who had distinguished themselves in the battle of Marengo all eyes were fixed. While I was looking out of the window a gentleman came in who had passed many years in Spain: he began to talk to me about Madrid, and when he heard my name, he said a Spanish lady is translating _Practical Education_ from the French. She understands English, and he gave us her address that we may send a copy of the book to her.

Mr. Knox, who was presented to Buonaparte, and who saw all the wonderful presentations, says that it was a huddled business, all the world received in a very small room. Buonaparte spoke more to officers than to any one else, affected to be gracious to the English. He said, "L'Angleterre est une grande nation, _aussi bien_ que la France, il faut que nous soyons amis!" Great men's words, like little men's dreams, are sometimes to be interpreted by the rule of contraries.

_To_ MRS. MARY SNEYD.

PARIS, _Jan. 10, 1803._

_Siècle réparateur,_ as Monge has christened this century.

I will give you a journal of yesterday: I know you love journals. Got up and put on our shoes and stockings and cambric muslin gowns, which are in high esteem here, fur-tippets and _fur-clogs_,--GOD bless Aunt Mary and Aunt Charlotte for them,--and were in coach by nine o'clock, drove to the excellent Abbé Morellet's, where we were invited to breakfast to meet Madame d'Ouditot, the lady who inspired Rousseau with the idea of Julie. Julie is now seventy-two years of age, a thin woman in a little black bonnet: she appeared to me shockingly ugly; she squints so much that it is impossible to tell which way she is looking; but no sooner did I hear her speak, than I began to like her; and no sooner was I seated beside her, than I began to find in her countenance a most benevolent and agreeable expression. She entered into conversation immediately: her manner invited and could not fail to obtain confidence. She seems as gay and open-hearted as a girl of fifteen. It has been said of her that she not only never did any harm, but never suspected any. She is possessed of that art which Lord Kames said he would prefer to the finest gift from the queen of the fairies,--the art of seizing the best side of every object. She has had great misfortunes, but she has still retained the power of making herself and her friends happy. Even during the horrors of the Revolution, if she met with a flower, a butterfly, an agreeable smell, a pretty colour, she would turn her attention to these, and for the moment suspend her sense of misery, not from frivolity, but from real philosophy. No one has exerted themselves with more energy in the service of her friends. I felt in her company the delightful influence of a cheerful temper, and soft attractive manners,--enthusiasm which age cannot extinguish, and which spends but does not waste itself on small but not trifling objects. I wish I could at seventy-two be such a woman! She told me that Rousseau, whilst he was writing so finely on education, and leaving his own children in the Foundling Hospital, defended himself with so much eloquence that even those who blamed him in their hearts, could not find tongues to answer him. Once at dinner, at Madame d'Ouditot's, there was a fine pyramid of fruit. Rousseau in helping himself took the peach which formed the base of the pyramid, and the rest fell immediately. "Rousseau," said she, "that is what you always do with all our systems; you pull down with a single touch, but who will build up what you pull down?" I asked if he was grateful for all the kindness shown to him? "No, he was ungrateful: he had a thousand bad qualities, but I turned my attention from them to his genius and the good he had done mankind."

After an excellent breakfast, including tea, chocolate, coffee, buttered and unbuttered cakes, good conversation, and good humour, came M. Cheron, husband of the Abbé Morellet's niece, who is translating _Early Lessons_, French on one side and English on the other. Didot has undertaken to publish the _Rational Primer_, which is much approved of here for teaching the true English pronunciation.

Then we went to a lecture on Shorthand, or _Passigraphy_, and there we met Mr. Chenevix, who came home to dine with us, and stayed till nine, talking of Montgolfier's _bélier_ for throwing water to a great height. We have seen it and its inventor: something like Mr. Watt in manner, not equal to him in genius. He had received from M. de la Poype a letter my father wrote some years ago about the method of guiding balloons, and as far as he could judge he thought it might succeed.

We went with Madame Recamier and the Russian Princess Dalgourski to La Harpe's house, to hear him repeat some of his own verses. He lives in a wretched house, and we went up dirty stairs, through dirty passages, where I wondered how fine ladies' trains and noses could go, and were received in a dark small den by the philosopher, or rather dévot, for he spurns the name of philosopher: he was in a dirty reddish night-gown, and very dirty nightcap bound round the forehead with a superlatively dirty chocolate-coloured ribbon. Madame Recamier, the beautiful, the elegant, robed in white satin trimmed with white fur, seated herself on the elbow of his armchair, and besought him to repeat his verses. Charlotte has drawn a picture of this scene. We met at La Harpe's Lady Elizabeth Foster and Lady Bessborough: very engaging manners.

We were a few days ago at a Bal d'Enfants; this you would translate a children's ball, and so did we, till we were set right by the learned:--not a single child was at this ball, and only half a dozen unmarried ladies: it is a ball given by mothers to their grown-up children. Charlotte appeared as usual to great advantage, and was much admired for her ease and unaffected manners. She danced one English country dance with M. de Crillon, son of the Gibraltar Duke: when she stood up, a gentleman came to me and exclaimed, "Ah, Mademoiselle votre soeur va danser, nous attendons le moment où elle va _paraître._" She appeared extremely well from not being anxious to appear at all. To-day we stayed at home to gain time for letters, etc., but thirteen visitors, besides the washerwoman, prevented our accomplishing all our great and good purposes. The visitors were all, except the washerwoman, so agreeable, that even while they interrupted us, we did not know how to wish them gone.

* * * * *

On the 27th January Mr. Edgeworth received a peremptory order from the French Government to quit Paris immediately. He went with Maria to the village of Passy. Their friend, Madame Gautier, generously offered to them the use of her house there, but they would not compromise her. M. de Pastoret and M. Delessert visited Mr. Edgeworth the next morning, fearless of Buonaparte and his orders, and the day after M. Pictet and M. Le Breton came to say that he could return to Paris. There had been some misapprehension from Mr. Edgeworth having been supposed to be brother to the Abbé Edgeworth. He wrote to Lord Whitworth that he would never deny or give up the honour of being related to the Abbé. Lord Whitworth advised him to state the exact degree of relationship, which he did, and we heard no more of the matter. [Footnote: The Abbé Edgeworth (who called himself M. de Firmont, from the estate possessed by his branch of the family) was first cousin once removed to Mr. Edgeworth, being the son of Essex, fifth son of Sir John Edgeworth, and brother to Mr. Edgeworth's grandfather, Colonel Francis Edgeworth of Edgeworthstown.]

MISS CHARLOTTE EDGEWORTH _to_ C.S. EDGEWORTH. PARIS, _Feb. 21, 1803._

We went yesterday to see the consecration of a Bishop at Nôtre Dame, and here I endured with satisfaction most intense cold for three hours, and saw a solemn ridiculous ceremony, and heard music that went through me: I could not have believed that sounds could have been so fine: the alternate sounds of voices and the organ, or both together, and then the faint, distant murmur of prayers: each peal so much in harmony as to appear like one note beginning softly, rising, rising, rising,--then dying slowly off. There was one man whose voice was so loud, so full and clear, that it was equal to the voices of three men. The church itself is very fine: we were placed so as to see below us the whole ceremony. The solemnity of the manner in which they walked, their all being dressed alike, and differently from the rest of the people, rendered these priests a new set of beings. The ceremony appeared particularly ridiculous, as we could not hear a word that was said, because the church is so large, and we were at too great a distance, and all we could see was a Bishop dressing or undressing, or lying on the ground! The Archbishop of Paris, who performed the chief part of the ceremony, is a man about eighty years of age, yet he had the strength to go through the fatigue which such a ceremony requires for three hours together in very great cold, and every action was performed with as much firmness as a man of fifty could do it, and there was but one part which he left out,--the walking round along with the other bishops with the cross borne before them. We were told that he has often gone through similar fatigue, and in the evening, or an hour after, amused a company at dinner with cheerful, witty conversation: he is not a man of letters, but he has abilities and knowledge of the world. All these men were remarkably tall and fine-looking, some very venerable: there were about sixty assembled. It appears extraordinary that there should not be one little or mean-looking among a set of people who are not like soldiers chosen for their height, and as they must have come from different parts of France. I think there is a greater variety of sizes among the French than among us: if all the people who stand in the street of Edgeworthstown every Sunday were Frenchmen, you would see ten remarkably little for one that you see there, and ten remarkably tall. I think there are more remarkably tall men in Ireland than in England. Maria is writing a story, [Footnote: Miss Edgeworth made a sketch for the story of _Madame de Fleury_ about this time, but did not finish it till long afterwards. The incident of the locked-up children was told to her by Madame de Pastoret, to whom it happened, and Maria took the name De Fleury from M. de Pastoret's country house, the Château de Fleury.] and has a little table by the fire, at which she sits as she used to do at Edgeworthstown for half an hour together without stirring, with her pen in her hand; then she scribbles on very fast. My father intends to present his lock, with a paper giving some account of it, by way of introduction to the society of which he is a member, _La Société pour encourager les arts et metiérs._ I suppose you see in the newspapers that the ancient Academy is again established under the name of the Institute?

MRS. EDGEWORTH _to_ MRS. MARY SNEYD.

PARIS, _Feb. 22, 1803._

The cough you mention has been epidemic here. The thermometer as low as 9° on the morning of the 15th; next day 40°, and the most charming weather has succeeded: the streets have been so well washed by the rain and scraped by the snow-cleaners, that they are actually dry and clean for the first time since October, which is fortunate, as the streets are crowded with people for the carnival, some in masks, some disguised as apothecaries, old women, harlequins, and knights-errant, followed by hundreds and thousands of men, women, and children, to whom they say what they can, generally nonsense devoid of wit.