Chapter XII: Book V: 218 (3)

Pamphlets and newspapers swarmed in thousands; the satires and poems, the songs of the _Actes des Apôtres_[389] replied to the _Ami du peuple_, or to the _Modérateur_[390] of the Club Monarchien, edited by Fontanes; Mallet Du Pan[391], on the political side of the _Mercure_, was in opposition to La Harpe and Chamfort on the literary side of the same journal. Champcenetz[392], the Marquis de Bonnay, Rivarol[393], Mirabeau the Younger (the Holbein of the sword, who levied on the Rhine the legion of the Hussars of Death), Honoré Mirabeau the Elder amused themselves by drawing caricatures at dinner and composing the _Petit almanach des grands hommes_: Honoré would subsequently go off to move martial law or the seizure of the property of the clergy. He spent the night at Madame Le Jay's[394], after declaring that he would not leave the National Assembly unless driven out at the point of the bayonet. Égalité consulted the devil in the Montrouge stone-quarries, and returned to the Jardin de Monceau to preside over the orgies prepared by Laclos[395]. The future regicide proved himself worthy of his race: he was twice prostituted; debauchery handed him over exhausted to ambition. Lauzun[396], already worn out, supped in his pleasure-house at the Barrière du Maine with dancers from the Opera, caressed indifferently by Messrs. de Noailles, de Dillon[397], de Choiseul, de Talleyrand[398] and other elegants of the time, of whom two or three mummies still survive.

The majority of the courtiers celebrated for their immorality at the end of the reign of Louis XV., and during the reign of Louis XVI., were enlisted under the tricolour banner: almost all of them had been through the American war and had besmirched their ribbons with the Republican colours. The Revolution employed them so long as it remained at a middling height; they even became the first generals of its armies. The Duc de Lauzun, the romantic lover of the Princess Czartoriska, the woman-hunter of the high-road, the Lovelace who "had" this one and then "had" that one, in the chaste and noble cant of the Court; the Duc de Lauzun, becoming Duc de Biron, and commanding the forces of the Convention in the Vendée: the pity of it! The Baron de Besenval[399], the lying and cynical revealer of the corruption of the upper classes, the fly on the wheel of the puerilities of the expiring old monarchy; that ponderous baron, compromised in the affair of the Bastille, and saved by M. Necker and Mirabeau only because he was a Swiss: the disgrace of it! What had such men to do with such events? When the Revolution had attained its full height, it scornfully abandoned these frivolous apostates from the throne: it had needed their vices, it now needed their heads; it disdained no blood, not even that of the Du Barry[400].

*

The year 1790 brought to completion the measures outlined by the year 1789. The property of the Church, first placed in the hands of the nation, was confiscated, the civil constitution of the clergy decreed, the nobility abolished.

[Sidenote: The Federation of July.]

I did not attend the Federation of July 1790: a somewhat serious illness made me keep my bed; but before that I had been much amused by the sight of the wheel-barrows on the Champ de Mars. Madame de Staël has written a wonderful description of that scene[401]. I shall always regret not to have seen M. de Talleyrand say Mass, served by the Abbé Louis[402], as I regret not to have seen him, sword at side, give audience to the Ambassador of the Grand Turk.

Mirabeau forfeited his popularity in the year 1790; his relations with the Court were obvious. M. Necker resigned office and withdrew into private life, none caring to restrain him[403]. Mesdames, the King's aunts, left for Rome with a passport from the National Assembly[404]. The Duc d'Orléans returned from England and declared himself the King's most humble and most obedient servant. Societies of Friends of the Constitution multiplied upon the soil and connected themselves with the parent society, receiving its suggestions and executing its orders.

Public life met with a favourable disposition in my character: I was attracted by what happened in public, because, in the crowd, I beheld my loneliness and had no occasion to combat my shyness. Nevertheless, the salons, sharing as they did in the universal agitation, had become a little less foreign to my mood, and I had made new acquaintances in spite of myself.

The Marquise de Villette I had met casually. Her husband[405], who bore a slandered reputation, wrote with Monsieur, the King's brother, in the _Journal de Paris._ Madame de Villette, still charming, lost a daughter of sixteen, more charming than her mother, upon whom the Chevalier de Parny wrote some verses worthy of the Anthology[406].

My regiment, which was in garrison at Rouen, preserved its discipline pretty late. It had an encounter with the mob on the subject of the execution of the actor Bordier[407], who underwent the last sentence pronounced by the parliamentary power; hanged one day, he would have been a hero the next, had he lived twenty-four hours longer. But at last the insurrection showed itself among the soldiers of the Navarre Regiment. The Marquis de Mortemart emigrated; his officers followed him. I had neither adopted nor rejected the new opinions; I was as little disposed to attack as to serve them, was unwilling either to emigrate or to continue in the military career, and I resigned my commission.

Freed from all bonds, I had, on the one side, somewhat animated discussions with my brother and the President de Rosanbo; on the other, discussions no less embittered with Ginguené, La Harpe, and Chamfort. From my early youth, my political impartiality pleased nobody. Besides, I attached importance to the questions then raised only through general ideas concerning the liberty and dignity of the human race; personal politics bored me; my real life lay in higher regions.

The streets of Paris, blocked with people night and day, were no longer suited to my lounging inclinations. To recover the desert, I took refuge in the theatre: I ensconced myself at the back of a box and allowed my thoughts to wander to the sound of Racine's[408] verses, Sacchini's[409] music, or the Opera ballets. I must have had the courage to see _Barbe-bleue_[410] and the _Sabot perdu_[411] twenty times in succession at the Italiens, courting tedium in order to dispel it, like an owl in a hole in a wall; while the monarchy fell, I heard neither the cracking of the venerable vaults nor the screeching of the vaudeville, neither Mirabeau's voice thundering in the tribune nor Colin's singing to Babet on the stage:

Qu'il pleuve, qu'il vente ou qu'il neige,
Quand la nuit est longue, ou l'abrège[412].

Madame Ginguené sometimes sent M. Monet, the director of mines, and his young daughter to disturb my unsociable mood: Mademoiselle Monet took her seat in the front of the box; I sat, half pleased, half grumbling, behind her. I do not know whether she attracted me, whether I liked her; but I was very much afraid of her. When she was gone, I regretted her, while rejoicing at no longer seeing her. Still, I sometimes went, with the perspiration standing on my brow, to fetch her for a walk: I gave her my arm, and I believe I pressed hers a little.

One idea governed me, the idea of going to the United States: a useful object was wanting for my voyage; I proposed, as I have said in the Memoirs and in several of my works, to discover the North-West Passage. This plan was not out of keeping with my poetic nature. No one troubled himself about me; I was at that time, like Bonaparte, a slim sub-lieutenant, entirely unknown; both of us emerged from obscurity at the same period, I to seek renown in solitude, he to seek glory among mankind. I had not attached myself to any woman, and my sylph still possessed my imagination. I placed before myself the bliss of realizing my fantastic wanderings in her company in the forests of the New World. Through the influence of a new manifestation of nature, my flower of love, my nameless phantom of the woods of Armorica, grew into _Atala_ beneath the shady groves of Florida.

[Sidenote: The North-West passage.]

M. de Malesherbes excited me on the subject of this voyage. I went to see him in the mornings: we sat, with our noses glued to maps; we compared the different plans of the Arctic Circle; we calculated the distances between Behring's Straits and the furthermost part of Hudson's Bay; we read the different narratives of the travellers and navigators, English, Dutch, French, Russian, Swedish, Danish; we enquired into the roads to be followed on land to reach the shores of the Polar Sea; we discussed the difficulties to be overcome, the precautions to be taken against the rigours of the climate, the attacks of wild animals, the scarcity of food. This illustrious man said to me:

"If I were younger, I would go with you, I would spare myself the sight of all the crimes, meannesses and madnesses which I see about me. But, at my age, a man must die where he stands. Do not fail to write to me by every ship, to keep me informed of your progress and your discoveries: I will commend them to the ministers. It is a great pity that you know no botany."

After these conversations, I would peruse Tournefort[413], Duhamel[414], Bernard de Jussieu[415], Grew[416], Jacquin, Rousseau's[417] Dictionary, the _Flores élementaires_; I ran to the Jardin du Roi, and before long thought myself a very Linnæus[418].

At last, in January 1791, I seriously made up my mind. The chaos was increasing: it was sufficient to bear an "aristocratic" name to be exposed to persecution: the more moderate and conscientious your opinions the more were you liable to suspicion and annoyance. I therefore resolved to strike my tents: I left my brother and my sisters in Paris, and made for Brittany.

At Fougères I met the Marquis de La Rouërie: I asked him to give me a letter for General Washington[419]. "Colonel Armand" (the name by which the marquis was known in America) had distinguished himself in the American War of Independence. He made himself famous in France through the royalist conspiracy which made such touching victims in the Desilles[420] family. He having died while organizing this conspiracy, his body was disinterred and recognized, and caused the misfortune of his hosts and of his friends. The rival of La Fayette and Lauzun, the predecessor of La Rochejacquelein, the Marquis de La Rouërie was a more spirited person than they: he had fought oftener than the first; he had carried off opera-singers like the second; he would have become the companion in arms of the third. He swept the woods in Brittany in company with an American major[421], and with a monkey seated on his horse's crupper. The Rennes law-students loved him for his boldness of action and his liberty of ideas: he had been one of the twelve Breton nobles sent to the Bastille. His figure and manners were elegant, his appearance smart, his features charming, and he resembled the portraits of the young lords of the League.

[Sidenote: I embark for America.]

I selected Saint-Malo as my port of embarkation, in order to embrace my mother. I have told you in the third book of these Memoirs how I passed through Combourg and of the sentiments that oppressed me. I stayed two months at Saint-Malo, busying myself with preparations for my departure, as I had done before, when I was thinking of departing for the Indies.

I struck a bargain with a captain called Dujardin[422], who was to carry to Baltimore the Abbé Nagault[423], superior of the seminary of Saint-Sulpice, and several seminarists under the conduct of their head. These travelling companions would have been more to my liking four years earlier: from being a zealous Christian I had become "a man of strong mind[424]," in other words a man of weak mind. This change in my religious opinions had been brought about by reading philosophical books. I believed in good faith that a religious mind was in part paralyzed, that there existed truths which it was unable to comprehend, superior though it might be in other respects. This blessed pride imposed upon me; I inferred in the religious mind that very absence of a faculty which exists precisely in the philosophic mind: the narrow intelligence thinks that it sees everything because it keeps its eyes open; the superior intelligence consents to close its eyes, because it sees everything within. Lastly, one thing finished me: the groundless despair which I carried at the bottom of my heart.

A letter from my brother has fixed the date of my departure in my memory: he wrote to my mother from Paris, informing her of the death of Mirabeau[425]. Three days after the arrival of this letter, I joined the ship lying in the roads[426]; my luggage was already on board. The anchor was weighed, a solemn moment with mariners. The sun was setting when the coasting pilot left us, after putting us through the channels. The weather was overcast, the wind slack, and the swell beat heavily upon the rocks at a few cables' length from our vessel.

My eyes remained fixed upon Saint-Malo, where I had left my mother in tears. I saw the steeples and domes of the churches where I had prayed with Lucile, the walls, the ramparts, the forts, the towers, the beach where I had spent my childhood with Gesril and my other play-fellows; I was abandoning my distracted country at the moment when she had lost a man who could never be replaced. I was going away in equal uncertainty as to my country's destinies and my own: which of us was to perish, France or I? Should I ever see France and my family again?

With nightfall came a calm which kept us lying at the mouth of the roads; the lights of the town and the beacons were kindled: those lights which twinkled beneath my paternal roof seemed at once to smile to me and bid me farewell, while lighting me amid the rocks, the darkness of the night, and the blackness of the waves.

I carried with me only my youth and my illusions: I was deserting a world whose dust I had trod and whose stars I had counted for a world of which the soil and the sky were both unknown to me. What was to become of me if I attained the object of my voyage? While I roamed upon the polar shores, the years of discord which have crushed so many generations with so loud a noise would have fallen silently over my head; society would have renewed its aspect in my absence. It is probable that I should never have had the misfortune to write; my name would have remained unknown, or would have won only a peaceful renown of the kind which is less than glory, which is scorned by envy and left to happiness. Who knows whether I would have recrossed the Atlantic, whether I would not have settled down among the solitudes explored and discovered at my peril and risk, like a conqueror in the midst of his conquests!

[Sidenote: We set sail.]

But no, I was to return to my native land, there to undergo altered miseries, to become something quite different from what I had been! The sea in whose lap I was born was about to become the cradle of my second life; she bore me upon my first voyage as though in the bosom of my foster-mother, in the arms of the confidant of my first tears and my first pleasures.

The ebb-tide, in the absence of the wind, carried us out to sea; the lights of the shore grew smaller and smaller, and disappeared. Exhausted with my reflections, with vague regrets, with even vaguer hopes, I went below to my cabin: I lay down to rest, rocked in my hammock to the sound of the billows which caressed the side of the vessel. The wind rose; the unfurled sails, which hung flapping about the masts, filled out, and when, next morning, I went up on deck, the land of France was out of sight.

Here toy destinies changed: "Again to sea!" as Byron sings.

[218] This book was written in Paris between June and December 1821, and revised in December 1846.--T.

[219] The _Moniteur_ of Sunday 29 April 1821 contains the following, under the heading, Paris, 28 April: "M. le Vicomte de Chateaubriand, French Minister Plenipotentiary in Berlin, arrived in Paris on the day before yesterday." The Duc de Bordeaux was christened at Notre-Dame on the 1st of May 1821.--B.

[220] Villèle left the Cabinet on the 27th of July 1821; Chateaubriand resigned his ambassadorship on the 31st of July.--B.

[221] Marigny has greatly changed since my sister occupied it. It has been sold and now belongs to Messieurs de Pommereul, who nave rebuilt it and much improved it.--_Author's Note._

[222] Antoine Auguste Bruzen de Lamartinière (1662-1746), compiler of the _Dictionnaire géographique, historique et critique._ He was born and spent his youth at Dieppe, and was the nephew of Richard Simon (_vide infra_).--T.

[223] Richard Simon (1638-1712), an early Rationalist, author of a number of works on the Old and New Testaments, which were promptly condemned by the Holy See.--T.

[224] Jean Pecquet (1610-1674), discoverer of the chyle reservoir or _réservoir de Pecquet._--T.

[225] See Madame de Sévigné's letters of 22 December 1664, January 1665, 19 November 1670, and 11 July 1672.--B.

[226] The district of Caux, in Upper Normandy, which includes Dieppe, is noted for the beauty of its women and the singularity of their head-dresses.--T.

[227] Renée Élisabeth de La Belinaye (1728-1816), eldest daughter of Armand Magdelon Comte de La Belinaye, and sister of Thérèse de La Belinaye who married Anne Joseph Jacques Tuffin de La Rouërie, and was the mother of the Marquis Armand de La Rouërie, the famous conspirator.--B.

[228] Jean Baptiste Isoard (1743-1816), known as Delisle de Sales, and nicknamed Diderot's Ape. Nevertheless, and although certain of his philosophical treatises were indicted and burned, he fought against Atheism and Materialism. His works ran into scores of volumes and made no mark whatever.--T.

[229] Or "villas," as we should say nowadays.--T.

[230] Claude Marie Louis Emmanuel Carbon de Flins des Oliviers (1757-1806) edited the _Journal de la Ville et des Provinces, ou le Modérateur_ with Fontanes, and produced, not without success, a number of comedies in verse.--B.

[231] Jean Baptiste Britard (1721-1791), known as Brizard, a well-known player of heavy fathers and kings. He retired on the 1st of April 1786.--B.

[232] François Joseph Talma (1763-1826) made his first appearance in 1787, and is regarded as the greatest actor of his day. Napoleon Bonaparte admitted him to his intimacy, and twice paid his debts. He had been educated in England, knew English perfectly, and played in London on more than one occasion.--T.

[233] Jean Mauduit de Larive (1749-1827) held the stage at the Français until eclipsed by Talma, when he retired and opened a school of declamation. He accompanied Joseph Bonaparte to Naples as reader in 1806, and built the hamlet of Larive on his property at Montlignon, near Montmorency.--T.

[234] Joseph Abraham Bénard (1750-1822), known as Fleury, a very popular light-comedy actor.--T.

[235] François René Molet (1734-1802), known as Molé, another player of light-comedy parts, principally those then known as fats and _petits-maîtres_: fops and dandies. He was an active member of the Comédie Française for forty-two years, from 1760 to the day of his death.--T.

[236] Henri Gourgaud (1714-1809), known as Dugazon, played comic men-servants' parts. He was the brother of Madame Vestris, the tragic actress.--T.

[237] Jean Baptiste Fouchard de Grandménil (1737-1816) gave up the bar for the stage. He excelled in _rôles à manteaux_ or mysterious strangers' parts. He was a member of the Academy of Fine Arts, and professor at the Conservatoire.--T.

[238] Mademoiselle Contat (1760-1813), a very perfect and versatile actress, who created the part of Suzanne in Beaumarchais' _Mariage de Figaro_ in 1784. She married M. de Parny, nephew to the poet.--T.

[239] Mademoiselle Saint-Val the younger. Her elder sister had left the Comédie Française in 1779.--B.

[240] Jeanne Adélaïde Gérardine Olivier (1765-1787), a native of London. A very charming actress; she was scarcely nineteen when she created the part of Chérubin in the _Mariage de Figaro_, achieving a success almost equal to that of Mademoiselle Contat as Suzanne.--B.

[241] Anne Françoise Hippolyte Boutet (1779-1847), known as Mademoiselle Mars, one of the most famous of French comic actresses. She made her first appearance at the Théâtre Montansier when thirteen years of age, in 1792, and did not definitely leave the stage until 1841, when she was sixty-two. She created over one hundred parts at the Théâtre Français alone, which she joined in 1798.--T.

[242] Jacques Marie Boutet (1745-1811), known as Monvel, an exceedingly intelligent actor. He commenced by playing Mold's parts at the Comédie Française, and in later life made a successful heavy father at the Théâtre de la République. He also wrote a number of successful comedies and comic operas, and under the Empire became a professor at the Conservatoire and a Member of the Institute.--T.

Monvel was the father of Mademoiselle Mars by a provincial actress called Marguerite Salvetat, who acted under the name of Madame Mars, whence the daughter took her stage-name.--B.

[243] Now the Théâtre du Palais-Royal.--B.

[244] Parny was born in the Île Bourbon.--T.

[245] I here omit some lines quoted from Parny.--T.

[246] Jacques Necker (1732-1804), Controller-General from 1776 to 1781, 1788 to 1789, and 1789 to 1790.--T.

[247] Ginguené was accredited as Ambassador of the French Republic at Turin in the early part of 1798. By affectation of simplicity, and also doubtless from economy, he caused his wife to be dispensed from appearing at the audiences in Court dress. He did not lose an hour before dispatching a special courier to carry the great piece of news to the Foreign Minister: the Citizeness Ambassadress had appeared in a _pet-en-l'air!_ Within a very few days, Talleyrand had signed Ginguené's recall.--B.

A _pet-en-l'air_ is a very vulgar term for a short morning gown.--T.

[248] The _Décade philosophique_, founded 10 Floréal Year II. (29 April 1794). Ginguené was its editor-in-chief. In 1804, after the Empire had been established, it changed its title to that of _Revue philosophique, littéraire et politique._ It ceased to appear in 1807.--B.

[249] Ponce Denis Escouchard Le Brun (1729-1807), nicknamed the French Pindar, a versatile poet and epigrammatist, who sang by turns, and with equal fervor, the Monarchy, the Republic, and the Empire. Ginguené edited and published his Collected Works in 1811.--T.

[250] For an account of this "classical supper," see the Recollections of Madame Vigée-Lebrun. Le Brun recited imitations of Anacreon, crowned with Pindar's laurels.--B.

[251] It is true that Le Brun wrote trenchant versus against Bonaparte, but he kept them to himself, and took care to publish those in which he extolled him. Bonaparte awarded him a pension of 6000 francs.--B.

[252] Chamfort was his adopted name. He never knew his real name nor that of his father.--T.

[253] Jacques Delille (1738-1813) translated the _Georgics_, the _Æneid_, and _Paradise Lost_ into French verse. He had a facile talent for versification, and was admitted to the French Academy in 1774. He appears to have been in orders, and undoubtedly for some time held the abbey of Saint-Séverin, but he never followed an ecclesiastical career, and he married after the Revolution.--T.

[254] Claude Carloman de Rulhière (1735-1791) was elected to the Academy in 1787. He commenced life as aide-de-camp to the Marshal de Richelieu in Guyenne. He then became secretary to the Baron de Breteuil, whom he accompanied on his embassy to Russia in 1760. In 1765, having meantime enjoyed a pension of 6000 francs for that purpose, he completed his _Histoire de la révolution de Russie en 1762._ This work, however, could not be published during the lifetime of Catherine II., and it eventually saw the light in 1797, six years after the death of the author. He published some poetry, in addition to the above and other historical works.--T.

[255] The Comtesse d'Egmont was the daughter of the Maréchal de Richelieu, and it was she who urged Rulhière to adopt a literary career.--B.

[256] Charles Palissot de Montenoy (1730-1814), author of a number of more or less polemical comedies, poems, and historical works.--T.

[257] Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais (1732-1799), author of the _Barbier de Séville_, the _Folle Journée, ou le Manage do Figaro, Tarare_, &c.--T.

[258] Jean François Marmontel (1723-1799), author of the _Contes moraux_ and a large number of miscellaneous and voluminous works.--T.

[259] Marie Joseph de Chénier (1764-1811), the poet, brother of André de Chénier. Chateaubriand succeeded to his chair at the Institute.--T.

[260] Urquhart and Motteux' RABELAIS, Book II. chap. 6: _How Pantagruel met with a Limosin, who affected to speak in learned phrase._--T.

[261] Pierre de Ronsard (1524-1585), the leading French poet of his day, but also noted for a pedantic affectation of erudition and a barbarous neologism which made Boileau say of him:

Que sa muse en français parla grec et latin.

("That his muse, speaking French, talked in Latin and Greek").--T.

[262] Chateaubriand wrote this page in June 1821; Fontanes had died on the 17th of March previous.--B.

[263] Rosanbo was guillotined on 1 Floréal Year II. (20 April 1794).--B.

[264] These are the four leading magisterial or parliamentary families of France under the Old Order. The Lamoignons produced Guillaume de Lamoignon (1617-1677), First President of the Parliament of Paris (1658-1677), himself the son of a chief justice; his sons Chrétien François de Lamoignon, a chief justice (1690) and Nicolas Lamoignon de Baville (1648-1724), Counsellor to the Parliament (1670), Master of Requests (1675), and lastly, Intendant of Languedoc; Guillaume de Lamoignon, Seigneur de Malesherbes, Chancellor of France (1750-1768), son of Chrétien François; his son, Chrétien Guillaume de Malesherbes (1721-1794), the famous minister and counsel for Louis XVI. at the King's trial; and Chrétien François Lamoignon (_d._ 1789), Chief Justice of the Parliament of Paris (1758) and Chancellor in 1787, great-grandson of the first Guillaume de Lamoignon. His son, Christian de Lamoignon, was created a peer of France, and died in 1827; in him the family of Lamoignon became extinct. The Molés held chief-justiceships from 1602 to the Revolution. The more remarkable members of the family were Édouard Molé (1558-1641), its founder, son of a counsellor to the Parliament, himself successively a counsellor, Procurator-General, and Chief Justice of the Parliament of Paris (1602); Matthieu Molé (1584-1656), his son, counsellor (1606), Procurator-General (1614), Chief Justice (1641) and Keeper of the Seals (1650); and more recently Matthieu Louis Molé (1781-1855), son of the President Molé de Champlatreux, Minister of Justice under Bonaparte (1813), who created him a count of the Empire, Minister of Marine (1815-1818) under the Restoration, when he became a peer of France, Foreign Minister (1830-1836), and Premier (1836-1839) under Louis Philippe. In 1840 he was elected a member of the French Academy. Of the Séguiers, Pierre Séguier (1504-1580) was an advocate, Advocate-General, and Chief Justice; his son, Antoine Séguier (1552-1626), was a counsellor to the Parliament, Advocate-General, and Ambassador of Henry IV. at Venice; Pierre Séguier (1588-1672), grandson of the first Pierre, was Intendant of Guyenne, Keeper of the Seals (1633), and Chancellor (1635); Antoine Louis Séguier (1726-1791) was Advocate-General to the Grand Council and subsequently to the Parliament (1755-1790) and a member of the French Academy (1757); and his son, Matthieu Séguier (_d._ 1848), was for many years a chief justice. Henri François d'Aguesseau (1688-1751) was the son of an intendant of Limousin, and was Chancellor of France from 1717 to 1718, 1720 to 1722, and 1737 to 1750.--T.

[265] _Cf. inter alia_, the character of the Présidente de Tourvel in Choderlos de Laclos' _Liaisons dangereuses._--T.

[266] This must be a slip of the pen. Malesherbes had only two daughters: Marie Thérèse, born 1756, who married, in 1769, Louis Le Peletier, Seigneur de Rosanbo, and Françoise Pauline, born 1758, who married, in 1775, Charles Philippe Simon de Montboissier-Beaufort-Canillac, commanding the Orléans Regiment of Dragoons.--B.

[267] The President de Rosanbo's three daughters married the Comte de Chateaubriand, the author's brother, the Comte Lepelletier d'Aulnay, and the Comte de Tocqueville. The last was made a lord of the Bed-chamber and a peer of France by Charles X., and was the father of Alexis de Tocqueville, author of the _Démocratie en Amérique._--B.

[268] Louis Le Peletier, Vicomte de Rosanbo (1777-1858) was created a peer of France on the same day as Chateaubriand, 17 August 1815, and together with the latter, retired from the Upper House in August 1830, refusing to take the oath to the usurper.--B.

[269] Navigated in recent years by Captain Franklin and Captain Parry.--(_Author's Note_ Geneva, 1831).

[270] René Nicolas Maupeou (1714-1792) succeeded his father in 1768 as Chancellor of France. In 1771 he banished the Parliament of Paris and installed in its stead the King's Privy Council, which was derisively nicknamed the "Maupeou Parliament" by the public, and which continued in power until the death of Louis XV. in 1774, when the Parliament was restored and Maupeou banished in his turn.--T.

[271] Of the royal edicts.--T.

[272] Charles Alexandre de Calonne (1734-1802), Controller-General of Finance (1783-1787).--T.

[273] Armand Marc Comte de Montmorin-Saint-Hérem (1746-1792), Minister of Foreign Affairs under Necker, and killed in the massacres of September.--T.

[274] Étienne Charles de Loménie, Comte de Brienne (1727-1794), successively Bishop of Condom, Archbishop of Toulouse, Archbishop of Sens, and a cardinal. In 1787 he was appointed Controller-General, and soon after became Prime Minister. He was arrested in 1793 and died in prison in 1794.--T.

[275] Anne of Brittany (1476-1514), daughter and heiress of Duke François II., was first married by proxy to the Emperor Maximilian I. The marriage was not consummated, and in 1491 Anne married King Charles VIII. of France. Charles died in 1498, and in 1499 his widow married his cousin and successor, Louis XII.--T.

[276] Charles of Blois, son of Margaret, sister of Philip VI., married in 1337 Joan of Penthièvre, daughter of Guy, and niece of John III., Duke of Brittany, on the understanding that he was to succeed to the latter's estates. Upon the death of John in 1341, a war broke out between Charles and the Count of Montfort (_vide infra_) which lasted until 1364, when Charles was slain at the Battle of Auray.--T.

[277] John Count of Montfort, brother of John III. Duke of Brittany, assumed the title of John IV. He died in 1345, and was succeeded by his son John V., who eventually entered into possession of the Duchy.--T.

[278] Letter to Madame de Grignan, 5 August 1671.--T.

[279] M. de Sévigné, her son.--_Author's Note._

[280] A play upon words: a _roué_ is a rake and also one broken on the wheel.--T.

[281] Bertrand Barère de Vieuzac(1755-1841), President of the Convention during the trial of Louis XVI., and member of the Committee of Public Safety (1793-1795).--T.

[282] A Suisse, or porter.--T.

[283] This duel took place _circa_ 1735 between Jean François de Kératry, a younger son from Cornouaille, not Morbihan, and the Marquis, not Comte, de Sabran.--B.

[284] A large proportion of Breton names commence with Ker: one says a "Ker" of Brittany as who should say a "Tre, Pol, or Pen" of Cornwall or a "Thwaite" of Westmoreland.--T.

[285] St. Corentin was the first titular Bishop of Cornouaille (or Quimper), which see was created by King Gallon, or Grallon, Mur, or the Great, not "three centuries before Christ," but towards the close of the fifth century A.D.--B.

[286] Giuseppe Balsamo (1743-1795), known as Alessandro Conte di Cagliostro, the conjurer, and one of the leading spirits in the affair of the Necklace.--T.

[287] Friedrich Anton Mesmer (1734-1815), the discoverer of animal magnetism.--T.

[288] Louis Anne Pierre Geslin, Comte (not Marquis) de Trémargat (_b._ 1749), a naval officer and knight of St. Louis.--B.

[289] Henri Charles Comte de Thiard-Bissy (1726-1794), a lieutenant-general and principal equerry to the Duc d'Orléans. In February 1787 he succeeded M. de Montmorin in his post of King's Commandant in Brittany. He was guillotined on the 26th of July 1794.--B.

[290] The twelve gentlemen sent to the Bastille, 15 July 1788, were the Marquis de La Rouërie, the Comte de La Fruglaye, the Marquis de La Bourdonnaye de Montluc, the Comte de Trémargat, the Marquis de Corné, the Comte Godet de Châtillon, the Vicomte de Champion de Cicé, the Marquis Alexis de Bedée, the Chevalier de Guer, the Marquis du Bois de La Feronnière, the Comte Hay des Nétumières, and the Comte de Becdelièvre-Penhouët. Their captivity was anything but harsh, and lasted under two months, from 15 July to 12 September 1788.--B.

[291] Gabriel Comte Cortois de Pressigny (1745-1823). He emigrated in 1791; on the Restoration he was sent as a special envoy to the Holy See. In 1816 he was created a peer of France, and in 1817 appointed Archbishop of Besançon.--B.

[292]

"Along the avenue
The devil went so fast
That he was lost to view
Before an hour had passed."--T.

[293]

"The beautiful maid became a duck,
Became a duck, became a duck,
And through a lattice off she flew
To a pond where duck-weed grew."--T.

[294] Pierre and François Guillaume de La Saudre. The Château de Bonnaban is still one of the finest seats in the neighbourhood of Saint-Malo. It is now the property of the Comte de Kergariou.--B.

[295] The Briantais, at Saint-Servan, on the banks of the Rance, was at that time the property of the Picot de Prémesnil family, and now belongs to M. Lachambre, a late member of the Chamber of Deputies.--B.

[296] The Bosq and the Montmarin faced each other on opposite banks of the Rance: the former at Saint-Servan, the latter at Pleurtuit. Both belonged to the opulent family of Magon.--B.

[297] The Balue, at Saint-Servan, also belonged to the Magons.--B.

[298] The Colombier, at Paramé, was the property, in 1788, of the Eon de Carissan family.--B.

[299] The Château de Lascardais was the principal residence of M. and Madame de Chateaubourg. It is in the commune of Mézières, canton of Saint-Aubin-du-Cormier, Arrondissement of Fougères (Ille-et-Vilaine) and is now occupied by Madame la Vicomtesse de Breil de Pontbriand, the Comtesse de Chateaubourg's grand-daughter.--B.

[300] Le Plessis-Pillet is in the commune of Dourdain, canton of Liffré, Arrondissement of Fougères.--B.

[301] Saint-Aubin-du-Cormier is twelve miles S.E. of Fougères. The tower is a very tall one. The battle referred to is that in which La Trémoille defeated the Bretons and the revolted Duc d'Orléans (afterwards Louis XII.) in 1488.--T.

[302] Robert Lambert Livorel (not Livoret) entered the Company of Jesus in 1753, at the age of eighteen. He was a coadjutor brother at Rennes College at the time of the suppression of the Company in 1762.--B.

[303] Louis Bruno Comte de Boisgelin (1734-1794), Knight of St. Louis and of the Holy Ghost, and holder of several Court and military appointments. He was guillotined on the 7th of July 1794; his wife, a sister of the Chevalier de Boufflers, ascended the scaffold on the same day.--B.

[304] François Bareau de Girac (1736-1820).--B.

[305] The name of Keralieu does not figure upon the lists of the States of 1788-1789, nor is it to be found in the Breton peerages. Doubtless the name should read Kersalaün. A duel did, in fact, take place between M. de Kersalaün and a young citizen of Rennes, Joseph Marie Jacques Blin. Jean Joseph Comte de Kersalaün was the eldest son of the Marquis de Kersalaün, the senior member of the Parliament. He was forty-five, and therefore much "older" than his adversary, who was only twenty-four years of age.--B.

[306] Captain René François Joseph de Montbourcher (1759-1835). His name was pronounced Montboucher, as Chateaubriand spells it.--B.

[307] Louis Pierre de Guehenneuc de Boishue (1767-1789) eldest son of Jean Baptiste René de Guehenneuc, Comte de Boishue. He was therefore only twenty-one years of age when he was killed, on the 27th of January 1789, in the streets of Rennes, at the same time as young Saint-Riveul (on whom see note _ante_).--B.

[308] The sacking of the house of Reveillon, the paper manufacturer of the Rue Saint-Antoine, took place 28 April 1789.--T.

[309] 4 May 1789.--T.

[310] 20 June 1789.--T.

[311] 30 June 1789.--T.

[312] Camille Desmoulins (1760-1794) delivered his famous harangue, at the conclusion of which he distributed leaves from the trees overhead to the rioters as a rallying-token, in the Palais-Royal on the 12th of July 1789. He was guillotined 5 April 1794--T.

[313] 30 June 1789.--B.

[314] Honoré Gabriel Riquetti, Comte de Mirabeau (1749-1791), represented the Third Estate of the town of Aix in the National Assembly.--T.

[315] Louis Auguste Le Tonnelier, Baron de Breteuil (_b._ 1733) was head of the Royal Household and Governor of Paris when placed at the head of this short-lived ministry.--T.

[316] Victor François Maréchal Duc de Broglie (1718-1804) became Minister of War. He was a distinguished soldier, and had been created a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire in 1759 by the Emperor of Germany in recognition of his services in the war against Prussia. The title is still borne by the heads of both branches of the Broglie family.--T.

[317] Arnaud de La Porte (1737-1792), Intendant-General of the Navy. In 1790 he was appointed Intendant of the Civil List, and distinguished himself by his fidelity and firmness in the King's cause, notably at the time of the arrest at Varennes. He perished on the scaffold in 1792.--T.

[318] Joseph François Foullon (1715-1789) was appointed Controller-General of Finance on the 12th of July and hanged from a lantern in the Rue de la Verrerie on the 22nd, thus becoming one of the first victims of the Revolution.--T.

[319] Armand Marc Comte de Montmorin-Saint-Hérem (_d._ 1792) was Minister of Foreign Affairs in Necker's cabinet. In 1791 he received the portfolio of the Interior. He perished in the massacres of September 1792.--T.

[320] César Guillaume de la Luzerne (1738-1821), Bishop of Langres, created a cardinal in 1817.--T.

[321] François Emmanuel Guignard, Comte de Saint-Priest (1735-1821), Minister of the Interior, created a Peer of France in 1815.--T.

[322] Louis Jules Mancini-Mazarini, Duc de Nivernais (1716-1798).--T.

[323] Charles Henri Sanson (_b._ 1739), appointed public executioner in 1778 by Louis XVI., who died by his hand fifteen years later.--B.

[324] Antoine Simon (_d._ 1794), cobbler and member of the Paris Commune, appointed tutor to Louis XVII., 1 July 1793, guillotined 28 July 1794.--B.

[325] Marie Thérèse of France (1778-1851), daughter of Louis XVI., married in 1799 her cousin the Duc d'Angoulême, second son of the Comte d'Artois, later Charles X.--T.

[326] "Of my birth I have the splendour."--T.

[327] Louis Duc de Normandie (1785-1795), second son of Louis XVI., became Dauphin on the death of his elder brother, and was recognised as King of France by the emigrants and the foreign Powers after the execution of his father. He died a wretched death in the Temple, 8 June 1795.--T.

[328] Louis Philippe Joseph, fifth Duc d'Orléans (1747-1793), nicknamed Philippe Égalité, voted for the King's death, and was himself guillotined, 6 November 1793.--T.

[329] In a speech made on the 9th of January 1816, preparatory to the general mourning ordered for the 21st, the anniversary of the execution of Louis XVT.--B.

[330] Charles Eugène of Lorraine, Duc d'Elbeuf, Prince de Lambesc (1754-1825), a kinsman of Marie Antoinette, whom he accompanied to France, becoming colonel of the regiment known as Royal-Allemand. After his trial and acquittal for charging the people at the Tuileries, he emigrated and took service in the Austrian army, rising to the rank of Lieutenant-Field-Marshal in 1796. He continued to live in Vienna after the Restoration, and died there, childless, in 1825, one of the branches of the House of Lorraine dying out with him.--T.

[331] Bernard René Jourdan, Marquis de Launey (1740-1789), Captain-Governor of the Bastille.--B.

[332] Jacques de Flesselles (1721-1789), provost of the merchants of Paris.--T.

[333] An unsavoury eminence, between the Faubourg Saint-Martin and the Faubourg du Temple, on which stood a number of gibbets, erected early in the fourteenth century.--T.

[334] After a lapse of fifty-two years, fifteen bastilles are being built in order to oppress the liberty in whose name the first Bastille was destroyed.--_Author's Note_ (Paris, 1841).

[335] Marie Paul Joseph Gilbert de Motier, Marquis de La Fayette (1757-1834) had taken a leading part in the assistance rendered by the French to the American Revolution. He was outlawed in 1792, fled, was captured by the Austrians, and imprisoned, for his complicity in the French Revolution, in the citadel of Olmütz, until 1797. This foreign captivity doubtless saved him from the native guillotine. He took no part in public affairs until the Restoration, when he sat in the Chamber of Deputies as a member of the opposition. In 1830, after the Orleanist usurpation he for the second time received the command of the National Guard.--T.

[336] Jean Sylvain Bailly (1736-1793) was a member of the French Academy and of the Academy of Science, and keeper of the picture-gallery at Versailles. He became the first president of the National Assembly, having presided at the occasion of the Oath of the Tennis Court, and was the first Mayor of Paris. His popularity left him in 1791, after his endeavour to suppress the riotous meetings in the Champ-de-Mars; he resigned the mayoralty and quitted Paris. In 1793, he was recognised at Melun, brought back to Paris, and guillotined (11 November).--T.

[337] Yolande Martine Gabrielle, Duchesse de Polignac (1749-1793), _née_ de Polastron, wife of the Comte Jules, later Duc de Polignac, governess of the Children of France, and favourite of Marie Antoinette. She was the mother of the Prince de Polignac who became minister to Charles X.--T.

[338] Louis Antoine, Duc d'Angoulême (1775-1844), and Charles Ferdinand, Duc de Berry (1778-1820).--T.

[339] Louis Joseph Prince de Condé (1736-1818), his son Louis Henri Joseph Duc de Bourbon (1756-1830), and his grandson Louis Antoine Henri Duc d'Enghien (1772-1804).--T.

[340] The King's aunts, daughters of Louis XV.: Madame Adélaïde (1732-1800) and Madame Victoire (1733-1799). They emigrated in 1791.--T.

[341] Madame Élisabeth (1764-1794), the King's sister, guillotined 10 May 1794.--T.

[342] Louis Stanislas Xavier Comte de Provence (1755-1824); succeeded to the Crown in 1795 as Louis XVIII. "Monsieur" is the title of the eldest brother of the King of France.--T.

[343] Médéric Louis Élie Moreau de Saint-Méry (1750-1819), chairman of the electors of Paris. He was arrested after the 10th of August 1792, but succeeded in making good his escape.--B.

[344] Trophine Gérard Marquis de Lally-Tolendal (1751-1830), delegate of the nobles of Paris to the States-General. He too escaped from the Abbaye after his arrest in August, and took refuge in England, whence he wrote to the Convention in order to obtain the honour (eventually awarded to Malesherbes) of defending Louis XVI. He was created a peer of France under the Restoration, and made a member of the French Academy; in 1817 he received his marquisate, the original title of the family being Comte de Lally and Baron Tollendal in Ireland.--T.

[345] Jean Paul Marat (1744-1793), the famous demagogue of the Terror.--T.

[346] Louis Bénigne François Bertier de Sauvigny (1742-1789), Intendant of Paris, and son-in-law to Foullon. He was hanged from a lantern after being made to kiss the head of his father-in-law, who had just met with the same fate.--T.

[347] Taboureau des Réaux, Intendant of Valenciennes, was Controller-General from October 1776 to June 1777.--B.

[348] Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de L'Aulne (1727-1781), Controller-General from 1774 to 1776.--T.

[349] Alexandre Frédéric Jacques Masson, Marquis de Pezay (1741-1777), commenced life as an officer of Musketeers, and made his name known by means of some trivial drawing-room verse and of his inferior prose translations of Tibullus, Catullus, and Propertius. He was charged with the duty of instructing Louis XVI., then Dauphin, in elementary tactics, managed to insinuate himself into the Prince's intimacy, and eventually succeeded in bringing about the fall of Terray and the rise of Necker.--T.

[350] The _Compte rendu au Roi_ was a sort of specimen budget published by Necker in 1780, from which public opinion was for the first time enabled to form an opinion of the working of the administration of the public revenues, till then kept secret. The _Compte rendu_ caused a prodigious sensation.--B.

[351] Antoine Leonard Thomas (1732-1785), a member of the French Academy, and a man of letters noted for rhetoric and over-emphasis of style. Chateaubriand's allusion is to the excessive optimism of the _Compte rendu_, which showed a very large surplus.--T.

[352] Anne Louise Germaine Baronne de Staël-Holstein (1766-1817), the most famous of women-writers. She married the Baron de Staël-Holstein, Swedish Ambassador to France, in 1786. He died in 1802, and eight years later she was married for the second time, but secretly, to a young officer, M. de Rocca. In 1815 she obtained two million francs from Louis XVIII., by way of a restitution of moneys due to her father.--T.

[353] Louis Marie Vicomte de Noailles (1756-1804), second son of Philippe de Noailles, Marshal Duc de Mouchy, and brother-in-law of La Fayette. He took part in the French expedition to the United States, and pronounced himself in favour of the Revolution in 1789. He sat in the States-General as deputy for the nobility of the bailiwick of Nemours.--T.

[354] Armand Désiré de Wignerod-Duplessis-Richelieu, Duc d'Aiguillon (1731-1800), representative of the nobility of the seneschalty of Agen in the States-General, and son of the Duc d'Aiguillon, Prime Minister to Louis XV.--T.

[355] Matthieu Jean Félicité Vicomte, later Duc de Montmorency-Laval (1767-1826), had also imbibed his revolutionary opinions in the American Campaign. He abandoned them, however, at the Restoration, under which he became a peer of France, Minister of Foreign Affairs, a member of the French Academy, and a duke. In January 1826 he was appointed governor to the Duc de Bordeaux, but died a few weeks later.--T.

[356] In the Opera-house, 1 October 1789.--T.

[357] When Louis XVI. entered the hall, M. de Canecaude, commissary of the King's Military Household, ordered the band-master to play Grétry's "_Où peut-on être mieux qu'au sein de sa famille?_" "Where is greater happiness found than in one's family circle?" The band-master replied that he had not the music, and played, "_Ô Richard! ô mon Roi, l'univers t'abandonne_:" "O Richard, O my King, the world is forsaking thee," from Richard Cœur-de-Lion by the same composer.--B.

[358] Vice-Admiral Charles Hector Comte d'Estaing (1729-1794) was a member of both forces, and had seen much service both on sea and land. He embraced the side of the Revolution, and was at this time Commandant of the National Guard. He was guillotined 28 April 1794.--T.

[359] Marat's paper was first published 12 September 1789, with the title the _Publiciste parisien._ With the sixth issue, that is, on 17 September 1789, the title was changed to the _Ami du peuple, ou le Publiciste parisien._--B.

[360] The paper money of the French Republic, "assigned" upon the spoils of the clergy, &c.--T.

[361] Thomas Mahi, Marquis de Favras (1744-1790), was accused of conspiring to assassinate La Fayette, Necker, and Bailly, and to carry off Louis XVI. in order to place him at the head of an anti-revolutionary army. He was condemned to be hanged, and executed 19 February 1790--T.

[362] The so-called cahiers or note-books consisted of the official instructions of the electors to the deputies to the States-General.--T.

[363] The original name of the Riquettis de Mirabeau was Arrighetti.--T.

[364] Victor Riquetti, Marquis de Mirabeau (1715-1789). He joined the economists, advocated liberty, and called himself the Friend of Men, after the title of his principal work, the _Ami des hommes_: nevertheless he proved himself the tyrant of his family, a bad husband, and a bad father. He died on the eve of the capture of the Bastille, 13 July 1789.--T.

[365] Jean Antoine Joseph Charles Elzéar de Riquetti (1717-1794). He adopted the title of _bailli_ in 1763, on becoming a grand-cross of the Order of Malta, and was thenceforth known as the Bailli de Mirabeau.--B.

[366] Louis de Rouvroy, Duc de Saint-Simon (1675-1755), author of the famous Memoirs.--T.

[367] Reine Philiberte Marquise de Villette (_d._ 1822), _née_ Roupt de Varicourt, was adopted by Voltaire at the instance of his niece, Mme. Denis. She called him uncle; he called her "_Belle et bonne_," and married her in 1777 to the Marquis de Villette (_vide infra_, p. 178).--T.

[368] Isaac René Guy Le Chapelier (1754-1794), one of the most capable members of the Constituent Assembly, and a founder of the Club Breton, later the Club des Jacobins. He was guillotined 22 April 1794.--T.

[369] Sophie Marquise de Monnier (1760-1789), _née_ Ruffei. For eloping with her, Mirabeau was imprisoned for nearly four years, 1777-1780, at Vincennes by _lettre-de-cachet_ obtained at his father's instance. His letters to Sophie from Vincennes, written in a style of exalted sentiment, were published in 1792 in 4 vols. 8vo. The lady herself was locked up in a convent until the death of her husband, a man very much her senior. She eventually committed suicide because of the infidelity of one of her lovers.--T.

[370] Riquetti, not Riquet, instead of Mirabeau. It was in the account of the sitting in which titles of nobility were abolished that the journalist, in conformity with that abolition, dropped Mirabeau's territorial title, and wrote of him by his patronymic of Riquetti.--B.

[371] André Boniface Louis Riquetti, Vicomte de Mirabeau (1754-1792), the Comte de Mirabeau's younger brother, nicknamed Mirabeau-Tonneau, because of his stoutness, to distinguish him from his brother, Mirabeau-Tonnerre.--T.

[372] M. de Lautrec de Saint-Simon was not a member of the Constituent Assembly, but acted as one of Mirabeau-Tonneau's seconds in his duel with the Duc de Liancourt.--B.

[373] Maximilien Marie Isidore Robespierre (1759-1794), the leader of the Terror.--T.

[374] The Château de Montaigne stood on a hill near the village of Saint-Michel, five leagues from Bergerac, in Guyenne. Montaigne was on one occasion captured by marauders and likely to be shot. His good-humour won not only his release but the restoration of the property of which he had been robbed (_Cf._ MONTAIGNE, Booke III. chap. 12: _Of Physiognomy_).--T.

[375] Laurent Marshal Marquis Gouvion-Saint-Cyr (1764-1830), later a distinguished officer in the armies of the Republic and the Empire. He would appear to have achieved no great success as either an amateur or professional actor.--T.

[376] L'_Autre Tartufe, ou, la Mère Coupable_, a prose drama in five acts, produced 6 June 1792.--B.

[377] The four leading and accomplished singers in the Italian _Opera Buffa_ company which first played in the Salle des Machines at the Tuileries and later, when the Royal Family came to occupy the palace, at the Théâtre de Monsieur, renamed Théâtre de la Rue Feydeau.--B.

[378] Louise Rosalie Lefèvre (1755-1821), wife of the actor Dugazon, a brilliant performer of amoureuses or leading ladies at the Théâtre Italien, later Opéra Comique, in the Rue Favart.--T.

[379] Jeanne Charlotte Dame d'Herbey (1764-1850), _née_ Schrœder, known as Madame Saint-Aubin, a player of _ingénues'_ parts at the Opéra Comique.--B.

[380] Marie Gabrielle Malagrida (1763-1818), known as Carline, and married to Nivelon, the dancer at the Opera. She played _soubrettes_ charmingly at the Théâtre Italien, but her acting was better than her singing: she had a very small voice.--B.

[381] Chateaubriand is mistaken here. He is writing of the theatres in 1789 and 1790, whereas Mademoiselle Olivier died in 1787.--B.

[382] André Ernest Modeste Gréry (1741-1813), the famous composer.--T.

[383] Marguerite Françoise Comtesse de Buffon (1767-1808), _née_ de Bouvier de Cépoy, and wife of Georges Louis Marie Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, son of the great writer. She was the mistress of Philippe Égalité, to whom she bore a son who was killed when fighting in the English army in the Peninsula. The Comte de Buffon was guillotined 10 July 1794. In 1798 his widow married M. Renouard de Bussières, a Strasburg banker.--B.

[384] The town-house of Louis Alexandre Duc de La Rochefoucauld (1735-1792).--T.

[385] Pauline Marie Michelle Frédérique Ulrique Comtesse de Beaumont (1768-1803), _née_ de Montmorin-Saint-Hérem, wife of the Comte Christophe François de Beaumont.--B.

[386] Anne Louise Dame de Shrilly, _née_ Thomas, wife of Antoine Jean François de Megret de Sérilly. Her husband and brother-in-law were guillotined in 1794. Her own death-sentence was commuted owing to the fact that she was pregnant In 1795 she married François de Pange, who died in September 1796.--B.

[387]

"Arras' candle so sacred and bright,
The torch that from far Provence came,
Although they afford us no light,
Are setting our fair France aflame;
We cannot touch them, no doubt.
But hope to snuff both of them out."

Robespierre was deputy for Arras, Mirabeau for Aix, the old capital of Provence.--T.

[388] Pierre de L'Éstoile (1540-1611) Grand-Crier to the French Chancery, and author of a valuable diary of the times of Henry III. and Henry IV.--T.

[389] The _Actes des Apôtres_ was published from November 1789 to October 1791; 311 numbers were issued in all. Its principal contributors were Peltier, Rivarol, Champcenetz, Mirabeau the younger, the Marquis de Bonnay, François Suleau, Montlosier, Bergasse, &c.--B.

[390] The _Journal de la Ville et des Provinces, ou, le Modérateur_, edited by M. de Fontanes, first appeared 1 October 1789.--B.

[391] Jacques Mallet-Dupan (1749-1800), political editor of the _Mercure de France._ He left France in 1792, returned first to his native city, Geneva, and then settled in London, where he founded the Mercure britannique (1799).--T.

[392] The Chevalier de Champcenetz (1759-1794), one of the wittiest Royalist partisans under the Revolution; arrested and murdered in 1794.--T.

[393] Antoine Comte de Rivarol (1753-1801), a brilliant and caustic wit.--T.