× FORE:��Il en avait trois grisesThe wedding took place in the spring of 1783, before her seventeenth birthday. The presents and corbeille were magnificent, and every day, between the signing of the contract and the marriage, Pauline, in a splendid and always a different dress, received the visits of ceremony usual on these occasions. As her family and her husband��s were related to or connected with every one of the highest rank in France, all the society of Paris passed through the h?tel de Noailles on those interminable evenings, which began at six o��clock and ended with a great supper, while Pauline sat by her mother, and was presented to every one who came.

× FORE:On one occasion the Duc de Richelieu so far departed from his usual habit as to recommend to the Duc de Fronsac a lad who bore a strong resemblance to himself, begging him to give him a post in his household and look after him. Fronsac, struck with jealousy of this prot��g�� of his father��s, did all he could to corrupt and ruin him, taught him to be a gambler and reprobate, and finally led [379] him into collision with himself in some love intrigue, challenged him to a duel, and killed him.

× FORE:

× FORE:She also met an acquaintance, M. Denon, who introduced her to the Comtesse Marini, of whom he was then the cavali��re servente; and who at once invited her to go that evening to a caf��.

× FORE:As to the other daughter, Mme. de Valence, her marriage had turned out just as might have been [409] foretold by any one of common sense. M. de Valence did not change his conduct in the least, he was still one of the most dissipated men in Paris though he never stooped to the dishonour of Philippe-��galit��. He remained always the favourite of Mme. de Montesson, who at her death left her whole fortune to him.Although stupid, M. Geoffrin was harmless, good, and charitable. Their only child, the Marquise de la Fert�� Imbault, adored her father, whom she preferred to her mother. She was a pretty, high-spirited girl, an ardent Catholic, hated her mother��s atheist friends, and always declared that she had forced her into her marriage, which, although a great one, was not a happy one.

× FORE:The great picture of Marie Antoinette and her three children, which under Napoleon had been hidden away in a corner at Versailles, was taken out and exhibited at the Salon, where every one crowded to look at it. Again she painted the portraits of the royal family, contrasting the simple, gracious politeness of the Duchesse de Berri, of whom she did two portraits, with the vulgar, pretentious airs of Caroline Murat.Her love for Tallien was beginning to wane. It had never been more than a mad passion, aroused by excitement, romance, and the strange circumstances which threw them into each other��s way; and kept alive by vanity, interest, gratitude, and perhaps above all by success. She wanted Tallien to be a great power, a great man; and she was beginning to see that he was nothing of the sort. If, when Robespierre fell, instead of helping to set up a government composed of other men, he had seized the reins himself, she would have supported him heart and soul, shared his power, ambition, [339] and danger, and probably her admiration and pride might have preserved her love for him. But Tallien had not the power to play such a part; he had neither brains nor character to sway the minds of men and hold their wills in bondage to his own. And now he was in a position which in any line of life surely bars the way to success: he was neither one thing or the other.

× FORE:The next morning they went to Raincy, where the Duke and M. de Sillery spent the whole of the day with them. The infatuation between the Duke and Mme. de Genlis seems to have been at an end, if we may trust her account of that last day.He was, in fact, a visionary, credulous enthusiast, with an overweening vanity and belief in his own importance; obstinate and self-confident to a degree that prevented his ever seeing the fallacy of his views. His own conceit, and the flattery and adulation of his family and friends, made him think that he, and no other, was the man to save and direct France. His very virtues and attractions [210] were mischievous in converting others to his unpractical and dangerous views.

× FORE:It was decided that the three sisters should meet at Viane, where Pauline and her husband went, with post-horses provided by Mme. de Tess��. It was eight years since Pauline and Rosalie had met, and Pauline said it was a foretaste of Heaven.

× FORE:��Meyerbeer, but that does not tell you much.��