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1745, Mdlle. Céline was "leading lady" at the Théâtre Français. She was a very beautiful woman, twenty-five years old, and of irreproachable character. Mddle. Céline was only her stage name, inasmach as she was the wife of Philippe de Quillac, late a lieutenant in the Royal Bodyguard, and now an actor of small parts in the theatre of which his wife was a distinguished ornament. De Quillac was a young man of good family, and of some small fortune. He honestly fell in love with Céline while he was still a lieutenant in the army, and honestly married her, and as a consequence of this social down-step (for actors and actresses were held as little better than outcasts in those days), he had to resign his commission. Having nothing better to do, he took to the stage, for which, it must be admitted, he had no special talent. Nevertheless, his own industry, backed by his wife's influence, obtained for him an engagement at the Français—a consummation which he had earnestly desired to bring about, in order that he might be constantly at his wife's side. In truth, she stood greatly in need of a protector, for the Duc de Richelieu had condescended to make two