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98 a circumstance which she had not foreseen. In the eighteen months of her sojourn at Coppet, the society which she knew formerly had grown baser. A whole race of parasites had arisen, whose real or fancied interest it was to obtain the favour of Napoleon by denouncing the people whom he detested. A woman, whose name is suppressed, lost no time in informing Napoleon that the road leading to Madame de Staël's dwelling was crowded with her visitors. Immediately one of her friends warned her that a gendarme would probably be sent to her without loss of time. She instantly became a prey to anxiety, an excessive anxiety it is certain, for she was excessive in most things.

She wrote to De Gérando to plead her cause with Talleyrand; she solicited the good offices of Lucian and Joseph Bonaparte; and finally she wrote a passionate but dignified letter to Napoleon himself. Then she waited, in the midst of strangers, and consuming herself with a fiery impatience that made every hour of fresh suspense a torture. She spent the nights sitting up with her maid, listening for the tramp of the horse which was to bring the gendarme and his message. But the gendarme did not arrive; and, worn out with her terrors, Madame de Staël bethought herself of her "beautiful Juliette." That loving and devoted person assured her of a kind welcome at St. Brice, a place about two leagues from Paris. Thither Madame de Staël went, and, finding there a varied and agreeable society, was for the time being cured of her fears. Hearing nothing more about her exile, she persuaded herself that Napoleon had changed his mind; and she returned with some friends to her own lodgings at Maffliers. It is probable enough that some officious courtier again drew her enemy's attention to