Page:The New Monthly Magazine - Volume 097.djvu/512

496 by us stolid sad-hearted Anglo-Saxons. We have Madame du Chatelet, deep in her books and scientific pursuits, and as much of the stoic as a Frenchwoman of the Louis Quinze era can be supposed, with Voltaire under her roof. We have her curious visitor, Madame de Grafigny, the Peruvian letter-writer extraordinary,—and assist at that poor lady's prompt and curious expulsion from the otium cum dignitate at Cirey. We are introduced to Madame Geoffrin, in her exquisitely neat and modestly simple attire; silver-haired, and not a whit ashamed to be and to seem old; with that upright figure of hers, that mien so dignified and becoming, that mingled air of benignity and thought: heiress to Madame Tencin's tact in salon arrangements, but herself the first to conceive of the salon in all its possibilities of extension and interest—to include among its habitués artists as well as littérateurs, politicians as well as scribes, men of the world as well as poetasters—to make its attraction such, that no "illustrious stranger" could leave Paris without trying to gain admission, and that princes were proud to be accepted there, and broad Christendom glad to send its representatives thither, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south. There we admire the noiseless activity and tranquil moderation of the hostess, and smile at the respectable husband who "assists" in silence, and who realises Coleridge's apple-dumpling-loving guest, and in whose stead Burigny officiates as major-domo—Burigny, one of madame's oldest friends, and therefore one of the best scolded (for it is a rather questionable distinction that celui qu'elle aime le mieux est aussi le mieux grondé). In her we see the Fontenelle of her sex—more benevolent, indeed, than Fontenelle, but his counterpart almost in prudence, art of enjoying and managing life, manner of speaking (by turns familiar, epigrammatic, and ironic without acerbity), and above all, in avoidance of excitement, in dread of all disquieting influences, all disturbing forces, and whatsoever is called ardent and impassioned, whatsoever accelerates the even tenor of the pulse, or flushes the cheek with emotion.

Besides all these, we have presented to us Madame de Caylus, youngest and sprightliest of the Grand Monarque epoch, the pride and torment of her aunt Maintenon, and the first-born of St. Cyr; and Adrienne Lecouvreur, the first French actress who reconciled the hitherto incompatible privileges of success on the boards and "consideration" in society; Ninon and Sophie (de Monnaie) ; the Rousseau-bitten Madame de la Tour, and the circumspect Madame de Lambert; the staid Madame Necker and her impulsive daughter; Marie Antoinette, Mesdames Récamier, Girardin, Dudevant, &c., &c.—a long list, but which we hope to see longer still, by a periodical arrival of new and old candidates for the Monday séances of the gallant critic.

Creation's worser half—the messieurs—he depicts in still greater number and variety; from Philip de Commynes and Rabelais, and Montaigne and Amyot, down to Lamartine, and Villemain, and Jules Janin. Montaigne he describes in his best manner—which is not that of Emerson, whose Michael, the Representative Man, seems quite another person. The philosophic Gascon of the "Causeries" is a Lucian-Aristophanes—blessed with a happy temperament—simple, natural, a man of the people—originally endowed with a deep fund of enthusiasm, vivacity, and tender feeling, which he had corrected by cherished habits