The Women of the French Salons [95]
her surprise at finding her so natural and so kindly. Her conversation was simple and without pretension. When she was pleased, her manners were even affectionate. She never entered into a discussion, confessing that she was not sufficiently attached to any opinion to defend it. She disliked the enthusiasm of the philosophers unless it was hidden behind the arts of the courtier, as in Voltaire, whose delicate satire charmed her. Diderot came once, "eyed her epicurean friends," and came no more. The air was not free enough. When at home she had three or four at supper every day, often a dozen, and, once a week, a grand supper. All the intellectual fashions of the time are found here. La Harpe reads a translation from Sophocles and his own tragedy. Clairon, the actress in vogue, recites the roles of Phedre and Agrippine, Lekain reads Voltaire, and Goldoni a comedy of his own, which the hostess finds tiresome. New books, new plays, the last song, the latest word of the philosophers--all are talked about, eulogized, or dismissed with a sarcasm. The wit of Mme. du Deffand is feared, but it fascinates. She delights in clever repartees and sparkling epigrams. A shaft of wit silences the most complacent of monologues. "What tiresome book are you reading?" she said one day to a friend who talked too earnestly and too long--saving herself from the charge of rudeness by an easy refuge in her blindness.
Her criticisms are always severe. "There are only two pleasures for me in the world--society and reading," she writes. "What society does one find? Imbeciles, who utter only commonplaces, who know nothing, feel nothing, think nothing; a few people of talent, full of themselves, jealous, envious, wicked, whom one must hate or scorn." To some one who was eulogizing a mediocre man, adding that all the world was of the same opinion, she replied, "I make small account of the world, Monsieur, since I perceive that one can divide it into three parts, les trompeurs, les trompes, et les trompettes." Still it is life alone that interests her. Though she is not satisfied with people, she has always the hope that she will be. In literature she likes only letters and memoirs, because they are purely human; but the age has nothing that pleases her. "It is cynical or pedantic," she writes to Voltaire; "there is no grace, no facility, no imagination. Everything is a la glace, hardness without force, license without gaiety; no talent, much presumption."
As age came on, and she felt the approach of blindness, she found a companion in Mlle. de Lespinasse, a young girl of remarkable gifts, who had an obscure and unacknowledged connection with her family. For ten years the young woman was a slave to the caprices of her exacting mistress, reading to her through long nights of wakeful restlessness, and assisting to entertain her guests. The one thing upon which Mme. du Deffand most prided herself was frankness. She hated finesse, and had stipulated that she would not tolerate artifice in any form. It was her habit to lie awake all night and sleep all day, and as she did not receive her guests until six o'clock, Mlle. de Lespinasse, whose amiable character and conversational charm had endeared her at once to the circle of her patroness, arranged to see her personal friends--among whom were d'Alembert, Turgot, Chastellux, and Marmontel--in her own apartments for an hour before the marquise appeared. When this came to the knowledge of the latter, she fell into a violent rage at what she chose to regard as a treachery to herself, and dismissed her companion at once. The result was the opening of a rival salon which carried off many of her favorite guests, notably d'Alembert, to whom she was much attached. "If she had died fifteen years earlier, I should not have lost d'Alembert," was her sympathetic remark when she heard of the death of Mlle. de Lespinasse.
But the most striking point in the career of this worldly woman was her friendship for Horace Walpole. When they first met she was nearly seventy, blind, ill-tempered,
Her criticisms are always severe. "There are only two pleasures for me in the world--society and reading," she writes. "What society does one find? Imbeciles, who utter only commonplaces, who know nothing, feel nothing, think nothing; a few people of talent, full of themselves, jealous, envious, wicked, whom one must hate or scorn." To some one who was eulogizing a mediocre man, adding that all the world was of the same opinion, she replied, "I make small account of the world, Monsieur, since I perceive that one can divide it into three parts, les trompeurs, les trompes, et les trompettes." Still it is life alone that interests her. Though she is not satisfied with people, she has always the hope that she will be. In literature she likes only letters and memoirs, because they are purely human; but the age has nothing that pleases her. "It is cynical or pedantic," she writes to Voltaire; "there is no grace, no facility, no imagination. Everything is a la glace, hardness without force, license without gaiety; no talent, much presumption."
As age came on, and she felt the approach of blindness, she found a companion in Mlle. de Lespinasse, a young girl of remarkable gifts, who had an obscure and unacknowledged connection with her family. For ten years the young woman was a slave to the caprices of her exacting mistress, reading to her through long nights of wakeful restlessness, and assisting to entertain her guests. The one thing upon which Mme. du Deffand most prided herself was frankness. She hated finesse, and had stipulated that she would not tolerate artifice in any form. It was her habit to lie awake all night and sleep all day, and as she did not receive her guests until six o'clock, Mlle. de Lespinasse, whose amiable character and conversational charm had endeared her at once to the circle of her patroness, arranged to see her personal friends--among whom were d'Alembert, Turgot, Chastellux, and Marmontel--in her own apartments for an hour before the marquise appeared. When this came to the knowledge of the latter, she fell into a violent rage at what she chose to regard as a treachery to herself, and dismissed her companion at once. The result was the opening of a rival salon which carried off many of her favorite guests, notably d'Alembert, to whom she was much attached. "If she had died fifteen years earlier, I should not have lost d'Alembert," was her sympathetic remark when she heard of the death of Mlle. de Lespinasse.
But the most striking point in the career of this worldly woman was her friendship for Horace Walpole. When they first met she was nearly seventy, blind, ill-tempered,