Madame RÉcamier.—Her Morning Parties.—GÉrard's Picture of Corinne.—Miniature of Madame de StaËl.—M. de ChÂteaubriand.—Conversation on the degree in which the French Language is understood by Foreigners.—The necessity of speaking French.

Of all the ladies with whom I have become acquainted in Paris, the one who appears to me to be the most perfect specimen of an elegant Frenchwoman is Madame RÉcamier,—the same Madame RÉcamier that, I will not say how many years ago, I remember to have seen in London, the admired of all eyes: and, wonderful to say, she is so still. Formerly I knew her only from seeing her in public, where she was pointed out to me as the most beautiful woman in Europe; but now that I have the pleasure of her acquaintance, I can well understand, though you who know her only by the reputation of her early beauty may not, how and why it is that fascinations generally so evanescent are with her so lasting. She is, in truth, the very model of all grace. In person, manner, movement, dress, voice, and language, she seems universally allowed to be quite perfect; and I really cannot imagine a better mode of giving a last finish to a young lady's study of the graces, than by affording her an opportunity of observing every movement and gesture of Madame RÉcamier.

She is certainly a monopolist of talents and attractions which would suffice, if divided in ordinary proportions, to furnish forth a host of charming women. I never met with a Frenchman who did not allow, that though his countrywomen were charming from agrÉmens which seem peculiarly their own, they have fewer faultless beauties among them than may be found in England; but yet, as they say, "Quand une FranÇaise se mÊle d'Être jolie, elle est furieusement jolie." This mot is as true in point of fact as piquant in expression;—a beautiful Frenchwoman is, perhaps, the most beautiful woman in the world.

The perfect loveliness of Madame RÉcamier has made her "a thing to wonder at:" and now that she has passed the age when beauty is at its height, she is perhaps to be wondered at still more; for I really doubt if she ever excited more admiration than she does at present. She is followed, sought, looked at, listened to, and, moreover, beloved and esteemed, by a very large circle of the first society in Paris, among whom are numbered some of the most illustrious literary names in France.

That her circle, as well as herself, is delightful, is so generally acknowledged, that by adding my voice to the universal judgment, I perhaps show as much vanity, as gratitude for the privilege of being admitted within it: but no one, I believe, so favoured could, when speaking of the society of Paris, omit so striking a feature of it as the salon of Madame RÉcamier. She contrives to make even the still-life around her partake of the charm for which she is herself so remarkable, and there is a fine and finished elegance in everything about her that is irresistibly attractive: I have often entered drawing-rooms almost capable of containing her whole suite of apartments, and found them infinitely less striking in their magnificence than her beautiful little salon in the Abbaye-aux-Bois.

The rich draperies of white silk, the delicate blue tint that mixes with them throughout the apartment,—the mirrors, the flowers,—all together give an air to the room that makes it accord marvellously well with its fair inhabitant. One might fancy that Madame RÉcamier herself was for ever vouÉe au blanc, for no drapery falls around her that is not of snowy whiteness—and indeed the mixture of almost any colour would seem like profanation to the exquisite delicacy of her appearance.

Madame RÉcamier admits morning visits from a limited number of persons, whose names are given to the servant attending in the ante-room, every day from four till six. It was here I had the pleasure of being introduced to M. de ChÂteaubriand, and had afterwards the gratification of repeatedly meeting him; a gratification that I shall assuredly never forget, and for which I would have willingly sacrificed one-half of the fine things which reward the trouble of a journey to Paris.

The circle thus received is never a large one, and the conversation is always general. The first day that I and my daughters were there, we found, I think, but two ladies, and about half a dozen gentlemen, of whom M. de ChÂteaubriand was one. A magnificent picture by GÉrard, boldly and sublimely conceived, and executed in his very best manner, occupies one side of the elegant little salon. The subject is Corinne, in a moment of poetical excitement, a lyre in her hand, and a laurel crown upon her head. Were it not for the modern costume of those around her, the figure must be mistaken for that of Sappho: and never was that impassioned being, the martyred saint of youthful lovers, portrayed with more sublimity, more high poetic feeling, or more exquisite feminine grace.

The contemplation of this chef-d'oeuvre naturally led the conversation to Madame de StaËl. Her intimacy with Madame RÉcamier is as well known as the biting reply of the former to an unfortunate man, who having contrived to place himself between them, exclaimed,—"Me voilÀ entre l'esprit et la beautÉ!"

To which bright sally he received for answer—"Sans possÉder ni l'un ni l'autre."

My knowledge of this intimacy induced me to take advantage of the occasion, and I ventured to ask Madame RÉcamier if Madame de StaËl had in truth intended to draw her own character in that of Corinne.

"Assuredly ..." was the reply. "The soul of Madame de StaËl is fully developed in her portrait of that of Corinne." Then turning to the picture, she added, "Those eyes are the eyes of Madame de StaËl."

She put a miniature into my hand, representing her friend in all the bloom of youth, at an age indeed when she could not have been known to Madame RÉcamier. The eyes had certainly the same dark beauty, the same inspired expression, as those given to Corinne by GÉrard. But the artist had too much taste or too little courage to venture upon any farther resemblance; the thick lips and short fat chin of the real sibyl being changed into all that is loveliest in female beauty on the canvass.

The apparent age of the face represented in the miniature points out its date with tolerable certainty; and it gives no very favourable idea of the taste of the period; for the shock head of crisped Brutus curls is placed on arms and bust as free from drapery, though better clothed in plumpness, than those of the Medicean Venus.

As we looked first at one picture, then at the other, and conversed on both, I was struck with the fine forehead and eyes, delightful voice, and peculiarly graceful turn of expression, of a gentleman who sat opposite to me, and who joined in this conversation.

I remarked to Madame RÉcamier that few romances had ever had the honour of being illustrated by such a picture as this of GÉrard, and that, from many circumstances, her pleasure in possessing it must be very great.

"It is indeed," she replied: "nor is it my only treasure of the kind—I am so fortunate as to possess Girodet's original drawing from Atala, the engraving from which you must often have seen. Let me show you the original."

We followed her to the dining-room, where this very interesting drawing is placed. "You do not know M. de ChÂteaubriand?" said she.

I replied that I had not that pleasure.

"It is he who was sitting opposite to you in the salon."

I begged that she would introduce him to me; and upon our returning to the drawing-room she did so. The conversation was resumed, and most agreeably—every one bore a part in it. Lamartine, Casimir Delavigne, Dumas, Victor Hugo, and some others, passed under a light but clever and acute review. Our Byron, Scott, &c. followed; and it was evident that they had been read and understood. I asked M. de ChÂteaubriand if he had known Lord Byron: he replied, "Non;" adding, "Je l'avais prÉcÉdÉ dans la vie, et malheureusement il m'a prÉcÉdÉ au tombeau."

The degree in which any country is capable of fully appreciating the literature of another was canvassed, and M. de ChÂteaubriand declared himself decidedly of opinion that such appreciation was always and necessarily very imperfect. Much that he said on the subject appeared incontrovertibly true, especially as respecting the slight and delicate shadows of expression of which the subtile grace so constantly seems to escape at the first attempt to convert it into another idiom. Nevertheless, I suspect that the majority of English readers—I mean the English readers of French—are more au fait of the original literature of France than M. de ChÂteaubriand supposes.

The habit, so widely extended amongst us, of reading this language almost from infancy, gives us a greater familiarity with their idiom than he is aware of. He doubted if we could relish MoliÈre, and named Lafontaine as one beyond the reach of extra-Gallican criticism or enjoyment.

I cannot agree to this, though I am not surprised that such an idea should exist. Every English person that comes to Paris is absolutely obliged to speak French, almost whether they can or can not. If they shrink from doing so, they can have no hope of either speaking or being spoken to at all. This is alone sufficient to account very satisfactorily, I think, for any doubt which may prevail as to the national proficiency in the language. No Frenchman that is at all in the habit of meeting the English in society but must have his ears and his memory full of false concords, false tenses, and false accents; and can we wonder that he should set it down as a certain fact, that they who thus speak cannot be said to understand the language they so mangle? Yet, plausible as the inference is, I doubt if it be altogether just. Which of the most accomplished Hellenists of either country would be found capable of sustaining a familiar conversation in Greek? The case is precisely the same; for I have known very many whose power of tasting the beauty of French writing amounted to the most critical acuteness, who would have probably been unintelligible had they attempted to converse in the language for five minutes together; whereas many others, who have perhaps had a French valet or waiting-maid, may possess a passably good accent and great facility of imitative expression in conversation, who yet would be puzzled how to construe with critical accuracy the easiest passage in Rousseau.

A very considerable proportion of the educated French read English, and often appear to enter very ably into the spirit of our authors; but there is not one in fifty of these who will pronounce a single word of the language in conversation. Though they endure with a polite gravity, perfectly imperturbable, the very drollest blunders of which language is capable, they cannot endure to run the risk of making blunders in return. Everything connected with the externals of good society is held as sacred by the members of it; and if they shrink from offending la biensÉance by laughing at the mistakes of others, they avoid, with at least an equal degree of caution, the unpardonable offence of committing any themselves.

I do not believe that it would be possible for a French person to enter into conversation merely for the pleasure of conversing, and not from the pressure of absolute necessity, unless he were certain, or at least believed himself to be so, that he should express himself with propriety and elegance. The idea of uttering the brightest or the noblest thought that ever entered a human head, in an idiom ridiculously broken, would, I am sure, be accompanied with a feeling of repugnance sufficient to tame the most animated and silence the most loquacious Frenchman in existence.

It therefore falls wholly upon the English, in this happy period of constant and intimate intercourse between the nations, to submit to the surrender of their vanity, to gratify their love for conversation; blundering on in conscious defiance of grammar and accent, rather than lose the exceeding pleasure of listening in return to the polished phrase, the graceful period, the epigrammatic turn, which make so essential a part of genuine high-bred French conversation.

But the doubts expressed by M. de ChÂteaubriand as to the possibility of the last and best grace of French writing being fully appreciated by foreigners, was not confined wholly to the English,—the Germans appeared to share it with us; and one who has been recently proclaimed as the first of living German critics was quoted as having confounded in his style, names found among the immortals of the French Pantheon, with those of such as live and die; Monsieur Fontaine, and Monsieur BruyÈre, being expressions actually extant in his writings.

More than once, during subsequent visits to Madame RÉcamier, I led her to speak of her lost and illustrious friend. I have never been more interested than while listening to all which this charming woman said of Madame de StaËl: every word she uttered seemed a mixture of pain and pleasure, of enthusiasm and regret. It is melancholy to think how utterly impossible it is that she should ever find another to replace her. She seems to feel this, and to have surrounded herself by everything that can contribute to keep the recollection of what is for ever gone, fresh in her memory. The original of the posthumous portrait of Madame de StaËl by GÉrard, made so familiar to all the world by engravings—nay, even by SÈvres vases and tea-cups, hangs in her bed-room. The miniature I have mentioned is always near her; and the inspired figure of her Corinne, in which it is evident that Madame RÉcamier traces a resemblance to her friend beyond that of features only, appears to be an object almost of veneration as well as love.

It is delightful to approach thus to a being that I have always been accustomed to contemplate as something in the clouds. Admirable and amiable as my charming new acquaintance is in a hundred ways, her past intimacy and ever-enduring affection for Madame de StaËl have given her a still higher interest in my eyes.