1851-1853] Chateau Grignan 151 



kingdom of his Infernal Majesty. The lights were red and 

 round in the fog, giving no light about them, and the black 

 figures flitting about, with the perpetual roll of wheels and 

 no voices. 



I have taken my place in the Tenby coach for J past 7, 

 and so my pageant will be over ; it has been a very pleasant 

 one, thanks to you. . . . 



Her visit to Aix-les-Bains had ended with a tour in Pro- 

 vence, including a pilgrimage to Chateau Grignan. She 

 wrote to Elizabeth : ' Are you taking up Mme de Sevigne's 

 letters ? Chateau Grignan is so vividly before me that 

 I must begin them again, contenting myself with only 

 two or three before breakfast. That is the way to 

 enjoy the book. That view from the garden at Montelimar 

 often rises up to my mind, with le Mont Ventoux in the 

 distance." 



Madame Sismondi to her niece Emma Darwin. 



Tuesday, Sth Feb. [1853]. 



... I should like to have looked in on your party of 32 

 very much. So many merry children would have been a 

 delicious sight. I do not give myself the trouble of reckon- 

 ing, but I think 1 5 of those must have been children. . . . 



. . . There is a quantity of interesting books just now, and 

 I think the older I get, the more my avidity in reading 

 increases and my curiosity grows. I am watching France 

 with a sort of personal interest, breathless to see what will 

 come of it, unable to form any guess of its future. Is all this 

 for good or for evil I am continually asking myself ? willing 

 to believe the first, but doubting it is as the decline of the 

 Romans, a falling away of intellectual power. I have 

 indulged myself this year with the Revue des Deux Mondes. 

 All the articles I have read are very clever, with a moral and 

 religious tone. There is an excellent article on Burke, which 

 teaches what true and wise Liberty is, and what is new to the 

 French, even to the best of their politicians, the necessity 

 of a high morality in politics. I rather wonder Louis 



