70 LA MARQUISE DE CKEQUY. 



nette, et la haute noblesse en deshabile ;" and the Abbe Delille, in a 

 letter which forms a part of the Abbe de Tessan's rich collection of 

 autographs,, to the Vicomte de Ventemille, dated 1778, after express- 

 ing t( a thousand thanks to Monsieur le Vicomte for the amiable 

 manner in which Madame de Crequy has just received him," &c., 

 proceeds thus : " She possesses a faculty of observation that must be 

 rcdoutable aux gens ridicules; and it is in this manner that I 

 account for her reputation of malicious severity. In fact, she 

 appears to possess, in a supreme degree, the talent " de bien raconter," 

 a talent that is now almost extinct, and which appears to have been 

 the privilege of the passed age. This favourable judgment will not 

 be belied by the memoirs of this lady, in which will be found a 

 curious correspondence between Voltaire and Madame de Crequy, 

 relative to the Black Cordon of St. Michel, and the erection of his 

 estate at Ferney into a Marquesate, which, says the author of GEdipus, 

 and of the Dictionnaire Philosophique, would have made la gloire et 

 lajoie de sa triste vie" 



The unpublished work to which the Abbe alludes, is certainly one 

 of the most curious collections of anecdotes that exist. We shall 

 select some fragments at thirty and forty years distance of dates. These 

 memoirs, it is proper to observe, were destined for the instruction of 

 the young Tancred Adner Raoul de Crequy, who died long before 

 his grandmother. 



FIRST EXTRACT, 1772. 



" The Princess des Ursenes, was my near relation and godmother. She 

 was as vain-glorious as it is possible to be when one has been called for the 

 space of fifteen or sixteen years Mademoiselle de la Tremoille. You may 

 think that the name of Crequy was sufficiently well known throughout all 

 Europe, and particularly at Rome, in memory of the Cardinal and the Duke 

 de Crequy Lesdejuieres, ambassador of France, under the reign of the late 

 king. Madame des Ursenes accordingly received us there " en perfection." 

 It would have done your heart good to hear her speak of M. M. de Crequy, 

 whose first female ancestor was the daughter of the Emperor Charlemagne, 

 &c. ; but as she always took great care to call me ' my niece/ your grand- 

 father's gratitude was in consequence diminished. I must tell you that my 

 godmother appeared to me an artful, insidious, overbearing, and disagrea- 

 ble person in the extreme. It was said she still preserved some remains of 

 beauty, but I could never discover them. What she had preserved without 

 the slightest alteration, was an air of insufferable arrogance, with the habits 

 of meddling in what did not in the least concern her. She used to make " des 

 toilettes prodigieurses" with her "vilaine gorge," and her old shoulders in 

 a state of nakedness. ' You who are one of the family/ said Prince Mans- 

 feld one day to me, ' do pray tell me why Madame des Ursenes favours us 

 with an exhibition of such things, and to please whom ?' ' To please us 

 young women, and more especially the Countess Fagnani/ I replied, shewing 

 him my neighbour, who had, independently of her ' belles epaules,' a ' belle 

 passion' for Prince Mansfeld, and apparently some anxiety on his account. 

 She took it into her head to be angry with him because we had conversed toge- 

 ther, with a certain * air d' intelligence,' in a language of which she did not 

 understand one word. I do not know in what mapner he replied to her re- 

 proaches, but so it is, that he received a coup de poignard from her, which 

 nearly proved fatal, and obliged him to repair to Venice to get cured, where 

 my father was ambassador. This accident, I assure you, has tormented my 

 conscience not a little." 



