f her property, and
became blind, she occupied a small dwelling in an ecclesiastical
foundation in Paris, but continued to receive philosophers, poets
and artists in her house; and in order to give a little more life to
the conversation, she invited a young lady whose circumstances were
straitened to be her companion. This was Mademoiselle l'Espinasse.
L'Espinasse was not beautiful, but she was young, amiable, lively, and
more susceptible than we in Germany are accustomed either to allow or
to pardon. Deffant, on the other hand, was witty and intelligent, but
old, bitter, and withal egotistically insensible. The boldest scoffers
assembled around L'Espinasse, and there was afterward formed around
her a circle of her own. Deffant turned day into night, and night into
day. She and the Duchess of Luxembourg, who was inseparable from her,
received learned distinguished personages and foreigners, from six
o'clock in the evening during the greater part of the night.

The importance in which such ladies and such societies were held, not
merely in France but in all Europe, may be judged of from the fact,
that the breach between Deffant and her young companion was treated
in some measure as a public European event. The French minister and
foreign ambassadors took part in it, and the whole literary world felt
its effect. After this breach there were two tone-giving tribunals for
the guidance of public opinion in matters of literature and taste,
and their decisions were circulated by letter over all Europe. Horace
Walpole, Henault, Montesquieu. Voltaire, whose correspondence with
Deffant has been published in the present century, remained true to
her cause. D'Alembert, whose correspondence with Deffant, as well as
that of the Duchess of Maine, have also been published in our century,
went over to L'Espinasse. This academician, whose name and influence
was next in importance to that of Voltaire, formed the nucleus of a
new society in the house of L'Espinasse, and was grievously tormented
by his _inamorata_, who pursued one plan of conquest after another
when she saw one scheme of marriage after another fail of success. It
appears from the whole of the transactions and consequences connected
with this breach, however surprising it may be, that this formation
of a new circle in Paris for evening entertainment may be with truth
compared to the institution of a new academy for the promotion of
European culture and refinement. The Duches