f daily news--everything was admissible, if only it
were treated with refinement and intelligence. The Hotel de Rambouillet
was no mere literary _reunion_; it included _hommes d'affaires_ and
soldiers as well as authors, and in such a circle women would not become
_bas bleus_ or dreamy moralizers, ignorant of the world and of human
nature, but intelligent observers of character and events. It is easy to
understand, however, that with the herd of imitators who, in Paris and
the provinces, aped the style of this famous _salon_, simplicity
degenerated into affectation, and nobility of sentiment was replaced by
an inflated effort to outstrip nature, so that the _genre precieux_ drew
down the satire, which reached its climax in the _Precieuses Ridicules_
and _Les Femmes Savantes_, the former of which appeared in 1660, and the
latter in 1673. But Madelon and Caltros are the lineal descendants of
Mademoiselle Scudery and her satellites, quite as much as of the Hotel de
Rambouillet. The society which assembled every Saturday in her _salon_
was exclusively literary, and although occasionally visited by a few
persons of high birth, bourgeois in its tone, and enamored of madrigals,
sonnets, stanzas, and _bouts rimes_. The affectation that decks trivial
things in fine language belongs essentially to a class which sees another
above it, and is uneasy in the sense of its inferiority; and this
affectation is precisely the opposite of the original _genre precieux_.

Another centre from which feminine influence radiated into the national
literature was the Palais du Luxembourg, where Mademoiselle d'Orleans, in
disgrace at court on account of her share in the Fronde, held a little
court of her own, and for want of anything else to employ her active
spirit busied herself with literature. One fine morning it occurred to
this princess to ask all the persons who frequented her court, among whom
were Madame de Sevigne, Madame de la Fayette, and La Rochefoucauld, to
write their own portraits, and she at once set the example. It was
understood that defects and virtues were to be spoken of with like
candor. The idea was carried out; those who were not clever or bold
enough to write for themselves employing the pen of a friend.

"Such," says M. Cousin, "was the pastime of Mademoiselle and her
friends during the years 1657 and 1658: from this pastime proceeded a
complete literature. In 1659 Segrais revised these portraits, adde