d her mind and preserved her from all personal
emotions in the midst of a convulsion which dispersed the royalist
society among whom she had intended to reside. The Grandlieus followed
the Bourbons to Ghent, leaving their house to Mademoiselle des Touches.
Felicite, who did not choose to take a subordinate position, purchased
for one hundred and thirty thousand francs one of the finest houses in
the rue Mont Blanc, where she installed herself on the return of the
Bourbons in 1815. The garden of this house is to-day worth two millions.

Accustomed to control her own life, Felicite soon familiarized herself
with the ways of thought and action which are held to be exclusively the
province of man. In 1816 she was twenty-five years old. She knew nothing
of marriage; her conception of it was wholly that of thought; she judged
it in its causes instead of its effect, and saw only its objectionable
side. Her superior mind refused to make the abdication by which
a married woman begins that life; she keenly felt the value of
independence, and was conscious of disgust for the duties of maternity.

It is necessary to give these details to explain the anomalies presented
by the life of Camille Maupin. She had known neither father nor mother;
she had been her own mistress from childhood; her guardian was an old
archaeologist. Chance had flung her into the regions of knowledge and of
imagination, into the world of literature, instead of holding her within
the rigid circle defined by the futile education given to women, and
by maternal instructions as to dress, hypocritical propriety, and the
hunting graces of their sex. Thus, long before she became celebrated, a
glance might have told an observer that she had never played with dolls.

Toward the close of the year 1817 Felicite des Touches began to
perceive, not the fading of her beauty, but the beginning of a certain
lassitude of body. She saw that a change would presently take place in
her person as the result of her obstinate celibacy. She wanted to retain
her youth and beauty, to which at that time she clung. Science warned
her of the sentence pronounced by Nature upon all her creations, which
perish as much by the misconception of her laws as by the abuse of
them. The macerated face of her aunt returned to her memory and made her
shudder. Placed between marriage and love, her desire was to keep
her freedom; but she was now no longer indifferent to homage and the
admiration that su