es, a
courageous and unshaken fidelity; but, whoever had any connection
with the government, or aspired to any employment, began to keep at
a distance from her house, and to dissuade timid people from
approaching it. My mother suffered a great deal from all these
symptoms of servitude, which she detected with incomparable
sagacity; but the more unhappy she was, the more she felt the desire
of diverting from the persons who were about her, the miseries of
her situation, and of diffusing around her that life and
intellectual movement, which solitude seemed to exclude.

Her talent for declamation was the means of amusement which had the
greatest influence over herself, at the same time that it varied the
pleasures of her society. It was at this period, and while she was
still laboring on her great work on Germany, that she composed and
played at Coppet, the greater part of the little pieces which are
collected in the 16th volume of her works*, under the title of
Dramatic Essays.

* Or the Second Volume of her OEuvres inedites.

Finally, at the beginning of summer, 1810, having finished the three
volumes of Germany, she wished to go and superintend the printing of
them, at 40 leagues distance from Paris, a distance which was still
permitted to her, and where she might hope to see again those of her
old friends, whose affections had not bent before the disgrace of
the Emperor.

She went, therefore, to reside in the neighbourhood of Blois, in'
the old castle of Chaumont-sur-Loire, which had in former times been
inhabited by the Cardinal d'Amboise, Diana of Poitiers, and
Catherine de Medicis. The present proprietor of this romantic
residence, M. Le Ray, with whom my parents were connected by the
ties of friendship and business, was then in America. But just at
the time we were occupying his chateau, he returned from the United
States with his family, and though he was very urgent in wishing us
to remain in his house, the more he pressed us politely to do so,
the more anxiety we felt, lest we should incommode him. M. de
Salaberry relieved us from this embarrassment with the greatest
kindness, by placing at our disposal his house at Fosse. At
this period my mother's narrative recommences.

Part The Second

CHAPTER 1.

Suppression of my Work on Germany.--Banishment from France.

Being unable to remain longer in the castle of Chaumont, the
proprietors of which had returned from America, I went and fixed
my