n, from the character of which one would never have
suspected her of knowing more than the average woman." She was an
incessant worker and had little time for social life; in the evening,
after having worked all morning, she received visits from the literary
men of France; and, to her credit may it be added, amid all her
literary work, she never neglected her domestic and maternal duties.

A woman of an entirely different type from that of Mme. Dacier, one
who fitly closes the long series of great and brilliant women of the
age of Louis XIV., who only partly resembles them and yet does not
quite take on the faded and decadent coloring of the next age, was
Mme. de Caylus, the niece of Mme. de Maintenon. It was she who, partly
through compulsion, partly of her own free will, undertook the rearing
of the young and beautiful Marthe-Marguerite de Villette. Mme. de
Maintenon was then at the height of her power, and naturally her
beautiful, clever, and witty niece was soon overwhelmed by proposals
of marriage from the greatest nobles of France. To one of these, M. de
Boufflers, Mme. de Maintenon replied: "My niece is not a sufficiently
good match for you. However, I am not insensible to the honor you pay
me; I shall not give her to you, but in the future I shall consider
you my nephew."

She then married the innocent young girl to the Marquis de Caylus, a
debauched, worthless reprobate--a union whose only merit lay in the
fact that her niece could thus remain near her at court. At the latter
place, her beauty, gayety, and caustic wit, her adaptable and somewhat
superficial character and her freedom of manners and speech, did
not fail to attract many admirers. Her frankness in expressing her
opinions was the source of her disgrace; Louis XIV. took her at her
word when she exclaimed, in speaking of the court: "This place is so
dull that it is like being in exile to live here," and forbade her to
appear again in the place she found so tiresome. Those rash words
cost her an exile of thirteen years, and only through good behavior,
submission, and piety was she permitted to return.

She appeared at a supper given by the king, and, by the brilliancy
of her beauty and _esprit_, she attracted everyone present and soon
regained her former favor and friends. From that time she was the
constant companion of Mme. de Maintenon, until the king's death, when
she returned to Paris; at that place her salon became an intellectual
centre, and