was seen the ever-favored yet not "gai"
Talleyrand. Of the incident Cooper noted: "It is etiquette for the kings
of France to dine in public on January 14 and on the monarch's
fete-day." Wishing to see this ceremony, Mr. and Mrs. Cooper were sent
the better of the two permissions granted for the occasion. Cooper
describes the ceremony--the _entree_ of Charles X: _"Le Roi_, tall,
decidedly graceful; the Dauphin to his right, the Dauphine to his left,
and to her right the Duchess of Berri." Passing Cooper, he continues:
"Near a little gate was an old man in strictly court-dress. The long
white hair that hung down his face, the _cordon bleu_, the lame foot,
and the unearthly aspect made me suspect the truth, it was M. de
Talleyrand as grand chamberlin, to officiate at the dinner of his
master"; whereby proving his own words: "It is not enough to be some
one,--it is needful to do something." A near Abbe whispered of
Talleyrand to Cooper: "But, sir, he is a cat, that always falls on its
feet." Yet of Talleyrand another's record is: "But if Charles Maurice
was lame of leg--his wit was keener and more nimble than that of any man
in Europe." Brushing past the gorgeous state-table to Mrs. Cooper, the
author adds: "She laughed, and said 'it was all very magnificent and
amusing,' but some one had stolen her shawl!"

[Illustration: COOPER'S SUMMER HOME, ST. OUEN, 1827.]

Cooper was ever a home-lover. Wherever he might be in foreign lands, he
contrived to have his own roof-tree when possible. Therefore, the summer
of 1827 sent them from rue St. Maur to the village of St. Ouen, on the
banks of the Seine and a league from the gates of Paris. The village
itself was not attractive, but pleasant was the home, next to a small
chateau where Madame de Stael lived when her father, M. Necker, was in
power. Some twenty-two spacious, well-furnished rooms this summer home
had, in which once lived the Prince de Soubise when _grand veneur_ of
Louis XV, who went there at times to eat his dinner--"in what served us
for a drawing-room," Cooper wrote. The beautiful garden of shade-trees,
shrubbery, and flowers, within gray walls fourteen feet high, was a
blooming paradise; and for it all--horses, cabriolet, grand
associations--was paid two hundred dollars per month for the season of
five.

"The Red Rover" was written in these three or four summer months in St.
Ouen on the Seine, whence the author's letters tell of watching the
moving life on the ri