schemes by the immeasurable difference existing between the most brilliant
theories and the simplest practice of administration.

Destiny having formerly placed me near crowned heads, I now amuse my
solitude when in retirement with collecting a variety of facts which may
prove interesting to my family when I shall be no more. The idea of
collecting all the interesting materials which my memory affords occurred
to me from reading the work entitled "Paris, Versailles, and the Provinces
in the Eighteenth Century." That work, composed by a man accustomed to
the best society, is full of piquant anecdotes, nearly all of which have
been recognised as true by the contemporaries of the author. I have put
together all that concerned the domestic life of an unfortunate Princess,
whose reputation is not yet cleared of the stains it received from the
attacks of calumny, and who justly merited a different lot in life, a
different place in the opinion of mankind after her fall. These memoirs,
which were finished ten years ago, have met with the approbation of some
persons; and my son may, perhaps, think proper to print them after my
decease.

J. L. H. C.

--When Madame Campan wrote these lines, she did not anticipate that the
death of her son would precede her own.





HISTORIC COURT MEMOIRS.