Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud (Being secret letters from a gentleman at Paris to a nobleman in London) — Volume 6 by Stewarton
page 7 of 71 (09%)
page 7 of 71 (09%)
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who, to expose her infamy, advised him to send some confidential person
to inform her that he had killed his elder brother, and expected the recompense on the same night. He went and was received with open arms, and had just retired with her, when the elder brother, accompanied by his friend, entered the room. Madame Chevalier, instead of upbraiding, laughed, and the next day the public laughed with her, and applauded her more than ever. She knew very well what she was doing. The stories of the key and the duel produced for her more than four thousand louis d'or by the number of new gallants they enticed. It was a kind of emulation among all young men in the North who should be foremost to dishonour and ruin himself with this infamous woman. Madame Chevalier and her husband now live here in grand style, and have their grand parties, grand teas, grand assemblies, and grand balls. Their hotel, I am assured, is even visited by the Bonapartes and by the members of the foreign diplomatic corps. In the house where I saw her, I observed that Louis Bonaparte and two foreign Ambassadors spoke to her as old acquaintances. Though rich, to the amount of ten millions of livres--she, or rather her husband, keeps a gambling-house, and her superannuated charms are still to be bought for money, at the disposal of those amateurs who are fond of antiques. Both her husband and herself are still members of our secret diplomacy, though she complains loudly that, of the two millions of livres--promised her in 1799 by Bonaparte and Talleyrand if she could succeed in persuading Paul I. to withdraw from his alliance with England and Austria, only six hundred thousand livres--has been paid her. I cannot finish this letter without telling you that before our military forces had reached the Rhine, our political incendiaries had already taken the field, and were in full march towards the Austrian, Russian, |
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