arrival, ornamented with a flower, which was taken off at my departure
for her hair to be dressed. There is nothing I fear so much as a pretty
woman in an elegant dishabille; I should dread them a hundred times less
in full dress. Mademoiselle de Menthon, whom I attended in the
afternoon, was ever so. She made an equally pleasing, but quite
different impression on me. Her hair was flaxen, her person delicate,
she was very timid and extremely fair, had a clear voice, capable of just
modulation, but which she had not courage to employ to its full extent.
She had the mark of a scald on her bosom, which a scanty piece of blue
chenille did not entirely cover, this scar sometimes drew my attention,
though not absolutely on its own account. Mademoiselle des Challes,
another of my neighbors, was a woman grown, tall, well-formed, jolly,
very pleasing though not a beauty, and might be quoted for her
gracefulness, equal temper, and good humor. Her sister, Madam de Charly,
the handsomest woman of Chambery, did not learn music, but I taught her
daughter, who was yet young, but whose growing beauty promised to equal
her mother's, if she had not unfortunately been a little red-haired.
I had likewise among my scholars a little French lady, whose name I have
forgotten, but who merits a place in my list of preferences. She had
adopted the slow drawling tone of the nuns, in which voice she would
utter some very keen things, which did not in the least appear to
correspond with her manner; but she was indolent, and could not generally
take pains to show her wit, that being a favor she did not grant to every
one. After a month or two of negligent attendance, this was an expedient
she devised to make me more assiduous, for I could not easily persuade
myself to be so. When with my scholars, I was fond enough of teaching,
but could not bear the idea of being obliged to attend at a particular
hour; constraint and subjection in every shape are to me insupportable,
and alone sufficient to make me hate even pleasure itself.