MADAME DE GENLIS: A WOEFUL CHANGE.
I got home to dinner to meet Mrs. and Miss Mary Young,[360] who are in town for a few weeks. Miss Mary is sensible, and quick, and agreeable.
They give a very unpleasant account of Madame de Genlis, or de Sillery, or Brulard, as she is now called.[361] They say she has established herself at Bury, in their neighbourhood, with Mlle. la Princesse d’Orleans and Pamela, and a Circe, and another young girl under her care. They have taken a house, the master of which always dines with them, though Mrs. Young says he is such a low man he should not dine with her daughter. They form twenty with themselves and household. They keep a botanist, a chemist, and a natural historian always with them. These are supposed to have been common servants of the Duke of Orleans in former days, as they always walk behind the ladies when abroad; but, to make amends in the new equalising style, they all dine together at home. They visit at no house but Sir Thomas Gage’s, where they carry their harps, and frequently have music. They have been to Bury ball, and danced all night Mlle. d’Orleans with anybody, known or unknown to Madame Brulard.
What a woeful change from that elegant, amiable, high-bred Madame de Genlis I knew six years ago! the apparent pattern of female perfection in manners, conversation, and delicacy.
There are innumerable democrats assembled in Suffolk; among them the famous Tom Paine, who herds with all the farmers that will receive him, and there propagates his pernicious doctrines.