MONTAURAN (Marquise Alphonse de), wife of the preceding; born Marie-Nathalie de Verneuil at La Chanterie near Alencon, natural daughter of Mademoiselle Blanche de Casteran, who was abbess of Notre-Dame de Seez at the time of her death, and of Victor-Amedee, Duc de Verneuil, who owned her and left her an inheritance, at the expense of her legitimate brother. A lawsuit between brother and sister resulted. Marie-Nathalie lived then with her guardian, the Marechal Duc de Lenoncourt, and was supposed to be his mistress. After vainly trying to bring him to the point of marriage she was cast off by him. She passed through divers political and social paths during the Revolutionary period. After having shone in court circles she had Danton for a lover. During the autumn of 1799 Fouche hired Marie de Verneuil to betray Alphonse de Montauran, but the lovely spy and the chief of the Chouans fell in love with each other. They were united in marriage a few hours before their death towards the end of that year, 1799, in which Jacobites and Chouans fought on Bretagne soil. Madame de Montauran was attired in her husband's clothes when a Republican bullet killed her. [The Chouans.]
MONTAURAN (Marquis de), younger brother of Alphonse de Montauran, was in London, in 1799, when he received a letter from Colonel Hulot containing Alphonse's last wishes. Montauran complied with them; returned to France, but did not fight against his country. He kept his wealth through the intervention of Colonel Hulot and finally served the Bourbons in the gendarmerie, where he himself became a colonel. When Louis Philippe came to the throne, Montauran believed an absolute retirement necessary. Under the name of M. Nicolas, he became one of the Brothers of Consolation, who met in Madame de la Chanterie's home on rue Chanoinesse. He saved M. Auguste de Mergi from being prosecuted. In 1841 Montauran was seen on rue du Montparnasse, where he assisted at the funeral of the elder Hulot. [The Chouans. The Seamy Side of History. Cousin Betty.]
MONTBAURON (Marquise de), Raphael de Valentin's aunt, died on the scaffold during the Revolution. [The Magic Skin.]
MONTCORNET (Marechal, Comte de), Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor, Commander of Saint-Louis, born in 1774, son of a cabinet-maker in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, "child of Paris," mingled in almost all of the wars in the latter part of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries. He commanded in Spain and in Pomerania, and was colonel of cuirassiers in the Imperial Guard. He took the place of his friend, Martial de la Roche-Hugon in the affections of Madame de Vaudremont. The Comte de Montcornet was in intimate relations with Madame or Mademoiselle Fortin, mother of Valerie Crevel. Towards 1815, Montcornet bought, for about a hundred thousand francs, the Aigues, Sophie Laguerre's old estate, situated between Conches and Blangy, near Soulanges and Ville-aux-Fayes. The Restoration allured him. He wished to have his origin overlooked, to gain position under the new regime, to efface all memory of the expressive nick-name received from the Bourgogne peasantry, who called him the "Upholsterer." In the early part of 1819 he married Virginie de Troisville. His property, increased by an income of sixty thousand francs, allowed him to live in state. In winter he occupied his beautiful Parisian mansion on rue Neuve-des-Mathurins, now called rue des Mathurins, and visited many places, especially the homes of Raoul Nathan and of Esther Gobseck. During the summer the count, then mayor of Blangy, lived at Aigues. His unpopularity and the hatred of the Gaubertins, Rigous, Sibilets, Soudrys, Tonsards, and Fourchons rendered his sojourn there unbearable, and he decided to dispose of the estate. Montcornet, although of violent disposition and weak character, could not avoid being a subordinate in his own family. The monarchy of 1830 overwhelmed Montcornet, then lieutenant-general unattached, with gifts, and gave a division of the army into his command. The count, now become marshal, was a frequent visitor at the Vaudeville.[*] Montcornet died in 1837. He never acknowledged his daughter, Valerie Crevel, and left her nothing. He is probably buried in Pere-Lachaise cemetery, where a monument was to be raised for him under W. Steinbock's supervision. Marechal de Montcornet's motto was: "Sound the Charge." [Domestic Peace. Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. The Peasantry. A Man of Business. Cousin Betty.]
[*] A Parisian theatre, situated until 1838 on rue de Chartres. Rue de
Chartres, which also disappeared, although later, was located
between the Palais-Royal square and the Place du Carrousel.
MONTCORNET (Comtesse de.) (See Blondet, Madame Emile.)
MONTEFIORE, Italian of the celebrated Milanese family of Montefiore, commissary in the Sixth of the line under the Empire; one of the finest fellows in the army; marquis, but unable under the laws of the kingdom of Italy to use his title. Thrown by his disposition into the "mould of the Rizzios," he barely escaped being assassinated in 1808 in the city of Tarragone by La Marana, who surprised him in company with her daughter, Juana-Pepita-Maria de Mancini, afterwards Francois Diard's wife. Later, Montefiore himself married a celebrated Englishwoman. In 1823 he was killed and plundered in a deserted alley in Bordeaux by Diard, who found him, after being away many years, in a gambling-house at a watering-place. [The Maranas.]
MONTES DE MONTEJANOS (Baron), a rich Brazilian of wild and primitive disposition; towards 1840, when very young, was one of the first lovers of Valerie Fortin, who became in turn Madame Marneffe and Madame Celestin Crevel. He saw her again at the Faubourg Saint-Germain and at the Place or Pate des Italiens, and had occasion for being envious of Hector Hulot, W. Steinbock and still others. He had revenge on his mistress by communicating to her a mysterious disease from which she died in the same manner as Celestin Crevel. [Cousin Betty.]
MONTPERSAN (Comte de), nephew of a canon of Saint-Denis, upon whom he called frequently; an aspiring rustic, grown sour on account of disappointment and deceit; married, and head of a family. At the beginning of the Restoration he owned the Chateau de Montpersan, eight leagues from Moulins in Allier, where he lived. In 1819 he received a call from a young stranger who came to inform him of the death of Madame de Montpersan's lover. [The Message.]
MONTPERSAN (Comtesse Juliette de), wife of the preceding, born about 1781, lived at Montpersan with her family, and while there learned from her lover's fellow-traveler of the former's death as a result of an overturned carriage. The countess rewarded the messenger of misfortune in a delicate manner. [The Message.]