CICOGNARA, Roman Cardinal in 1758; protector of Zambinella. He caused the assassination of Sarrasine who otherwise would have slain Zambinella. [Sarrasine.]
CINQ-CYGNE, the name of an illustrious family of Champagne, the younger branch of the house of Chargeboeuf. These two branches of the same stock had a common origin in the Duineffs of the Frankish people. The name of Cinq-Cygne arose from the defence of a castle made, in the absence of their father, by five (cinq) daughters all remarkably fair. On the blazon of the house of Cinq-Cygne is placed for device the response of the eldest of the five sisters when summoned to surrender: "We die singing!" [The Gondreville Mystery.]
CINQ-CYGNE (Comtesse de), mother of Laurence de Cinq-Cygne. Widow at the time of the Revolution. She died in the height of a nervous fever induced by an attack on her chateau at Troyes by the populace in 1793. [The Gondreville Mystery.]
CINQ-CYGNE (Marquis de), name of Adrien d'Hauteserre after his marriage with Laurence de Cinq-Cygne. (See Hauteserre, Adrien d'.)
CINQ-CYGNE (Laurence, Comtesse, afterwards Marquise de), born in 1781. Left an orphan at the age of twelve, she lived, at the last of the eighteenth and the first of the nineteenth century, with her kinsman and tutor M. d'Hauteserre at Cinq-Cygne, Aube. She was loved by both her cousins, Paul-Marie and Marie-Paul de Simeuse, and also by the younger of her tutor's two sons, Adrien d'Hauteserre, whom she married in 1813. Laurence de Cinq-Cygne struggled valiantly against a cunning and redoubtable police-agency, the soul of which was Corentin. The King of France approved the charter of the Count of Champagne, by virtue of which, in the family of Cinq-Cygne, a woman might "ennoble and succeed"; therefore the husband of Laurence took the name and the arms of his wife. Although an ardent Royalist she went to seek the Emperor as far as the battlefield of Jena, in 1806, to ask pardon for the two Simeuses and the two Hauteserres involved in a political trial and condemned to hard labor, despite their innocence. Her bold move succeeded. The Marquise de Cinq-Cygne gave her husband two children, Paul and Berthe. This family passed the winter season at Paris in a magnificent mansion on Faubourg du Roule. [The Gondreville Mystery.] In 1832 Mme. de Cinq-Cygne, at the instance of the Archbishop of Paris, consented to call on the Princesse de Cadignan who had reformed. [The Secrets of a Princess.] In 1836 Mme. de Cinq-Cygne was intimate with Mme. de la Chanterie. [The Seamy Side of History.] Under the Restoration, and principally during Charles X.'s reign, Mme. de Cinq-Cygne exercised a sort of sovereignty over the Department of the Aube which the Comte de Gondreville counterbalanced in a measure by his family connections and through the generosity of the department. Some time after the death of Louis XVIII. she brought about the election of Francois Michu as president of the Arcis Court. [The Member for Arcis.]
CINQ-CYGNE (Jules de), only brother of Laurence de Cinq-Cygne. He emigrated at the outbreak of the Revolution and died for the Royalist cause at Mayence. [The Gondreville Mystery.]
CINQ-CYGNE (Paul de), son of Laurence de Cinq-Cygne and of Adrien d'Hauteserre; he became marquis after his father's death. [The Gondreville Mystery.]
CINQ-CYGNE (Berthe de). (See Maufrigneuse, Mme. Georges de.)
CIPREY of Provins, Seine-et-Marne; nephew of the maternal grandmother of Pierrette Lorrain. He formed one of the family council called together in 1828 to decide whether or not the young girl should remain underneath Denis Rogron's roof. This council replaced Rogron with the notary Auffray and chose Ciprey for vice-guardian. [Pierrette.]
CLAES-MOLINA (Balthazar), Comte de Nourho; born at Douai in 1761 and died in the same town in 1832; sprung from a famous family of Flemish weavers, allied to a very noble Spanish family, time of Philip II. In 1795 he married Josephine de Temninck of Brussels, and lived happily with her until 1809, at which time a Polish officer, Adam de Wierzchownia, seeking shelter at the Claes mansion, discussed with him the subject of chemical affinity. From that time on Balthazar, who formerly had worked in Lavoisier's laboratory, buried himself exclusively in the "quest of the absolute." He expended seven millions in experiments, leaving his wife to die of neglect. From 1820 to 1825* he was a tax-collector in Brittany—duties performed by his elder daughter who had secured the position for him in order to divert him from his barren labors. During this time she rehabilitated the family fortunes. Balthazar died, almost insane, crying "Eureka!" [The Quest of the Absolute.]