Ninon, I have said, had lovers when verging on her ninetieth year! Whence came this mystery? Like Poppæa Sabina, the second wife of Nero, Ninon is averred to have preserved her wondrous beauty unimpaired to extreme old age, by using baths of asses' milk; but it was neither these, nor the famous cosmetic, so long known among our Parisian belles as Crême de l'Enclos, the component parts of which are milk, lemon-juice and brandy, which preserved the dazzling complexion and delicate skin of Ninon for so many years untouched by Time; but a spell wrought upon her by the great master of evil, whom she served throughout a long and wasted life.
It would seem as if Time, the destroyer of all things, failed to impair the charms of Ninon, at least entirely, for he could not deprive her of her marvellous power to win and seduce; thus, at her age of ninety, does not the Abbé Chaulieu say? "that Cupid had retreated even into the lines of her forehead." Hence in age she was worshipped for her beauty, by the grandsons of those who had loved her in the bloom of her youth!
Ninon was born at Paris in May, 1616, during the reign of Louis XIII. Her father was a gallant, but dissipated gentleman of Touraine, who had fought in the battles of Henry the Great. Her mother was Mademoiselle de Raconis, a lady of Orleans, from whom she inherited her beauty and gaiety of disposition. Monsieur de l'Enclos was passionately fond of music, and inspired his daughter with the same taste, so that in girlhood she became mistress of the lute, the harp and guitar; but Madame de l'Enclos, who destined her for a convent, was averse to such accomplishments as frivolities, and was careful to take her daughter to Notre Dame twice daily—that is, to morning mass and to evening vespers; but little Ninon always substituted for her missal some little volume of poetry, or a romance which she read under her veil, as she knelt before the altar, thus her responses were often very odd ones.
Before she was ten years of age she had all Charron and Montaigne by heart, and spoke with fluency the Spanish and Italian languages.
In her fifteenth year, the death of her parents left Ninon the mistress of her own actions, with a fortune of ten thousand livres per annum.
Her loveliness was then divine! Her form was finely proportioned, her complexion singularly delicate; her face was a fine oval, and long dark lashes with drooping lids gave a charming softness to her sparkling hazel eyes. Her hair was a rich golden brown, and fell about her neck in wavy profusion. Her little nostrils, her rosy mouth and chin were perfect!
In temper she was at times violent and imperious, and her disposition had this peculiarity, that while even eager and lively about trifles that affected herself, she was too often carelessly cold and selfishly indifferent about all that concerned others.
She was born to be a coquette, and the spirit of gallantry, with the desire to charm, win and enslave, pervaded her whole existence. She was the centre of Parisian fashion; lovers she had in plenty, and if she desired to marry, some of the proudest titles in France were at her disposal; but Ninon, whom her mother had destined for the service of God, preferred a life of perfect freedom—such freedom as the days of Louis "the Just" permitted, with independence and intrigue—to live, not for others, but for herself alone.
We shall see how all this ended.
One night in the year 1633, she was seated alone in a room of her house in the Rue de Parlement, behind the Palais-Royal. Her lovers, the Counts de Coligné and Jersey, and her favourite friends, the Comtesse de la Suze, D'Olonne, and the Duchesse de Bouillon-Mancini, the cripple Abbé Scarron, M. de Sévigné, and others, had all retired and departed in their carriages or sedans, and Ninon was now seated before a mirror in that famous boudoir, the walls of which, as history tells us, were decorated with frescoes, that illustrated the story of Cupid and Pysche.