Peint en émail par Petitot
Gravé en 1770 par PP Choffard.
Desel Grav. de L. M. Imp. et du Roi d’Espagne.
To face page 48.
The greatest apologist of the society of the seventeenth century could hardly describe it as strait-laced; except by comparison with the first half of the one succeeding; and if some of the grandes dames of the circle in which she moved held aloof and deprecated the unconventionalities of Mademoiselle de L’Enclos, for the most part they accepted them, more or less silently, and treated her with cordiality, delighting in her friendship, and fascinated by the elegance and dignity with which she conducted the hospitalities of her crowded salons. The prevailing charm of one graced with the refinement of no surface education, and accomplishments never unduly self-asserted, shone through the gentle gaiety of her demeanour. She was absolutely innocent of any shadow of self-interest; taste alone guided her inclinations, her competence protected her from greed, and natural generosity was ever prompting her to kindly actions. Once, at a later day, when Anne of Austria was beginning to settle into the calm austerities of maturer years, and urged by some prudes about her, she sent orders for the temporary retirement of Ninon into a convent, leaving her to select the one she preferred—the tale goes that she expressed her gratitude to the exempt of the guards who delivered the message, for the choice so left her, and that she would choose the convent of the Grands Cordeliers, an establishment about to be suppressed for the scandals attaching to it; but it is far more probable that the jest originated with some acquaintance; for to make light of orders from the Court was in no wise according with Ninon’s code.
That command, however, again reached her at a yet later time, and then was enforced. In Louis XIII.’s days, Ninon was often a guest at the Louvre, and on the occasion of one of the State balls given there, she was present with Rambouillet for her cavalier in chief. As she was entering her carriage to return home, she felt a pull at her mantle, and turning, she saw beside her “a little man, clad entirely in black velvet, whose smile was mocking and full of sarcasm, and his eyes shone like carbuncles. Rambouillet, seeing my terror,” she wrote later, “demanded of the man what he wanted; but the Man in Black silenced him with an imperious gesture, and said to me, in a tone of profound melancholy—‘You are proud of your beauty, mademoiselle, and you are right, for it is marvellous. But alas! all these charms will one day fade. The rosy hues of your skin will die out, age will come, and bring its wrinkles. Ah, believe me! Beware! Endeavour to hinder this misfortune, for afterwards there will be nothing left to you.’ So saying, he gravely saluted me, and disappeared among the arches of the colonnade.”[1]
CHAPTER V
An Excursion to Gentilly—“Uraniæ Sacrum”—César and Ruggieri—The rue d’Enfer and the Capucins—Perditor—The Love-philtre—Seeing the Devil—“Now You are Mine!”
Ninon’s pledge of eternal fidelity to Rambouillet did not hinder other friendships; and about this time she one day made an excursion to Gentilly with the Comte de Lude, intent on visiting the great magician, Perditor, who conducted there his famous incantations. She chose de Lude for her companion on this occasion, because he was an utter disbeliever. The adventure was prompted by the craze, ever latent in society, and then recently kindled to fever-heat, for magic and occultism. The theme, as old almost as the ages, is ever new, and likely to remain so until the mysteries of life and death are revealed. And some short time previously, the rumour had circulated that a man named Febroni, intensely hated by Richelieu, was endeavouring to compass the cardinal’s destruction, by causing a wax image of him to be made and exposed to a slow fire, and as the image melted, so the minister’s life would dwindle to the death. This was, of course, no new device of witchcraft and diablerie; but it served to arouse intense interest and curiosity, and the air was as full of sorcery and demonology as when the first Ruggieri practised his arts for Catherine de Médicis, and watched the stars from the old tower-top of Blois, the observatory of the terrible queen, “Uraniæ Sacrum.”
Some half-dozen years before Ninon was born, a man named César and another Ruggieri, probably taking the old magician for sponsor, had been notorious as potent masters of the “Black Art.” That they were credited with possessing unlimited command over the elements, and to produce thunder and lightning at will, was but a small part of his power. He could manufacture love-potions to render the indifferent one enamoured of the wooer, and insidious poisons to destroy a hated human obstacle, and perform many services of the like nature for a price, but the fees were startlingly high.