TO THE SAME.
Paris, July, 1805.
Thérèse dit que Paris est si beau, ‘que les yeux lui en font mal.’
‘C’est si beau, que les yeux m’en font mal’—on pourrait philosopher sur cette idée, appliquée aux plaisirs d’une grande ville. Son costume, qui contrastait avec une calêche, a un peu attiré les yeux, dans une ville où tout le monde entend toutes les convenances de l’habillement; ce qui me prive de la commodité de la mener quelquefois dans les boutiques: car je lui ferais du tort si je la faisais quitter son habillement de paÿsanne. Ou elle le reprendrait à regret, ou ses parents la blâmeraient de l’avoir quitté. Les femmes qu’on voit à pied actuellement dans les rues, sont plus élégantes que je ne me rappelle de les avoir jamais vues. La symmétrie et la légèreté de leurs tailles, les grâces de leur maintien, et le goût de leur parure, sont plus frappantes que dans aucun autre moment que je puis me rappeler. Elles portent presque toutes le blanc orné des couleurs à la fois gaies, vives, et délicates, et elles paraissent toutes entre dix-huit et vingt-cinq ans. Je crois qu’aprés cette époque on les envoie en province.
TO THE SAME.
Paris, July, 1805.
Mrs. —— has just the no manner which, without being civil, always puts those at their ease who have not been used to good society; and though good-looking, has what I have heard some of the London women call, something ‘ordinary’ in her air, which counteracts the effects of a dress the most magnifique as to expense so completely, that it cannot écraser the plainest. Mad. Demidoff has the same tournure (but without any pretensions whatever to beauty). I have just seen a gown of hers (Mad. Demidoff) at 260 louis, composed of one yard-and-half square of Brussels lace. Mad. Sueur brought it to show me, as a sop to Cerberus, for having disobliged me about Mrs. C——’s cloak. She is so civil and obliging (for she did all she could about that commission), that I pay her without regret, while I grudge all the other saucy marchandes with whom I have any dealings.
I saw a birutsche to-day, which the Baroness has bought for 150 louis. It seems to my eyes clumsy, and has no resemblance to an English carriage, except in being perfectly plain. It is the ‘coloured gown,’ but without the air of a first-rate mantua-maker. It is all green, and looks like a great Muscovite duck. I asked the coachmaker to let me know when he had a good second-hand one, but in the true spirit of ‘Ne voulez-vous pas que je gagne?’ he assured me there was never any such thing. Certainly the Baroness encourages tradespeople to talk such nonsense; for though an extremely sensible, unaffected woman, her manner to them savours of a simplicity I cannot remark in her general character. It may possibly arise from not having always had the disposal of so much money as at present, and therefore thinking it beneath her to make the slightest effort to obtain the value of it.