Madame Vigée Le Brun
COMTESSE D’ANDLAU
Catalani, then young and beautiful, was one of her new friends, and used to sing at her parties. She painted her portrait, and kept it as a pendant to the one she had done of Grassini in London.
Grassini had sung at her London parties, and comparing these two great singers and actresses—both young, beautiful, and celebrated—Mme. Le Brun found that although the voice of Catalani was in its beauty and compass one of the most extraordinary ever known, Grassini had more expression.
Amongst other old friends whom she now frequented was the Comtesse de Ségur, who equally disliked the alterations in social matters.
“You wouldn’t believe,” she said to Lisette, who came to see her at eight o’clock one evening, and found her alone, “that I have had twenty people to dinner to-day? They all went away directly after the coffee.”
She observed also that it was now usual for all the men to stand at one side of the room, leaving the women at the other, as if they were enemies.
The Comte de Ségur was made Master of the Ceremonies by Napoleon when he became Emperor, after which his brother used to put on his cards, “Ségur sans cérémonies.”
Most of the great painters were to be found at the house in the rue du Gros-Chenet, where the suppers were as gay and pleasant as of old.