There is considerable mystery about this good lady’s career.
It was a foregone conclusion that a woman of this style would dote upon and do her best endeavour to spoil a bright, handsome boy such as was her grandson Alfred. Being an only son, an elder brother having died in infancy, the child was made much of on all sides. His good looks, his smartness, even his early developed taste for extravagant luxuries, charmed his accomplished grandmother, whom when later on he entered the army we find presenting him with a magnificent service of plate, which brought upon him more ridicule than envy from his brother officers.
In 1815 Paris was in a ferment of excitements and entertainments, all the great men and many of the great ladies of Europe were there gathered together—where the spoil is there shall the vultures be gathered together. Young D’Orsay, mere lad though he was, came very much to the front; even thus early his immaculate dress was noticeable; his spirited English hunter and his superb horsemanship attracted attention. Though he probably did not particularly relish the occurrence, he was presented to the Duke of Wellington. A great meeting this, the conqueror of the men of France and the future conqueror of the women of England.
Lord William Pitt Lennox, himself only sixteen, relates that he met D’Orsay in Paris in 1814, and he goes on to state that “in the hours of recreation, he showed me all the sights of the ‘City of Frivolity,’ as Paris has been not inaptly named.” Pretty good for two such mere lads!
“One of our first visits was to the Café des Milles Colonnes, which was, at the period I write of, the most attractive café in Paris. Large as it was, it was scarcely capable of containing the vast crowds who besieged it every evening, to admire its saloons decorated with unprecedented magnificence.…
“Wellington had a private box at the Théâtre Français, which D’Orsay and myself constantly occupied to witness the splendid acting of Talma, Madame Georges, Mademoiselle Duchesnois in tragedy, and of that daughter of Nature, Mademoiselle Mars, in comedy.…
“Upon witnessing Perlet in Le Comédien d’Etampes, D’Orsay said—
“‘Is not Perlet superlative?’”
In another of his numerous voluminous and often highly entertaining memoirs, Lord William writes of this same visit to Paris:—