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MADAME DE STAEL. 367
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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« Science Tells Us That There Is No Such...
. sense to discover tier merit . The character of Madame Necker was have singularl been y consistent to the languishing throughout Parisian life . Somewhat elegantes . repulsive II y avait she de may la
gene aupres cV elle , they complained , looking with horror on her formal manners and her stiff and angular movements . But nothing daunted
by their fastidious strictures , Madame Necker set herself diligently to search out dutydetermining to " study the arts of conversation and
housekee _23 ing / ' , and to reduce all things to precise and methodical rulesas if she were still tlie orderly school-girl poring over Latin
and Greek , . Stern self-denial and rigid routine were amongst the luxuries of her existence ; and ( were , it not for a little weakness
verging into worship of M . Necker ) her uncultivated manners and cold exterior must have made her rather appear blameless and
severe in her irreproachable routine , than amiable or pleasing as contrasted with her frivolous companions . These sage parents
had their own particular crotchets about education : who has not ? The mother was not one to lavish caresses upon her child . She
was the dispassionate disciplinarian , ready to cram its tiny head in a itiless with stores of knowledgetill ( like a poor little
plant p which way has been drowned instead of , being nourished with water ) the overtasked prodidrooped and showed signs of
premature fading . To recruit the gy little one ' s failing strength it was necessary to let her run idle in the woods for some years longer .
• ' She next amused herself by composing tragedies , comedies , and other sentimental vagarieswhich were highly praised by her father ,
who delihted to , her in livelconversationand could not resist an g opportunit eng y age of making a show y of her _taleti , ts . We have
littl an e amusing body , with pictur large e of brown the child eyes full at eleven of eager years curiosity old : a and precocious
earnestnessdressed in the buckram fashion of the times , and sitting bolt upri , ht on a little stool by her mother's sideengaging in lively
repartee g and grave discourse with oldish round , -wigged gentlemen , amongst whom were Ragnal , Marmontel , Thomas , and Grimm . What
wonder that the little Germaine was never a child in the true sense ¦ of the word . The natural openness of her disposition could not save
her from the disadvantage of being paraded and nattered before from admirin the g pedantry eyes as a and youthful stiffness prodi which gy , would though have it j > been _^ obabl the y kept result her of
the miht mother have ' s been system caused , as well by the as from indiscretion the pertness of the and father conceit . which _,
U g p to the age of twenty , Germaine Necker amused herself by composing and romancesand bdelighting in the society
of those around poems her . Her real , entry y into life seems to have commenced at the time of her marriage . The circumstances of
this this time marriage . The are Baron curiousl de Stael y suggestive was a handsome of the state _jDiece of of society flesh and at
. blood name , , and looking sufficient well in money court to , finery be respectable , possessing . What a high more -sounding _coixld
Madame De Stael. 367
MADAME DE STAEL . 367
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Aug. 1, 1862, page 367, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01081862/page/7/
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