a
careless, jaunty air; upon seeing ladies who were strangers to her, she
bawled out, 'Ah! mon Dieu, where is Franklin? Why did you not tell me
there were ladies here?' You must suppose her speaking all this in
French. 'How I look!' said she, taking hold of a chemise made of
tiffany, which she had on over a blue lute-string, and which looked as
much upon the decay as her beauty, for she was once a handsome woman;
her hair was frizzled; over it she had a small straw hat, with a dirty
gauze half-handkerchief round it, and a bit of dirtier gauze than ever
my maid wore was bowed on behind. She had a black gauze scarf thrown
over her shoulders. She ran out of the room; when she returned, the
Doctor entered at one door, she at the other; upon which she ran
forward to him, caught him by the hand, 'Helas! Franklin;' then gave
him a double kiss, one upon each cheek, and another upon his forehead.
When we went into the room to dine, she was placed between the Doctor
and Mr. Adams. She carried the chief of the conversation at dinner,
frequently locking her hand into the Doctor's, and sometimes spreading
her arms upon the backs of both the gentlemen's chairs, then throwing
her arm carelessly upon the Doctor's neck."

Another house to which Franklin was welcome was that of the Countess
d'Houdetot celebrated for her part in the life of Rousseau. It was at
her chateau that Franklin had to undergo the ordeal of such a
glorification as must have tried his philosophic nerves to the
uttermost. The chronicler of the occasion declares that "the venerable
sage, with his gray hair flowing down upon his shoulders, his staff in
hand, the spectacles of wisdom on his nose, was the perfect picture of
true philosophy and virtue." But the "sage" must have found his virtue
a burden on that day. He was escorted through the grounds; wine was
poured out freely; music was played, and the company in turn celebrated
the guest in stanzas which were none the less fulsome because they were
true. The ceremony closed with the planting of a Virginia locust by the
Doctor.

The surrender of Burgoyne in 1777 had brought about the treaty with
France; the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, four years later, was
the beginning of peace and the cause of the treaty with England. What
effect the news of Cornwallis's defeat had in England; how Lord North,
the Prime Minister, received the message "as he would have taken a ball
in his breast," walking wildly up and down