delight to know you as a great apostle of
the ideas which are to be our life, if Heaven intends us a great
and permanent life. I count myself happy in having seen you, and
in finding with you Beranger, the genuine poet, the genuine man of
France. I have felt all the enchantment of the lyre of Beranger;
have paid my warmest homage to the truth and wisdom adorned with such
charms, such wit and pathos. It was a great pleasure to see himself.
If your leisure permits, Monsieur, I will ask a few lines in reply.
I should like to keep some words from your hand, in case I should not
look upon you more here below; and am always, with gratitude for the
light you have shed on so many darkened spirits,

Yours, most respectfully,

MARGARET FULLER.

* * * * *

_Paris, Jan_., 1847.--I missed hearing M. Guizot, (I am sorry for it,)
in his speech on the Montpensier marriage. I saw the little Duchess,
the innocent or ignorant topic of all this disturbance, when presented
at court. She went round the circle on the arm of the queen. Though
only fourteen, she looks twenty, but has something fresh, engaging,
and girlish about her.

I attended not only at the presentation, but at the ball given at
the Tuileries directly after. These are fine shows, as the suite of
apartments is very handsome, brilliantly lighted,--the French ladies
surpassing all others in the art of dress; indeed, it gave me much
pleasure to see them. Certainly there are many ugly ones; but they are
so well dressed, and have such an air of graceful vivacity, that
the general effect was of a flower-garden. As often happens, several
American women were among the most distinguished for positive beauty;
one from Philadelphia, who is by many persons considered the prettiest
ornament of the dress circle at the Italian opera, was especially
marked by the attention of the king. However, these ladies, even if
here a long time, do not attain the air and manner of French
women. The magnetic fluid that envelops them is less brilliant and
exhilarating in its attractions.

Among the crowd wandered Leverrier, in the costume of Academician,
looking as if he had lost, not found, his planet. French _savants_ are
more generally men of the world, and even men of fashion, than those
of other climates; but, in his case, he seemed not to find it easy to
exchange the music of the spheres for the music of fiddles.

Speaking of Leverrier leads to another of my