ity of one
law, _la parfaite bonne compagnie_, whose aim was a social one--to
distinguish itself from bad company, vulgar and provincial society,
by the perfection of the means of pleasing, by the delicacy of
friendship, by the art of considerations, complaisances, of _savoir
vivre_, by all possible researches and refinements of _esprit_. It
fixed everything--usages, etiquette, tone of conversation; it
taught how to praise without bombast and insipidness, to reply to
a compliment without disdaining or accepting it, to bring others to
value without appearing to protect them; it prevented all slander.
If it did not impart modesty, goodness, indulgence, nobleness of
sentiment, it at least imposed the forms, exacting the appearances
and showing the images of them. It was the guardian of urbanity and
maintained all the laws that are derived from taste. It represented
the religion of honor; it judged, and when it condemned a man he was
socially-ruined."

A type of what may be called the social mistress of the nobility--the
personification of good taste, elegance and propriety such as it
should be--was the Comtesse de Boufflers, mistress of the Prince de
Conti, intimate friend of Hume, Rousseau, and Gustave III., King of
Sweden. The countess was one of the most influential and spirituelle
members of French society, her special mission and delight being the
introduction of foreign celebrities into French society. She piloted
them, was their patroness, spoke almost all modern languages, and
visited her friends in their respective countries. She was the most
travelled and most hospitable of great French women, hence the woman
best informed upon the world in general.

She was born in Paris in 1725, and in 1746 was married to the Comte
de Boufflers-Rouvrel; soon after, becoming enamored of the Prince de
Conti, she became his acknowledged mistress. To give an idea of
the light in which the women of that time considered those who were
mistresses of great men, the following episodes may be cited: One day,
Mme. de Boufflers, momentarily forgetting her relations to the Prince
de Conti, remarked that she scorned a woman who _avait un prince du
sang_ (was mistress of a prince of the blood). When reminded of her
apparent inconsistency, she said: "I wish to give by my words
to virtue what I take away from it by my actions...." On another
occasion, she reproached the Marechale de Mirepoix for going to see
Mme. de Pompadour, and in the hea