bed in my art
that nothing could take me away from it. Then, besides, the moral and
religious principles my mother had instilled me with were a strong
protection against the seductions surrounding me. Happily I never as
yet had read a single novel. The first I read, "Clarissa Harlowe," was
only after my marriage, and it interested me prodigiously. Before my
marriage I read nothing but sacred literature, such as the moral
precepts of the Holy Fathers, which contained everything one needs to
know, and some of my brother's class-books.

To return to those gentlemen. As soon as I observed any intention on
their part of making sheep's eyes at me, I would paint them looking in
another direction than mine, and then, at the least movement of the
pupilla, would say, "I am doing the eyes now." This vexed them a
little, of course, but my mother, who was always present, and whom I
had taken into my confidence, was secretly amused.

On Sundays and saints' days, after hearing high mass, my mother and my
stepfather took me to the Palais Royal for a walk. The gardens were
then far more spacious and beautiful than they are now, strangled and
straightened by the houses enclosing them. There was a very broad and
long avenue on the left arched by gigantic trees, which formed a vault
impenetrable to the rays of the sun. There good society assembled in
its best clothes. The opera house was hard by the palace. In summer
the performance ended at half-past eight, and all elegant people left
even before it was over, in order to ramble in the garden. It was the
fashion for the women to wear huge nosegays, which, added to the
perfumed powder sprinkled in everybody's hair, really made the air one
breathed quite fragrant. Later, yet still before the Revolution, I
have known these assemblies to last until two in the morning. There
was music by moonlight, out in the open; artists and amateurs sang
songs; there was playing on the harp and the guitar; the celebrated
Saint Georges often executed pieces on his violin. Crowds flocked to
the spot.

We never entered this avenue, Mlle. Boquet and I, without attracting
lively attention. We both were then between sixteen and seventeen
years old, Mlle. Boquet being a great beauty. At nineteen she was
taken with the smallpox, which called forth such general interest that
numbers from all classes of society made anxious inquiries, and a
string of carriages was constantly drawn up outside her door.

She had a