egate: trust, consult, and
apply to her without reserve. No woman ever had more than she has, 'le
ton de la parfaitement bonne compagnie, les manieres engageantes, et le
je ne sais quoi qui plait'. Desire her to reprove and correct any, and
every the least error and inaccuracy in your manners, air, address,
etc. No woman in Europe can do it so well; none will do it more
willingly, or in a more proper and obliging manner. In such a case she
will not put you out of countenance, by telling you of it in company; but
either intimate it by some sign, or wait for an opportunity when you are
alone together. She is also in the best French company, where she will
not only introduce but PUFF you, if I may use so low a word. And I can
assure you that it is no little help, in the 'beau monde', to be puffed
there by a fashionable woman. I send you the inclosed billet to carry
her, only as a certificate of the identity of your person, which I take
it for granted she could not know again.

You would be so much surprised to receive a whole letter from me without
any mention of the exterior ornaments necessary for a gentleman, as
manners, elocution, air, address, graces, etc., that, to comply with your
expectations, I will touch upon them; and tell you, that when you come to
England, I will show you some people, whom I do not now care to name,
raised to the highest stations singly by those exterior and adventitious
ornaments, whose parts would never have entitled them to the smallest
office in the excise. Are they then necessary, and worth acquiring, or
not? You will see many instances of this kind at Paris, particularly a
glaring one, of a person--[M. le Marechal de Richelieu]--raised to the
highest posts and dignities in France, as well as to be absolute
sovereign of the 'beau monde', simply by the graces of his person and
address; by woman's chit-chat, accompanied with important gestures; by an
imposing air and pleasing abord. Nay, by these helps, he even passes for
a wit, though he hath certainly no uncommon share of it. I will not name
him, because it would be very imprudent in you to do it. A young fellow,
at his first entrance into the 'beau monde', must not offend the king 'de
facto' there. It is very often more necessary to conceal contempt than
resentment, the former forgiven, but the latter sometimes forgot.

There is a small quarto book entitled, 'Histoire Chronologique de la
France', lately published by Le President Henault,