g, and silent devotion. To avert the blindness which was
gradually stealing upon her, she submitted to an operation, which might
have been successful, had she obeyed the injunctions of her physicians.
But Ballanche lay dying in the opposite house, and, true to the noble
instincts of her heart, she could not let the friend who had loved her
so long and well die alone. She crossed the street, and took her place
by his bedside, thus sealing her own fate, for all hopes of recovering
her sight were lost. Her health also was extremely delicate; but, much
as she needed quiet and repose, she kept up her relations with society
and held her receptions for Chateaubriand's sake. But both their lives
were fast approaching to a close. Chateaubriand died on the 4th of July,
1848. For some time before his death he was speechless, but kept his
dying eyes fixed upon Madame Recamier. She could not see him, and this
dark, dreary silence filled her soul with despair.

Madame Recamier shed no tears over her loss, and uttered no
lamentations. She received the condolences of her friends with
gratitude, and strove to interest herself in their pursuits. But a
deadly paleness, which never left her, spread over her face, and "the
sad smile on her lips was heart-breaking." Sightless and sad, it was
time for her to die. Madame de Stael and Montmorency, the friends of her
youth, had long since departed. Ballanche was gone, and now
Chateaubriand. She survived the latter only eleven months. Stricken with
cholera the following summer, her illness was short, but severe, and her
last words to Madame Lenormant, who bent over her, were, "_Nous nous
reverrons,--nous nous reverrons_."

So impalpable was the attraction that brought the world to the feet of
Madame Recamier that it is interesting to analyze it. It did not lie in
her beauty and wealth alone; for she lost the one, while time blighted
the other. Nor was it due to power of will; for she was not great
intellectually. And had she been a person of strong convictions, she
would never have been so universally popular. As it was, she pleased
equally persons of every shade of opinion and principle. Her instinctive
coquetry can partly account for her sway over men, but not over women.
What, then, was the secret of her influence? It lay in the subtile power
of a marvellous tact. This tact had its roots deep in her nature. It was
part and parcel of herself, the distinguishing trait in a rare
combination of q