angel, the loss of her husband's fortune and her own, the
years of wandering and exile, the second period of brief and illusive
prosperity, and the swift reverses which led to her final retreat. She
was at the height of her beauty and her fame in the early days of the
Restoration, when her salon revived its old brilliancy, and was a center
in which all parties met on neutral ground. Her intimate relations with
those in power gave it a strong political influence, but this was never
a marked feature, as it was mainly personal.

But the position in which one is most inclined to recall Mme. Recamier
is in the convent of Abbaye-aux-Bois, where, divested of fortune and
living in the simplest manner, she preserved for nearly thirty years the
fading traditions of the old salons. Through all the changes which tried
her fortitude and revealed the latent heroism of her character, she
seems to have kept her sweet serenity unbroken, bending to the passing
storms with the grace of a facile nature, but never murmuring at the
inevitable. One may find in this inflexible strength and gentleness
of temper a clue to the subtle fascination which held the devoted
friendship of so many gifted men and women, long after the fresh charm
of youth was gone.

The intellectual gifts of Mme. Recamier, as has been said before, were
not of a high or brilliant order. She was neither profound nor original,
nor given to definite thought. Her letters were few, and she has left
no written records by which she can be measured. She read much, was
familiar with current literature, also with religious works. But the
world is slow to accord a twofold superiority, and it is quite possible
that the fame of her beauty has prevented full justice to her mental
abilities. Mme. de Genlis tells us that she has a great deal of esprit.
It is certain that no woman could have held her place as the center of
a distinguished literary circle and the confidante and adviser of
the first literary men of her time, without a fine intellectual
appreciation. "To love what is great," said Mme. Necker "is almost to be
great one's self." Ballanche advised her to translate Petrarch, and she
even began the work, but it was never finished. "Believe me," he writes,
"you have at your command the genius of music, flowers, imagination,
and elegance. ... Do not fear to try your hand on the golden lyre of the
poets." He may have been too much blinded by a friendship that verged
closely upon a m