pet, "that the De Stael is going to call on me.
She has been in Weimar. I wish you were here, for I must get up my French
as well as I can." And the jealousy of the fiery Bettina bursts out at the
very thought of any one being at Weimar and visiting Goethe but herself.

"I have not heard from your son since the 13th of August, and here is the
end of September. De Stael has made his time pass quickly, and driven me
out of his head. A celebrated woman is a curiosity. Nobody else can
compete with her. She is like brandy, which the poor grain it is made from
can never be compared to. For brandy smacks on the tongue and gets into
the heard, and so does a celebrated woman. But the simple wheat is better
far to me;--the sower sows it in the loosened soil, and the bounteous sun
and fruitful showers draw it from the earth again, and it makes green the
whole field, and bears golden ears, and at last gives rise to a happy
harvest-home. I would rather be a simple wheat-grain than a celebrated
woman; and rather, far rather, that he should break me for his daily bread
than that I should get into his head like a dram. And now I will tell you
that I supped last night with De Stael in Maintz. No woman would sit next
her at table, so I sat down beside her myself. It was uncomfortable
enough; for the gentlemen stood round the table, and crowded behind our
chairs, to speak to her and see her close. They bent over me. I
said--'_Vos adorateurs me suffoquent_.' She laughed. She told me that
Goethe had spoken to her of me. I would fain have sat and listened, for I
should like to hear what it was he said. And yet I was wrong; for I would
rather he did not speak of me to any one--and I don't believe he did--she
perhaps only said so. At last so many came to speak to her, and pressed
upon me so much, that I couldn't bear it any longer. I said to her--'_Vos
lauriers me pesent trop sur les epaules_;' and I stood up, and pushed my
way through the crowd. Sismondi, her companion, came to me and kissed my
hand, and told me I was very clever, and said it to the rest, and they
repeated it twenty times over, as if I had been a prince whose sayings are
always thought so wise though ever so commonplace.

"After that I listened to what she said about Goethe. She said she
expected to find him a second Werther, but she was disappointed--neither
his manners nor appearance were like it, and she was very sorry that he
fell short of him so entirely. Frau Rath, I was