be constantly referring our
readers to original sources--the Celebrated Trials by Guyot de Pitaval,
the Life of Marie de Rossan, and the Lettres galantes of Madame
Desnoyers.]

"Her complexion, which was of a dazzling whiteness, was illumined by not
too brilliant a red, and art itself could not have arranged more
skilfully the gradations by which this red joined and merged into the
whiteness of the complexion. The brilliance of her face was heightened
by the decided blackness of her hair, growing, as though drawn by a
painter of the finest taste, around a well proportioned brow; her large,
well opened eyes were of the same hue as her hair, and shone with a soft
and piercing flame that rendered it impossible to gaze upon her steadily;
the smallness, the shape, the turn of her mouth, and, the beauty of her
teeth were incomparable; the position and the regular proportion of her
nose added to her beauty such an air of dignity, as inspired a respect
for her equal to the love that might be inspired by her beauty; the
rounded contour of her face, produced by a becoming plumpness, exhibited
all the vigour and freshness of health; to complete her charms, her
glances, the movements of her lips and of her head, appeared to be guided
by the graces; her shape corresponded to the beauty of her face; lastly,
her arms, her hands, her bearing, and her gait were such that nothing
further could be wished to complete the agreeable presentment of a
beautiful woman."

[Note: All her contemporaries, indeed, are in agreement as to her
marvellous beauty; here is a second portrait of the marquise, delineated
in a style and manner still more characteristic of that period:--

"You will remember that she had a complexion smoother and finer than a
mirror, that her whiteness was so well commingled with the lively blood
as to produce an exact admixture never beheld elsewhere, and imparting to
her countenance the tenderest animation; her eyes and hair were blacker
than jet; her eyes, I say, of which the gaze could scarce, from their
excess of lustre, be supported, which have been celebrated as a miracle
of tenderness and sprightliness, which have given rise, a thousand times,
to the finest compliments of the day, and have been the torment of many a
rash man, must excuse me, if I do not pause longer to praise them, in a
letter; her mouth was the feature of her face which compelled the most
critical to avow that they had seen none of equal perfection,