who read it to the friends
assembled around her chair:

"Clusine qui dans tous les temps
Eut de tous les honnetes gens
L'amour et l'estime en partage:
Qui toujours pleine de bon sens
Sut de chaque saison de l'age
Faire a propos un juste usage:
Qui dans son entretien, dont on fut enchante
Sut faire un aimable alliage
De l'agreable badinage,
Avec la politesse et la solidite,
Et que le ciel doua d'un esprit droit et sage,
Toujours d'intelligence avec la verite,
Clusine est, grace au ciel, en parfaite sante."

Such a poem would not be accorded much praise nowadays, but the hearts
of her friends regarded the sentiments more than the polish, as a
substantial translation into English will serve to show appeared in
the lines:

Clusine who from our earliest ken
Had from all good and honest men
Love and esteem a generous share:
Who knew so well the season when
Her heritage of sense so rare
To use with justice and with care:
Who in her discourse, friends enchanted all-around,
Could fashion out of playful ware
An alloy of enduring wear,
Good breeding and with solid ground,
A heavenly spirit wise and fair,
With truth and intellect profound,
Clusine, thanks be to Heaven, her perfect health has found.

Her salon was open to her friends in general from five o'clock in the
evening until nine, at which hour she begged them to permit her to
retire and gain strength for the morrow. In winter she occupied a
large apartment decorated with portraits of her dearest male and
female friends, and numerous paintings by celebrated artists. In
summer, she occupied an apartment which overlooked the boulevard, its
walls frescoed with magnificent sketches from the life of Psyche. In
one or the other of these salons, she gave her friends four hours
every evening, after that retiring to rest or amusing herself with a
few intimates. Her friendship finds an apt illustration in the case of
the Comte de Charleval. He was always delicate and in feeble health,
and Ninon when he became her admirer in his youth, resolved to
prolong his life through the application of the Epicurian philosophy.
De Marville, speaking of the Count, whom no one imagined would survive
to middle age, says: "Nature, which gave him so delicate a body in
such perfect form, also gave him a delicate and perfect intelligence."
This frail and delicate invalid, lived, however, until the age of
eighty years, and was always grateful to Nin