It has long been thought that the twelfth part, which concludes the story of _Marianne_, was by Mme. Riccoboni; but Fleury[84] has proved quite satisfactorily that the _Conclusion_, which appeared in 1745, in an Amsterdam edition of _Marianne_, was written by one of those who, as d'Alembert says, "se sont charges, sans qu'on les en priat, de finir les romans de M. de Marivaux, et (qui) ont eu dans cette entreprise un succes digne de leurs talents:" while a simple _Continuation_, written, in fact, by Mme. Riccoboni, and so cleverly, too, as to almost deceive the critics of the eighteenth century, did not appear until 1751.[85] Marianne is a young girl, beautiful and of high birth, who, when but a small child, has the misfortune to lose her parents in an attack by robbers on the road to Bordeaux. Sheltered by a priest and his sister, she reaches the age of fifteen, without, however, having discovered who her parents were. Deprived by death of her guardians, she finds herself at this early age alone and unprotected in the streets of Paris. She seeks the counsel of a kindly priest, who refers her to a rich and apparently respectable man, but in reality the personification of hypocrisy. Of his character study of M. de Climal, Marivaux was justly proud. Few, if any, however, will justify him in rating it superior to Moliere's Tartuffe.[86] Throughout her trials and temptations Marianne preserves her innocence and her hand for M. de Valville, a handsome and wealthy young aristocrat, who is really enamoured of Marianne, despite certain infidelities of which he is guilty, and which Marianne pardons with the same forbearing charity and kindly philosophy that characterize our author himself.[87] The story of _Marianne_ is interesting, though never of so absorbing an interest as to hold the reader's attention more closely than was held that of the writer himself. It is a book to be read by piecemeal, and it may be laid down at any time. Indeed, one is not surprised, nor much distressed, when the author fails to grasp again his fallen pen after the eleventh part. I would not in any way detract from the literary value of a work which, as even critical La Harpe declares, "assures him one of the first places among French novelists;"[88] but the interest inspired by _Marianne_ is of much the same sort as that inspired by the _Spectateur_. The thread of the story serves merely to join the analyses of character, moral reflections, and digressions of various kinds which abound. The style is conversational, very similar to that of his journals. Taken as a whole it may be considered as a psychological study of a young girl's heart, as viewed by herself in maturer years. I am half inclined to say the heart of a coquette, for Marianne has much of the coquette in her nature, but she has, too, the nobler qualities of heart and mind. She is an epitome, in short, of the feminine side of Marivaux.