Mdlle. Duclos, like her aunt, chanted or recitatived her parts. The French had got accustomed to the sing-song cadences of their rhymed plays, when suddenly a new charm fell upon their delighted ears. The new charmer was Adrienne Lecouvreur--a hat-maker’s daughter, an amateur actress, then a strolling player. In 1717 she burst upon Paris, and in one month she enchanted the city by her acting in Monimia, Electra, and Bérénice, and had been named one of the king’s company for the first parts in tragedy and comedy. Adrienne’s magic lay in her natural simplicity. She spoke as the character she represented might be expected to speak. This natural style had been suggested by Molière, and had been attempted by Baron, but unsuccessfully. It was given to the silver-tongued Adrienne to subdue her audience by this exquisite simplicity of nature. The play-going world was enthusiastic. Whence did the new charmer come? She came from long training in the provinces, and was the glory of many a provincial city before, in 1717, she put her foot on the stage of the capital, and at the age of twenty-seven began her brilliant but brief artistic career of thirteen years. Tracing her early life back, people found her a baby, true child of Paris. In her little-girlhood she saw ‘Polyeucte’ at the playhouse close by her father’s house. She immediately got up the tragedy, with other little actors and actresses. Madame la Présidente La Jay, hearing of the ability of the troupe and of the excellence of Adrienne as Pauline at the rehearsals in a grocer’s warehouse, lent the court-yard of her hotel in the Rue Garancière, where a stage was erected, and the tragedy acted, in presence of an audience which included members of the noblest families in France. All Paris was talking of the marvellous skill of the young company, but especially of Adrienne, when the association called the ‘Comédie Française,’ which had the exclusive right of acting the legitimate drama, arose in its spite, screamed ‘Privilege!’ and got the company suppressed. The little Adrienne, however, devoted herself to the stage; and when she came to Paris, after long and earnest experience in the provinces, her new subjects hailed their new queen--queen of tragedy, that is to say; for when she took comedy by the hand the muse bore with, rather than smiled upon her; and, wanting sympathy, Adrienne felt none. Outside the stage her heart and soul were surrendered to the great soldier and utterly worthless fellow, Maurice de Saxe. He was the only man to whom she ever gave her heart; and he had given his to so many there was little left for her worth the having. What little there was was coveted by the Princesse de Bouillon. Adrienne died while this aristocratic rival was flinging herself at the feet of the handsome Maréchal; and the wrathful popular voice, lamenting the loss of the dramatic queen, accused the princess of having poisoned the actress.