death.] "I have been very triste: tout m'ennuie dans ce mondeci, et je ne scais pas pourquoi, unless it be the recollection of what I have suffered. I think the best thing for me is to return to my dear child. I love him so entirely that seeing him may render my feelings less poignant. Any inconveniences are more supportable than being separated from one's children. How much more we love them than our husbands! the latter are often so selfish and cruel; but children cannot force mothers from their affection."... "PARIS, 1817 Your kind letter by Tom Moore reached me. He seldom sees me: I did not take with him at all.... How happy you must be at filling the world with your name! Mme. de Stael and Mme. de Genlis are forgotten, and if the love of fame be of any weight, your excursion to Paris was a brilliant success. Your work on France has appeared through a French translation, in which they have suppressed what they thought best. Its truths cannot at this moment be admitted here, but in all other countries it will have complete success. The violent clamor of the Paris gazettes proves it to be too well written. They are publishing it in America, where your talents are justly appreciated.... I have not seen Mme. d'H---- for a long time: she dines at half-past nine--wakes when other persons sleep, which makes it impossible to enjoy her society without paying the price of a night's repose.... Your friend and admirer Mr. S---- is dead of old age. I met him two weeks previous at a party. His widow gave a dinner the next week, because she was afraid of being _triste_--receives and appears on the Boulevards, because 'bon ami m'a dit qu'il fallait vivre.' Her friends flatter themselves that her sensibility will not kill her, at the same time that it enables them to give agreeable parties.... My desire to see my child is stronger than my taste for Paris. I am of your opinion: the best thing a woman can do is to marry: even quarrels with one's husband are preferable to the ennui of a solitary existence. There are so many hours apart from those appropriated to the world that one cannot get rid of--at least one like myself, having no useful occupation. You never felt ennui, because you cultivate talents which will immortalize you.... Mme. de Stael died regretting a life that she had contrived to render very agreeable. Her most intimate friends were ignorant that a marriage with M. Rocca existed, and unless her will had substantiated the fact they would have treated it as a calumny. Marrying a man twenty years younger than herself, without fortune or name, is in France _un ridicule, pire qu'un crime_. What think you of the _Manuscript of St. Helena_ being attributed to her and Benjamin Constant? Is it possible to carry the desire of rendering her inconsistent further?... Adieu! Your recollection accompanies me to the New World, where I hope I may meet any one half so agreeable. They write me that my son is _petri d'esprit_. I fear that after exciting my hopes