We pause too long over these minutia. We turn over madame de Sévigné's pages: an expression, a detail strikes us; we are impelled to put it down; but the memoir grows too long, and we must curtail. She returned to Paris in August, 1685, and enjoyed for three years more the society of her daughter. [Sidenote: 1687. Ætat. 61.] During this period she lost her uncle, the abbé de Coulanges. "You know that I was under infinite obligations to him," she, writes to count de Bussy: "I owed him the agreeableness and repose of my life; and you owed to him the gladness that I brought to your society: without him we had never laughed together. You owe to him my gaiety, my good humour, my vivacity; the gift I had of understanding you; the ability of comprehending what you had said, and of guessing what you were going to say. In a word, the good abbé, by drawing me from the gulf in which M. de Sévigné had left me, rendered me what I was, what you knew me, and worthy of your esteem and friendship. I draw the curtain before the wrong you did me: it was great, but must be forgotten; and I must tell you that I have felt deeply the loss of this dear source of the peace of my whole life. He lived with honour, and died as a Christian. God give us the same grace! It was at the end of August that I wept him bitterly. I should never have left him, had he lived as long as myself." [Sidenote: 1688. Ætat. 62.] The subsequent separation of mother and daughter renewed the correspondence. This division lasted only a year and a half, when madame de Sévigné repaired to Grignan, which she did not quit again. The letters written during these few months are very numerous and long. The growing charms and talents of Pauline de Grignan; the _début_ of the young marquis de Grignan, who began his career at sixteen in the siege of Philipsburg; and the deep interest felt by both, is the first subject. The arrival of James II. in France, and the court news, which had the novelty of the English royal family being established at St. Germain, fills many of the letters. The account of the acting of Esther[76], which enlivened the royal pleasures; and her naïve delight at having been spoken to by the king is one of her most agreeable passages. Added to this pleasure was that of M. de Grignan receiving the order of the saint esprit. Soon after she repaired to Britany, where her time was spent partly at Rennes, with the duchess de Chaulnes, partly at the Rochers. Her absence from Paris was felt bitterly by her friends: her motive, the payment of her debts, was, however, appreciated and applauded; and she was at once mortified and gratified by the offer of a loan of money to facilitate her return. Madame de la Fayette wrote to make her the proposition; but the money was to come from her kind friend the duchess de Chaulnes. The proposal was made with some _brusquerie_: "You must not, my dear, at any price whatever, pass the winter in Britany.