The fidelity of the aforegoing portrait is confirmed by other contemporary evidence. Examined in detail, it would appear that Armande's features were far from perfect, but that the _ensemble_ was fascinating to a very remarkable degree. Mlle. Poisson, in a _Lettre sur la vie et les œuvres de Molière et les comédiens de son temps_, which she contributed to the _Mercure_ of 1740, describes her as "of middle height," with "very small eyes," and "a large flat mouth"; but adds that she had "an engaging air," and "performed every action with grace." The elder Grandval is in accord with Mlle. Poisson: "Without being beautiful, she was piquant and capable of inspiring a _grande passion_." While a bitter enemy of Armande, the anonymous author of _La Fameuse Comédienne_, while denying her "_aucun trait de beauté_" is fain to admit that her appearance and manners rendered her very amiable in the opinion of many people, and that she was "very affecting when she wished to please." That Armande should have triumphed so completely over physical deficiencies was probably due, to some extent, to the perfection of her toilettes. "No one," the brothers Parfaict tell us, in their _Histoire du Théâtre Français_, "knew better than she how to enhance the beauty of her face by the arrangement of her coiffure, or of her figure by the fashion of her costume." And Mlle. Poisson records that she "showed most remarkable taste and invariably opposed to the mode of the time." She seems indeed to have had some claim to be considered the arbitrix of feminine taste in dress, for the _Mercure galant_ of 1673 ascribes to her the credit of a radical reform in ladies' toilettes, nothing less than the substitution of gowns, "_tout unis sur le corps, de la manière que la taille parait plus belle_," for the majestic but somewhat heavy costume hitherto in vogue, which concealed beneath its too ample folds the graceful lines of the figure. * * * * * If Armande, as a woman, was an object of admiration to her contemporaries, as an actress, she aroused in them something very like enthusiasm. It would indeed have been a matter for surprise had it been otherwise, since she enjoyed advantages which fall to the lot of very few. She came of a family which had already contributed several finished performers to the French stage, and "had in her blood the passion and instinct of the theatre." With her charm of manner and exquisite taste in dress, she combined many accomplishments: "she had a very pretty voice, sang with great taste in both French and Italian, and danced ravishingly." She had received a long and careful training from one who was perhaps an even better teacher than he was an actor, and who was as ambitious for her success as for his own. And, finally, nearly all her parts--certainly all her more important parts--were written by Molière with the express object of enabling her to display her abilities to the best advantage.