To _Bérénice_, early in the following January, succeeded _Baiazet_, Mlle. de Champmeslé playing the part of Roxane. Madame de Sévigné attended the fifth performance, and next day writes to Madame de Grignan: "We have been to see the new play by Racine, and thought it admirable. My _daughter-in-law_[45] is, in my opinion, the best performer I ever saw. She is a hundred leagues in front of Des Œillets, and I, who am supposed to have some talent for acting, am not worthy to light the candles when she appears.... I wish you had been with me that afternoon; I am sure you would not have thought your time ill spent. You would have dropped a tear or two, for I myself shed twenty; besides, you would have greatly admired your _sister-in-law_."[46] _Bajazet_ printed, the Marchioness sent her daughter a copy: "If I could send Champmeslé with it, you would find the tragedy among the best; without her, it loses half its value. Racine's plays are written for Champmeslé, and not for posterity. Whenever he grows old and ceases to be in love, it will be seen whether or not I am mistaken."[47] Mlle. de Champmeslé did not by any means confine her creations to her lover's heroines; the répertoire of the Hôtel de Bourgogne was a rich one. Thus, in March of that same year, she appeared in the title-part in _Ariane_, a new tragedy by her fellow-townsman, Thomas Corneille. This play was praised by some critics, but, in all probability, owed its success almost entirely to her impersonation of the heroine, "which drew the public as the light draws the moth." Madame de Sévigné was again among the audience, and wrote of the actress in terms of enthusiasm: "The Champmeslé is something so extraordinary that in your life you never saw any one like her. It is the actress that people flock to see, not the play. I went to _Ariane_ entirely for the sake of seeing her. The tragedy is insipid; the rest of the players wretched. But when the Champmeslé appears, every one is enthralled, and the tears of the audience flow at her despair."[48] When, seven years later, Mlle. de Champmeslé migrated to the Théâtre Guénégaud, it was in _Ariane_ that she secured her first triumph. "_Ariane_," wrote Donneau de Visé in the _Mercure_, "has been extremely well attended. Mlle. de Champmeslé, that inimitable actress, has drawn tears from the majority of the audience." The natural manner of her acting and her pathetic rendering of the hapless heroine gave indeed to the play a new lease of life.