The French girls are kept under very strict superintendence. They are not allowed to go to parties, or places of public amusement, without being accompanied by some married female relation; and they see their lovers only in the presence of a third person. Marriages are entirely negotiated by parents; and sometimes the wedding day is the second time that a bride and bridegroom see each other. Nothing is more common than to visit a lady, and attend her parties, without knowing her husband by sight; or to visit a gentleman without ever being introduced to his wife. If a married couple were to be seen frequently in each other’s company, they would be deemed extremely ungenteel. After ladies are married, they have unbounded freedom. It is a common practice to receive morning calls from gentlemen, before they have risen from bed; and they talk with as little reserve to such visiters, as they would in the presence of any woman of refinement. The French are generally slender, active, and well proportioned, with brown complexions and dark eyes and hair. The prevailing expression of their countenances is vivacity, and their manners are characterized by a graceful ease, which, if it be not nature, is the best possible imitation of nature. An artificial state of society is here carried to the utmost point of refinement. In the perpetual invention of beautiful forms more sober nations have toiled after them in vain, scolding all the while about French fashions, and French caprices. The beautiful Marie Antoinette first introduced the custom of wearing feathers in the hair. Having one day playfully stuck a peacock’s feather among her curls, she was pleased with the effect, and called for some small ostrich plumes. She arranged them so tastefully with jewels, that the king declared he had never seen any thing more beautiful. Feathers immediately brought an extravagant price in France, and the fashion soon prevailed all over Europe. One day the same queen put on a brown lutestring dress, which the king, with a smile, remarked was _couleur de puce_. As soon as this was made known, every person of fashion was eager to wear the color of a flea. They distinguished between the various shades of a young and an old flea, and between different parts of the body of the same insect. The dyers could not possibly satisfy the hourly demand. The silk merchants, finding this mania injurious to their trade, presented new satins to her majesty, who having chosen a glossy ash color, the king observed that it was the color of her hair. The uniform of fleas was forthwith discarded, and every body was eager to wear the color of the queen’s hair. Some of her ringlets were obtained by bribery, and sent to Lyons and other manufactories with all haste, that the exact hue might be caught. French ladies, especially those not young, use a great deal of rouge. A traveller who saw many of them in their opera boxes, says, “I could compare them to nothing but a large bed of peonies.”