The Memoirs of François René Vicomte de Chateaubriand sometime Ambassador to England, Volume 1 (of 6): Mémoires d'outre-tombe, volume 1Chateaubriand, François-René, vicomte de
General
The Memoirs of François René Vicomte de Chateaubriand sometime Ambassador to England, Volume 1 (of 6): Mémoires d'outre-tombe, volume 1
Chateaubriand, François-René, vicomte de
Chateaubriand, François-René, vicomte de, 1768-1848
[136] Thérèse Josèphe de Moëlien (1759-1793), daughter of Sébastien
Marie Hyacinthe de Moëlien, Chevalier, Seigneur de Trojolif (not
Tronjoli), Kermoisan, Kerguelenet, &c. She was twenty-three years
of age when Chateaubriand saw her at Combourg, and when writing his
Memoirs he must have recalled her with his school-boy eyes; for
contemporary evidence declares that she was not beautiful, nor even
pretty. The words "and close friend of the Marquis de La Rouërie" do
not occur in the Manuscript of 1826. Thérèse de Moëlien was in love,
not with La Rouërie, but with Major Chafner, an American officer, whom
she was to have married if she outlived the plot in which they were
both engaged. She was guillotined, however, in Paris on the 18th of
June 1793. Major Chafner was in London at the time of the discovery of
the so-called Breton Conspiracy. He returned to Brittany, and perished
at Nantes, after fighting on the side of the Vendeans to revenge the
death of Mademoiselle de Moëlien.--B.
[137] An allusion to the mystical hymns of Orpheus, which were called
"perfumes" (αρώματα).--B.
[138] Jean Baptiste Joseph Eugène de Ravenel du Boisteilleul
(1738-1815), first cousin of Chateaubriand's mother, and therefore
uncle in the manner of Brittany of the great writer.--B.
[139] Hyacinthe Eugène Pierre de Ravenel du Boisteilleul (1784-1868), a
captain of artillery, and decorated on the battle-field at Smolensk, 17
August 1812.--B.
[140] Pauline Zoé Marie de Farcy de Montavallon (1784-1850) married
Hyacinthe de Ravenel du Boisteilleul, 16 November 1814.--B.
[141] Vice-Admiral Charles Jean Comte d'Hector (1722-1808), commander
of the port of Brest from 1780 to 1791. He joined the Princes' Army at
Coblentz, and was made colonel of a regiment consisting exclusively
of naval officers. He died at Reading in Berkshire at the age of
eighty-six.--B.
[142] The Peace of Versailles, 1783.--T.
[143] Pierre André de Suffren-Saint-Tropez (1726-1788), known as the
Bailli de Suffren, had fought the English in India by sea and land in
the war of 1782.--T.
[144] Comte de Lamotte-Piquet (1720-1791), lieutenant-general of
the French Navy. Between 1737 and 1783 he took part in twenty-eight
campaigns, and distinguished himself especially in America.--T.
[145] Charles Hector Comte d'Estaing (1720-1794), admiral in command
of the combined fleets at Cadiz on the signature of the treaty of
peace. He embraced the principles of the Revolution, and served in the
Republican army and naval forces; but was guillotined in 1794.--T.
[146] Jean François Galaup, Comte de La Pérouse (1741-1788[?]) set out
on a voyage of discovery in 1785. He was known to have visited Japan
and New Holland when, in 1788, all traces of him were lost. In 1827,
Captain Dillon discovered the wrecks of his ships, the _Boussole_ and
the _Astrolabe_, off the coast of Vanikoro, since called the Pérouse,
one of the Santa Cruz group, between the Solomon Islands and the New
Hebrides.--T.
BOOK III[147]
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