Briançon and Mirabeau quarrelled, flew at one another’s throats, and were parted, with difficulty, by the panting marquise. This episode led to a coolness between brother and sister, a coolness which in time ended in bitter enmity. Then came the French Revolution which brought complete ruin to the de Cabris family and destruction to their house. Louise and her husband fled from the country during the Terror. When they returned to France they found their home at Grasse gone and their affairs in a state of dissolution. To add to the troubles of the irrepressible lady her husband had lapsed into a state of hopeless insanity. The once gay marquise, having lost estate, position and friends, retired to a small _appartement_ in Paris with her sick husband. She had one daughter who was married and had children. The moralist may ask what was the end of this wild, rollicking and reckless woman. She did not end her days—as some may surmise—in a poor-house, a lunatic asylum or a jail. On the contrary she devoted the last years of her life to the care of her poor imbecile husband whom she nursed with a tenderness that the most loving wife could not exceed. More than that she applied her fine talents to the teaching of her grandchildren; so that the last we see of the flighty marquise is a sweet-faced old lady, with white hair, who guides the finger of a child, standing at her knee, across the pages of a book of prayer. ----- [18] “Contes Populaires des Provençaux,” by Beranger-Feraud, 1887. [19] “The Maritime Alps,” by Miss Dempster, 1885. [20] “Old Provence,” by T. A. Cook, 1914, vol. 2, p. 298. [21] “Life of Mirabeau,” by S. G. Tallentyre. “Les Mirabeau,” by L. de Lomenie. [Illustration: CAGNES.] XII CAGNES AND ST. PAUL DU VAR ALONG the road from Nice to Vence are two interesting little towns, Cagnes and St. Paul du Var. Cagnes—or rather old Cagnes—is perched on the top of a beehive-shaped hill on the confines of a plain. It looks very picturesque from the distance and, unlike many other places, it is equally attractive near at hand.