The Sun.
London, England, 1855-06-01 00:00:00

peculiarity of the Quarterly, its principle charm
continues to be manifested chiefly through
what may be termed its biographical depart-
ment. Altogether, out of the eight articles
composing the present number there are as many
as three of this particular character. There is a
biographical paper on " The Emperor Nicholas ;"
this one, however, too curt, and altogether insuffi-
cient, it must be confessed. There is a biographi-
cal paper on " Sir -Richard Steele," a memorial of
that genial and exquisite essayist, defending him
from the influence of Mr. Macaulay's'sneers, preju-
dice, and depreciation. And, besides these, there
is also in the number of the Quarterly now be-
fore us a very charming and graceful biographical
whose life was such a roniance—born
paper on " Madame de Maintenon"—that astonish-
'and living in a palace !—the wife, first
itlan
eegatwhponi
erisncoarnippled buffoon, and afterwards of the
Grand Illonarque ! Reading her story anew, we
find no extravagance in that phrase of Madame de
Sevigne where she says, " the position of Madame
de Maintenon is perfectly unique." And scarcely
any in the judgment pronounced upon her character
by Madame de Defend: rise up from it (i.e., the
perusal of Madame de Maintenon s Correspondence)
with a high opinion of her mind, with little esteem
'
for her heart, and no taste for her person ; but I
persist in believing that she was not false." More,
however, will be known upon this most important
question, namely, as to the perfect sincerity of
Madame de Maintenon, so soon as M. Lavelle°
shall have completed the enterprise upon which he
has recently adventured—the publication of a com-
plete edition of her works; in ten little volumes,
two of which volumes have already made
their appearance. Few of the readers of
the Quarterly will fail to follow with interest the
epitomised record here given of the career of this
extraordinary woman—the wife and then the
widow of Scarron, the wife and then the widow cf
Louis XIV., nee Mademoiselle Francoise d'Au-
tmemaipdoenralriyfe,soLjoaubretill:b/entdwiee7zeimin3s.coansdeqlu6e4nsce of
bigne, otherwise as she was designated during her
island of Martinique. Born on the 27th13
eenr,tionedon Constant cla'Achuabriggenfwtarseacsoonnatinbeide
November,
1635, in the Conciergerie of the Chate
mh
with the English Government),
au-Tro, mi
eht
thet the
correspondencea( wt
il
e ther ep
he
re irofd
Francois° was placed by her mother under the
care, first of all, of a Calvinist aunt, Madame de
Villette, and subsequently under that of "another
near relation and a zealous Catholic," Maclaine eo
Neuillant. Here it was under the fatter guardian-
ship that the future spouse of the King of France
used to go forth of a morning to keep watch over a
brood of turkeys with a basket on her arm, a long
stick in her hand, a coarse straw hat on her head,
and a mask on her face to preserve her complexion!
Afterwardsshe was educated firstly by the nuns of the
Convent of Ursulins at Niort, and secondly by those
of the Ursulin Convent in the Rue Saint Jacques
at Paris. Between the age of fourteen and fifteen,
Mdlle. d'Aubigne was removed from the latter
establishment, taking up her abode with her
mother at Paris, in lodgings immediately opposite
the house of the Malade de la Reine, as he was
called, the author of the Virgile Travesti and of the
Roman Comique, the "divine" and "inimitable"
cripple—Scarron—the P 1 nceof Burlesque. Shortly.
after the death of Madame d'Aubigne, Scarron'
married the destitute orphan—the girl being then
sixteen and the " buffoon-rhymster ' (as he is here
called by the reviewer) forty-two. It was in the
June of 1652 that Mademoiselle d'Aubigne became
Madame Scarron. It is not the disparity of age,
however, that renders this union horrible—it is not
the difference of years between the husband and
wife. But, 0 ! the terrible appearance of the
bridegroom. Here is the description of him—the
description of—