The Sun.
London, England, 1837-10-12 00:00:00

LIT_LRATURE,

THE FOREIGN QUAItTERLY REVIEW.
. X
tindoti, Poch end ..4rristrong, 1837.
Two most interoSting ttot-ks are reviewed in this
Number of the " Forz ein Quattal-r—the Meinoirs
of Madarte LAM, and the Chevalier d'Artaud's
History of Pope Pins thc 6evvuth. Madame Le-
brun, one of the early tffiigtatits of the first French
Revolution, so celebrated for he 'beauty, her wit, her
musical accomplishmentt", her skill in pOrtinit-painting,
and her virtue, is still alive and ;n the enicytnent of
excellent health, though she has passed eightie!h
ytar. Her remini:3cence.-.1 therefore, embrace ttotkcs
of nearly all the distinguished courtiers, statesmen, and
men of letters who figured in France from the acces
sion of the unfortunate Louis the Sixteenth till the
downfall of the monarchy. In 17'79 she painted a
portrait of the Queen, whose personal beauty she
desctibcs in language only less glowing than the cele-
brated sketch of Edmund Burke. " Marie Antoinette,"
etty!,4 Madame Lebrun, " was tall, exquisitely well
made, gtif ciently plump without being too much so. Her
li
arms were superb, her hands small, perfectly formed,
and her feet charming. Her gait •was more graceful
woman in France ; she held
than that of any othef
which enabled you
her head very erect, with n innies;,y
her Court,
to distinguish the Sovereign atnidtlt at:
and yet that majesty did not in the least detract .from
the extreme kindness and benevolence of her look. •
. . But the most remarkable thin ,3 about her face
was the brilliancy of her complexion. I never saw
any so brilliant—yes, brilliant is the word—for her
skin was so transparent that it took no shade. I
lacked colours to represent that freshness, those delicate
tones which belonged exclusively to that fascinating
face, and which I never observed in any other woman."
Madame Le Brun's sketches of the principal personages
to whose notice her great talents recommended her at
Rome, Vienna, St. Petersburg, and London, are
equally vivid and interesting. We select her first in-
terview with Catherine the Second of Russia :
" I reached the Empress's apartment trembling a little,
and there I was tete-a•tete with the Autocrat of all the
Russias. M. d'Esterhazy bad told me that I must kiss her
hand, and consequently for this purpose she had taken ofT
one of her gloves, which ought to have reminded me of his
injunction ; but I completely forgot it. It is true that the
sight of this so celebrated woman made such an impression
upon me, that it was impossible for me to think of any thing
else but contemplating her. I was at first extremely sur-
prised to find her so small ; I bad fancied her to be a pro-
digiously large woman, as large as her renown. She was
very fat, but she had still a fine face, to which her gray hair,
turned up, formed an admirable frame, Genius appeared
to be seated upon her broad and very high forehead. Her
eyes were soft and fine, her nose perfectly Grecian, her
complexion very ruddy, and her physiognomy extremely ani-
mated. She said to me immediately in a tone of voice full
of kindness, but nevertheless somewhat harsh, lam de-.
lighted, Madam, to receive you here ; your reputation has
outstripped you. lam very fond of the arts, and especially
of painting. I am not a connoisseur, but an amateur.'
All that she added during this conversation, which was of
considerable length, about the desire she felt that I should
like Russia well enough to make a long stay there, bore the
character of such great benevolence, that my timidity left
me ; and by the time I took leave, I had recovered all my
assurance. Only I could not forgive myself for not having
kissed her hand, which was very beautiful and very white ;
especially as M. d'Esterhazy did not fail to reproach me for

11.
Of the urbanity and even kindness of the Prince of
Wales, afterwards George the Fourth, Madame Le-
brun has recorded several very flattering instances,
which are duly noticed by the Reviewer. In fact, no
work could have more justice done to it. The Re-
viewer writes of Madame Lebrun and her reminis-
cences with all the cordiality of an old friend, in
whose mind every succeeding anecdote awakened
some corresponding but long forgotten pleasantry or
bon mot. The Review of D'Artaud's Life of
Pope Pius the Seventh is equally copious and inte-
resting, and serves to throw fresh light on some of
the obscurest passages in the career of Napoleon.
The indignities to which the unfortunate Pontiff was
exposed while a prisoner at Fontainbleau are touch-
ingly narrated, as well as those which accelerated the
death of his truly Christian predecessor. When the
report of his intended captivity first reached the Pope,
through the agents of the Emperor, his Holiness
calmly observed—" All has been foreseen and pro-
vided against. Before leaving Rome we signed a
formal abdication, which will come into operation the
moment we become a prisoner. * * There will then
remain in your hands only a poor monk named Bar-
nabas Chiaramonte." The following account of the
death
.of the " last of the Stuarts," from the same
article, will be read with interest :
" On the 15th of July, 1807, the family of the Stuarts
became extinct by the death of Cardinal York. This
Prince, who was born at Rome on the 6th of March, 1725,
was baptized in the month of May following by Pope Be-
nedict XI 11. He at first took the title of Duke of York,
and, upon being invested with the purple by Benedict
XIV. in 1747, assumed that of Cardinal. His father, who
married the grand-daughter of Sobieski, tha saviour of
Vienna, had bequeathed all his papers and jewels to his
eldest son, Prince Charles-Edward, the Duke of York's
brother, and the latter, upon the death of that Prince in
1788, came into possession of them. On • the death of the
last of the Stuarts being notified to Napoleon, he said, If
they had but left a child eight years old, I would have re-
placed him on the throne of Great Britain.' M. Artaud,
in a note, gives verbatim the Cardinal's will, which has never
been before published. It is too voluminous to be trans-
cribed at length in this brief article, and we shall therefore
extract the passages most important to an English reader :
.4 We, Henry-Benedict-Maria, son of James 111., King
of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, Cardinal of the
Holy Roman Church, Bishop of Frascati, considering, &c.

. .
.
0 WC moreover expressly declare, that all property of
whattinver kind belonging to us. whether moveable or im-
moveabies
diamonds, and orders, as well as
si'.7oeus';icer'oveiswn', the decorations, valuable effects,
the insignia ,
royal house, our own property in funds,
and credits of our-
c vgligsoever kind they may be, be-
our riL,hts and duties o.
ft.4r:yation to us, and are of
long exclusively and without : 45 proceeding in part
our own free property and possessio.., ic;yal house and
from the inheritance of the ancestors of ou:
family, and duly devolved and bequeathed unto and in
part as acquired and saved by ourselves.

" Finally, we purpose here to renew, and to regard and
hold, as expressly inserted, our protest, preserved in the acts
of the notary Cataldi, the 27th January, 1788, upon the oc-
casion of the death of our most serene brother, relative to
the transmission of our rights and succession to the throne
of England in favour of the Prince to whom they will by
right (de jure) fall by proximity of blood, and by the laws
of succession ; we here declare that we so t ransmit them to
him in the most express and solemn manner
" Given at our residence of Frascati this day, 15th July,
1802.

HENRY, THE KING."
The pretended right of Cardinal York to the
England devolved upon the second son of Victor
Amadeus of Tulin ; but we have not heard that
any attempt was ever made, either actually or by a
written instrument, to establish it in any way. Several
trunks filled with important papers relative to the re- '
hellion in 1715 and 1745 were bequeathed by Cardinal
York to the care of the Bishop of Milevi ; but by
a series of curious accidents they came into the pos-
session of England in 1817, having been purchased
from Sardinia by the British Government.
The reviews of " The Statistics of Insanity in
Europe," of " Carl Ritter's Researches in the Island
of Hayti," and of the present state of " German
Literature," display considerable stores of information,
and the exercise of critical faculties of a high order.
We recommend readers of weak nerves and strong
imaginations not to look into the Article. on Insa-
nity. Its details aro quite appalling—we shudder to
think of them. To such, however, as take a lively
interest in the solution of the curious problem—Are
Negroes capable of the highest state of moral and
mental culture and civilivation ?—the Review of Carl
Ritter's Researches will appear the most valuable ar.