The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-12-19
WOMEN IN FRANCE.
How the Widows Of Some Great
Frenchmen Spend Their Years.
Paris Letter in New York Post.

How the Widows Of Some Great
Frenchmen Spend Their Years.
Paris Letter in New York Post.
Madame Alexander Dumas has not
directed by her husband during his life
time. She lives in the apartment where he
intended to settle, but which in reality he
occupied only tWenty-fOur hours in his cof-
fin. In the summer Madame Dumas goes to
Marty, the country home which Dumas
loved so devotedly, and here she preserves
lected, and guards faithfully ali the papers
and manuscripts never to be published
A difficult and a delicate undertaking. for
no day passes without request from a
director an editor, or a friend, all of whom
she must deny, without offending any. She
fulfills these duties with the greatest tact,
and, together with her two daughters-in-
law, Madame Colette Dumas and Madame
d'Hauterives she has made herself the
legacy left by Dumas With those of his
friends who remain faithful to her she de-
lights il. talking of him whose last years
she enlivened and whose sufferings she
Soothed.
Who does not know of the dignity and
statelinesS of MAZDA ne CARROTS life? Con-
sluerlng herSelf rich enough with a few
thousand francs income she would accept
nothing from the government, and proudly
refused the pension which was justly due
ner she lives in the Avenue de Palma, al
ways eager to receive or to help any who
come in her husbands name. No sovereign
passes through Paris without calling upon
who was faithful in days of spIendor and
who remains so worthy. Madame Carnot is
surrounded by old Elysee friends. In one
corner Of her apartment she has arranged
chapel, and here she has placed around the
portrait of Carnot innumerable souvenirs
sent to her after the assassination at Lyons
crowns, wreaths, portraits bibelots OBJ
Jects or art, all manner of tributes to the
victim of Caserio.
Place Malesherbes, in the house which used
10 resound with the solemn ecnoes of Gou-
nod $ mighty organ. OF all these artists
the memory of her hero with the greatest
vigilance She does not wish a breath to
duli the mirror wherein she contemplates
the unreal image of the departed one. Last
year they wanted to play at the opera con-
certS one of Gounod's early symphonies
Madame Maaame Gounod opposed It, because she
Sanctity. In this way she lives, seeing only
her son and daughter, her nephew Dubufe,
and her sister, Keeping to herself all that
she can of the author of Faust"
The widow of the composer of "NIignon''
now lives on the Avenue Victor Hugo in an
bibelots, and they are numerous, with
which Ambrose Thomas liked to surround
n,lmself. Aside from the considerable an-
tnor rights, he left a large fortune to
which his wife was sole heir. His manu-
scripts he decided to the Conservatory Ma
dame Thomas is to reopen her salon, where
the glory of the master during his lifetime
drew many illustrious people, and where
she will now gather about her the faithful
let" -
Mime. Pasteur still lives in the Institute
PaSteur. She wanted to give I'D this apart-
ment, which is reserved for the director of
the institute, but the managers begged her
to remain near the tomb of the ilustrious
this tomb, which, since his death, has been
her only care. She has insisted upon paw
ing the entire cost OF it--100, 600 francs-not
wishing that a centime of the institutes re-
should Disturbed hIIt 6afp cd
that the tomb should be worthy of the great
savant and of his work. Day by day she
spired among his disciples; she sees his
methods, inexhaustible in new discoveries,
continually growing and increasing.
Rue d'Assas in an old house which claims
the reverence of passers-by with a sign
upon the wall, the widow of the distin-
are the pages she has published since his
death, and the new editions she has pre-
pared to populariZe the immortal works of
the master. Continuing the duties Of sec
rotary which she filled so well during the
lifetime of Michelet she is determined to
let nothing of his escape the public or re-
main unknown. During the summer months
at Velizy she works over the pages of his
memoirs. some of which have already been
published. She is alone in the world she
has no children she sees almost nobody.
tiplying the glory of NLichelet.
Jules Simon died leaving no fortune what
ever, but the government has granted to
his widow a pension of 1900 francs, which
enables her to keep the apartment in the
Place de la Madeleine, where for fifty years
she lived with her husband, and where she
now remains, surrounded by his books, his
memories, arranging his inedited manu-
scripts, planning. doubtless, to publish the IN
in the Vie Contemporaries, of which he was
director until his death. The Society for
the Protection of Children has made Nine.
Simon president in her husbands place, She
takes a very active interest in it. recalling,
no doubt, the days when she presided at the
Hotel de Vile for the committee on inStruc-
ton and public charity years ago.
Since the marriage of her daughter with
Paul Dubois, the sculptor, Nine Tame has
lived alone on the Rue Hamelin, in a
perb house. with splendid rooms, Moorish
antechambers, and nothing which reminds
one of the old house in the Rue Cassette,
whence issued the immortal pages of the
"OrigineS de la France Contemporaries"
Nine. Taine, always surrounded with her
husbands friends, is deeply interested in
collecting his letters and material of all
kinds for the biography which is to be writ
ten by his nephew, M. Chevrillon. In the
summer she goes to the cottage which Thine
loved so devotedly, at Mention Saint Ber
nard in the Alps. always devoting herself
methodically and reverently to her task
$50 they live" concludes Maurel differ
ing their various characteristics alike in
their unfaltering devotion to the memory of
a great man.