The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-08-02
ACOUNTESS AND ALONE
DOORS OF CHATEAU AT VILE
 D,AvARY UNLOCKED.
Its Owner, Comtesse de Treguain Has Moody Hope of Being Mur- dered-Led Gay Life in Days
 of Napoleon.
Lucien du Rubenpu. in New York

d'Avray, France, an octogenarian IS slowly wearing a life away that has had crowded into it all the possible vicissitudes of an existence translated from the splendors of an imperial court of the penury and neglect of squalid poverty.
 It is the old Comtesse de Treguain | who is thus passing away; the last remnant of once great family, heiress | to millions and courted for her brilliant
 mind by the gay throng that f1ocked | to the Tuileries when young Louis | Napoleon was prince-president-em peror.
 With nothing left but the crumbling walls of the old chateau, the few acres \ of dank woodland that surrounded it | and her dogs, she passes her days writ l ing, starving mending a bit of lace and waiting for death. The grilles and the doors of Chateau l de Treguain are always open, ''in hopes," she says. that some wander | ing marauder will come in and kill me-"
 It was one of those days in June evoked by Sir Launfal that l went | there.
 The chateau was not hard to find. It turned the long. gloomy facade of | its back to the white ribbon of the roadway, while it's front invited the breezes that blew through the messy aisles of virgin forest. It invited, too. my nterested-curious- which intrusion was not in the least disputed by the dozen lean dogs that lounged lazily on the broad stone steps | that led into the garden. Before an open window an old wo-
 man, bent and poorly dressed. sat writ | ing at a rude table. 1t was the chatelaine of the mansion,
 and as she regarded my presence only in mute taciturnity, I introduced my
 self.
 | Even in her poverty and the misery
 of her old age her eyes and the hauteur of her voice and manner resented me
 with all the indescribable vigor the French display at the approach of an
 inquisitive stranger.
 Offered Hospitality.
 Monsieur" she said. inquiringly. l "A thousand pardons. madame" 1 re- piled, "I was attracted first by the open grille, then by the cool forest be- yond. l thought the house was unin-
 habited; l see that 1 have intruded: will go."
 "Ah, no, monsieur. What poor hos l pitality my ruined fortunes have to of-
 fer. you are welcome to, Be at home,
 and she turned again to the work of filling up the page with fine, close
 writing.
 Then l won her confidence by loving
 her dogs, gaunt and hungry eyed, they seemed to feed in little else but the
 food of love.
 1 spoke again. I interested her by
 telling that I was a writer-her sym pathy, too, for 1t was in the hard | realms of unappreciated poesy that she had left her life slip away.
 Tt is such a long time," she said, | with a warm, but sweet smile, since
 any one but sheriff's officers has come
 here, that naturally, 1 thought you
 were merely another. Indeed, one
 comes tomorrow, to sell the few poor
 things that are still here, and then will
 come the end of this poor wreck" | Melancholy shreds of paper, garland ed with faded roses, hung from the de-
 serted walls. Some pure Louis XIV,
 chests, gaping at each angle and tot
 tering on their legs. stood against the
 walls and the huge chairs. in grand style, in the four corners of the room. vomited their stuffing through the rents | of the moth eaten tapestry that es- sayed to cover them did not tell her that I had come to hear the story of her life. She came to that by the easy stages of polite interlocution. Such histories are obscure, perhaps, when they are but the story of the complicated details that mark the dissipation of millions by interruptions caretakers. She was brought up and educated, like all French girls of family, and came to Paris in her early maidenhood. Then she tasted the delights of the brilliant society of the period. Her father, Admiral Baudin, was welcom- ed everywhere, and his daughter soon won a distinct place by her wit, her esprit and her manner. She lost herself in the seductions of the Tuileries and St. Cloud, and her palms were read by the bards, in the saloons of the day. It was to her that the gallant Napo- leon III remarked after reading, or hearing, one of her palms:
 Beginning of Trouble.
 "Ah, madame, but you are more blessed than a titular ruler, for you have an empire that trembles before no conqueror but yourself-the empire of your mind!'
 Then she married the handsome Comte de Treguain. an aristocrat of the old regime, whose family, deSpoiled during the great revolution and return ed at the restoration, had nothing to give him but the luster of name and the blood stained record that the guillotine of the Terror had written for him.
 It was one of his ancestors that went to the block in the tumbril with Madame Roland, that aged Lamarch, whom she begged the eXecutloner tu take first, for" she said to her com rade, my blood spreading before your eyes would make you feel death twice you should not have the pain of seeing my head fall"
 Welded life was d period of great happiness for the young comtesse. great, but all too brief.
 Part of 1t passed among the dstrac- tions of the court; part among the Quietnesses of her rural estates.
 Her first sorrow was the death of her father; a greater soon followed. when the ruthless reaper cut down her husband.
 Distracted by grief. the widow seclusion of her house in Paris, and sought surCease in her literary inclina- tions.
 She went nowhere, and saw but few of the callers whose names went up to her through the portal that immured her in the Rue de Calais.
 At first she was much missed in the places she had shone most brilliantly.