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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Sébastien Mercier, who in his Tableau de Paris covered a tremendously wide range of subjects and who was himself a dramatist of sorts (if not of parts), protested against the common practice of representing on the stage young unmarried ladies to whom young men made love. There is nothing more false, says he, in the picture of French manners than contemporary comedy, in which men make love to young ladies (demoiselles); for they are kept in convents until their wedding day, and it is absolutely impossible to make them a declaration of love. They are never seen alone, and it is shameful to employ any means resembling seduction. Girls of the upper bourgeoisie are also in convents; those of the “second étage” are constantly with their mothers; and girls of the other classes have in general no sort of freedom or of familiar communication with men before their marriage. Therefore, Mercier concludes, authors of comedy, in making all their amoureuses ladies of quality, are really portraying only the love-affairs of grisettes. And the dramatists, “s'ils ne veulent pas aller directement contre les usages,” should henceforth admit as heroines only young widows.
1 Tableau de Paris (1782–83), iii, 143.
2 Loc. cit.
3 Lénient, la Comédie en France au XIXe siècle, i, 327, apropos of widows in Scribe.
4 Aunillon (1728), iii, 12.
5 Boissy (1725), sc. 1.
6 Legrand (1722), sc. 1.
7 1737; i, 8.
8 Rambaud, Histoire de la civilisation française, ii, 565.
9 Caillot, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire des moeurs (1827), ii, 36.
10 His usual task is defined by Dr. Rhubarbini of Desportes' la Veuve coquette (1721): “Songe seulement à t'insinuer comme je t'ai dit auprès de la suivante de ce logis pour connaître et anatomiser les dispositions du coeur de sa maîtresse à mon égard.” One valet, Valentin of Avisse's le Valet embarrassé (1742), imagines a rather startling trick, put into practice years later by the youthful duc de Fronsac: in order to get into the house where his master's Julie is closely guarded, he plans to set fire to the house and abduct the girl amid the confusion. Cf. the false fire-alarm in Clarissa Harlowe. Richardson's Works (London, 1884), vi, 284.
11 1737: i, 1.
12 Mme de Graffigny, Cénie (1730), ii, 1.
Cf. Boissy, la Rivale d'elle-même (1721), sc. 6: Angelique. Je lui ai répondu que je l'aimais aussi, et que je ne serais pas fâchée d'être sa femme. Dorimene. Cela n'est pas bien; une jeune fille doit cacher de pareils sentiments.
The Marquise of Dufresny's la Réconciliation normande (1719) says to her suivante:
13 Destouches (1716), sc. 2.—Nérine develops her thesis with a simile that borders on the indecent. In fact, this early play by Destouches is very much in the manner of Dancourt, far more lively than the later dramatized épîtres. Rustaut, of Saint-Foix' la Colonie (1749), paraphrases (i, 4) Nérine's remark: “Je croyons que plus une fille a toujours été sage, plus elle a d'impatience d'être épousée.”
14 Patrat (1783).—This is one of the few comedies that Grimm praises. Correspondance, xiii, 339.
15 Marivaux (1736).
16 Vigée (1784).
17 Legrand, la Nouveauté (1727), divertissement.
18 Fagan (1735), iii, 5.
19 Destouches (1762), iv, 7.
20 Autreau, l'Amante romanesque (1718), ii, 10.
21 Dorat, la Feinte par amour (1773), i, 1.
Cf. Boissy, l'Epoux par supercherie (1744), i, 5:
22 1777, i, 6:
23 1770: sc. 13. Cf. Boissy, le Rival favorable (1739), i, 6:
24 Marivaux (1727), i, 1.
25 Goncourt, la Femme au XVIIIe siècle, éd. définitive, i, 252.
26 Mémoires secrets, 13 octobre 1775.
27 Op. cit., 25 mars 1769: “Au mariage de M. le Comte de Fitz-James, M. le Duc de Chartres lui donna un souper à sa petite maison, appelé le souper des Veuves. On y avoit réuni les Maîtresses de ce Prince, et de différens Seigneurs mariés, ou sur le point de se marier. Tout étoit tendu de noir” …
28 Caylus, “Du mariage, de ses motifs et de ses' effets,” Oeuvres badines complètes (1787), xii, 89.
29 Mémoires sur la cour de Louis XV (1860–65), xiii, 171.
30 On the authority of the Boston Traveler (6 Feb. 1929), p. 10, this naïve and ungrammatical inscription was found by Dean F. A. Alabaster of Nebraska Wesleyan University.