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Annora's hands were clasped, her cheeks were flushed, her eyes glanced with the dew of admiration, and there were others who were carried along by the charm of the young orator's voice and enthusiasm; but there were also anxious glances passing, especially between the divine Arthenice and her son-in-law, M. de Montausier, and when there had been time for the compliments the discourse merited to be freely given, Madame de Rambouillet said: 'My dear friend, the tribute may be indeed the highest, but it can scarcely be the most appreciable either by the fortunate individual or his friends.
There is something infinitely pathetic in the epitaph this much-loved and successful woman wrote for herself when she felt that the end was near: Ici git Arthenice, exempte des rigueurs Don't la rigueur du sort l'a touours poursuivie. Et si tu veux, passant, compter tous ses malheurs, Tu n'aura qu'a, compter les moments de sa vie. The spirit of unrest is there beneath the calm exterior.
At least, he no longer blamed his nephew and threatened him with his aunt; but declared that Madame de Rambouillet would soon put all such folly out of our minds. I asked my husband what Madame de Rambouillet could have to do with our affairs; and he shrugged his shoulders and answered that the divine Arthenice was the supreme judge of decorum, whose decisions no one could gainsay.
Malherbe and Racan, the latter sighing hopelessly over the attractions of the dignified Marquise, gave her the romantic name of Arthenice, and forthwith the other members of the coterie took some nom de parnasse, by which they were familiarly known.
"Do you remember," said Flechier, many years later, in his funeral oration on the death of the Duchesse de Montausier, "the salons which are still regarded with so much veneration, where the spirit was purified, where virtue was revered under the name of the incomparable Arthenice; where people of merit and quality assembled, who composed a select court, numerous without confusion, modest without constraint, learned without pride, polished without affectation?"
The allusion was a fortunate one; it established a precedent, and, besides, English people have always been supposed to be eccentric. I am, however, doing the noble lady injustice. Arthenice, as she was called by an anagram of her baptismal name of Catherine, was no blind slave to the conventional.
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