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Concerning their plans for the future, beyond those in which he was personally engaged, Morét knew almost nothing; but he did put me in the way of finding out nearly all that I wished to know. Nor is it necessary that I should describe my subsequent interviews with the emperor.
She was a native of Nimes, where her people had been wealthy landowners, she said, but some unfortunate speculation on her father's part brought ruin to them, and she was now governess in the family of a certain Baron de Moret, of the Château de Moret, near Paris. A governess!
M. de Meaux had her pursued, but as she threatened to kill herself if she were taken back to the Abbey of Notre Dame, the prelate wrote to M. Bontems, that is to say, to the real father, and poor Opportune was taken to Moret, a convent of Benedictines, in the forest of Fontainebleau. There they took the course of lavishing care, and kindness, and attentions on her.
People were astonished this year, that while the Princess of Savoy was at Fontainebleau, just before her marriage, she was taken several times by Madame de Maintenon to a little unknown convent at Moret, where there was nothing to amuse her, and no nuns who were known. Madame de Maintenon often went there, and Monseigneur with his children sometimes; the late Queen used to go also.
In the very centre of the plain, at equal distances from Moret and Montereau, the traveler passes the old chateau of Saint-Lange, standing amid surroundings which lack neither dignity nor stateliness.
We made no stop at Fontainbleau, though the court was there; but lay at Moret, which is one stage further, a very paltry little town where, however, we found good accommodation.
The professor sat down; and Philip without a word placed before him the picture which the Salon had rejected; Foinet nodded but did not speak; then Philip showed him the two portraits he had made of Ruth Chalice, two or three landscapes which he had painted at Moret, and a number of sketches. "That's all," he said presently, with a nervous laugh.
The two roads diverged after passing Fontainebleau, the shorter by Nemours and the longer by Moret. The first road was the smoother, but apart from the chance of seeing the Vendange the route de Burgoyne was far the more picturesque. Smollett's portraiture of the peasantry in the less cultivated regions prepares the mind for Young's famous description of those "gaunt emblems of famine."
Madame de Moret had long been attached to the Prince de Joinville; who, young, reckless, and impetuous, returned her passion, and scarcely made any effort to conceal his rivalry with the monarch. Courtiers have, moreover, sharp eyes, and it was not long ere the King was apprised of the intrigue.
Most visitors to Paris will have had pointed out to them the so-called "Maison Francois Premier" on the Cour La Reine. This richly ornate and graceful specimen of Renaissance architecture formerly stood at Moret, and bit by bit was removed to the capital in 1820. A spiral stone staircase and several fragments of heraldic sculpture were left behind.
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