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With all her resources, however, both of patronage and of bel-esprit, Lady Angelica was equally surprised and mortified to find herself foiled at her own arms, by a girl whom nobody knew. She changed her manoeuvres she thought she could show Miss Caroline Percy, that, whatever might be her abilities, her knowledge, or her charms, these must all submit to the superior power of fashion.
I seem to see an intelligence naturally grave and austere donning a dress of wit for convention's sake. The author desires to entertain as much as to teach, the thinker is also a bel-esprit, the jurisconsult has a touch of the coxcomb, and a perfumed breath from the temple of Venus has penetrated the tribunal of Minos.
Cator's, and Lady Spilsbury's, or Lady Angelica Headingham's conversazione Rosamond has a mixture of naivete and sprightliness that is new, and might take. If she had more courage, and would hazard more in conversation, if she had, in short, l'art de se faire valoir, one could hand her verses about, and get her forward in the bel-esprit line.
A stronger and a meaner motive he kept to himself. He was small-minded enough to think that a subject overshadowed him, nec pluribus impar. He hated Fouquet because he was so much admired, because he was called the Magnificent, because his châteaux and gardens were incomparably finer than St. Germain or Fontainebleau, because he was surrounded by the first wits and artists, no trifling matter in that bright morning of French literature, when every gentleman of station in Paris aspired to be a bel-esprit, or, if that was impossible, to keep one in his employ. "Le Roi s'abaissa jusqu'
"What do you say to them?" said the Doctor. My companion thought them very pretty, and the Doctor gave me them in his handwriting, begging me, at the same time, not to give any copies. Madame de Pompadour joked my companion about her 'bel-esprit', but sometimes she reposed confidence in her.
It was Missy, who had devised an excuse for calling him into her room just as she was ready to go to a ball, so that he should see her in her ball dress. It was with disgust that he remembered her fine shoulders and arms. "And that father of hers, with his doubtful past and his cruelties, and the bel-esprit her mother, with her doubtful reputation."
The moment the pressure was taken off, the spirit boiled with surprising rapidity: immediately Lady Angelica Headingham shone forth a beauty, a bel-esprit, and a patroness; and though she appeared as it were impromptu in these characters, yet, to do her justice, she supported them with as much spirit, truth, and confidence, as if she had been in the habit of playing them all her life, and as if she had trod the fashionable stage from her teens.
She has a clear complexion, is young, tall; her manners are doucereuses, for, besides being a beauty, she has pretensions, I understand, to bel-esprit. The majority of those present were undeniably captivated by her peculiar fascination. Augustus Barfield has the following remarks in his famous Journal: There were no two opinions about the success of the débutante.
And my dear young friends, you shall find young friends too, as well as old ones, at my house: my nieces, the Lady Pembrokes, are to be with me; and Lady Angelica Headingham, who will entertain you, though, perhaps, you will sometimes be tired for her, she works so hard aux galeres de bel-esprit. I acknowledge she has a little too much affectation.
"What do you say to them?" said the Doctor. My companion thought them very pretty, and the Doctor gave me them in his handwriting, begging me, at the same time, not to give any copies. Madame de Pompadour joked my companion about her 'bel-esprit', but sometimes she reposed confidence in her.
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