MINARD (Prudence), sister of the preceding, was sought in marriage by Felix Gaudissart towards the end of Louis Philippe's reign. [The Middle Classes. Cousin Pons.]
MINETTE,[*] vaudeville actress on rue de Chartres, during the Restoration, died during the first part of the Second Empire, lawful wife of a director of the Gaz; was well known for her brilliancy, and was responsible for the saying that "Time is a great faster," quoted sometimes before Lucien de Rubempre in 1821-22. [A Distinguished Provincial at Paris.]
MINORETS (The), representatives of the well-known "company of army contractors," in which Mademoiselle Sophie Laguerre's steward, who preceded Gaubertin at Aigues, in Bourgogne, acquired a one-third share, after giving up his stewardship. [The Peasantry.] The relatives of Madame Flavie Colleville, daughter of a ballet-dancer, who was supported by Galathionne and, perhaps, by the contractor, Du Bourguier, were connected with the Minorets, probably the army contractor Minorets. [The Government Clerks.]
MINORET (Doctor Denis), born in Nemours in 1746, had the support of Dupont, deputy to the States-General in 1789, who was his fellow-citizen; he was intimate with the Abbe Morellet, also the pupil of Rouelle the chemist, and an ardent admirer of Diderot's friend, Bordeu, by means of whom, or his friends, he gained a large practice. Denis Minoret invented the Lelievre balm, became an acquaintance and protector of Robespierre, married the daughter of the celebrated harpsichordist, Valentin Mirouet, died suddenly, soon after the execution of Madame Roland. The Empire, like the former governments, recompensed Minoret's ability, and he became consulting physician to His Imperial and Royal Majesty, in 1805, chief hospital physician, officer of the Legion of Honor, chevalier of Saint-Michel, and member of the Institute. Upon withdrawing to Nemours, January, 1815, he lived there in company with his ward, Ursule Mirouet, daughter of his brother-in-law, Joseph Mirouet, later Madame Savinien de Portenduere, a girl whom he had taken care of since she had become an orphan. As she was the living image of the late Madame Denis Minoret, he loved her so devotedly that his lawful heirs, Minoret-Levrault, Massin, Cremiere, fearing that they would lose a large inheritance, mistreated the adopted child. Doctor Minoret, at the time when he was worried over their plotting, saw Bouvard, a fellow-Parisian with whom he had formerly associated, and through his influence interested himself greatly in the subject of magnetism. In 1835, surrounded by some of his nearest relatives, Minoret died at an advanced age, having been converted from the philosophy of Voltaire through the influence of Ursule, whom he remembered substantially in his will. [Ursule Mirouet.]
MINORET-LEVRAULT (Francois), son of the oldest brother of the preceding, and his nearest heir, born in 1769, strong but uncouth and illiterate, had charge of the post-horses and was keeper of the best tavern in Nemours, as a result of his marriage with Zelie Levrault-Cremiere, an only daughter. After the Revolution of 1830 he became deputy-mayor. As principle heir to Doctor Minoret's estate he was the bitterest persecutor of Ursule Mirouet, and made away with the will which favored the young girl. Later, being compelled to restore her property, overcome by remorse, and sorrowing for his son, who was the victim of a runaway, and for his insane wife, Francois Minoret-Levrault became the faithful keeper of the property of Ursule, who had then become Madame Savinien de Portenduere. [Ursule Mirouet.]
MINORET-LEVRAULT (Madame Francois), wife of the preceding, born Zelie Levrault-Cremiere, physically feeble, sour of countenance and action, harsh, greedy, as illiterate as her husband, brought him as dower half of her maiden name (a local tradition) and a first-class tavern. She was, in reality, the manager of the Nemours post-house. She worshiped her son Desire, whose tragic death was sufficient punishment for her avaricious persecutions of Ursule de Portenduere. She died insane in Doctor Blanche's sanitarium in the village of Passy[*] in 1841. [Ursule Mirouet.]
MINORET (Desire), son of the preceding couple, born in 1805. Obtained a half scholarship in the Louis-le-Grand lyceum in Paris, through the instrumentality of Fontanes, an acquaintance of Dr. Minoret; finally studied law. Under Goupil's leadership he became somewhat dissipated as a young man, and loved in turn Esther van Gobseck and Sophie Grignault—Florine—who, after declining his offer of marriage, became Madame Nathan. Desire Minoret was not actively associated with his family in the persecution of Ursule de Portenduere. The Revolution of 1830 was advantageous to him. He took part during the three glorious days of fighting, received the decoration, and was selected to be deputy attorney to the king at Fontainebleau. He died as a result of the injuries received in a runaway, October, 1836. [Ursule Mirouet.]
MIRAH (Josepha), born in 1814. Natural daughter of a wealthy Jewish banker, abandoned in Germany, although she bore as a sign of her identity an anagram of her Jewish name, Hiram. When fifteen years old and a working girl in Paris, she was found out and misled by Celestine Crevel, whom she left eventually for Hector Hulot, a more liberal man. The munificence of the commissary of stores exalted her socially, and gave her the opportunity of training her voice. Her vocal attainments established her as a prima donna, first at the Italiens, then on rue le Peletier. After Hector Hulot became a bankrupt, she abandoned him and his house on rue Chauchat, near the Royal Academy, where, at different times, had lived Tullia, Comtesse du Bruel and Heloise Brisetout. The Duc d'Herouville became Mademoiselle Mirah's lover. This affair led to an elegant reception on rue de la Ville-l'Eveque to which all Paris received invitation. Josepha had at all times many followers. One of the Kellers and the Marquis d'Esgrignon made fools of themselves over her. Eugene de Rastignac, at that time minister, invited her to his home, and insisted upon her singing the celebrated cavatina from "La Muette." Irregular in her habits, whimisical, covetous, intelligent, and at times good-natured, Josepha Mirah gave some proof of generosity when she helped the unfortunate Hector Hulot, for whom she went so far as to get Olympe Grenouville. She finally told Madame Adeline Hulot of the baron's hiding-place on the Passage du Soleil in the Petite-Pologne section. [Cousin Betty.]
MIRAULT, name of one branch of the Bargeton family, merchants in Bordeaux during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. [Lost Illusions.]
MIRBEL (Madame de), well-known miniature-painter from 1796 to 1849; made successively the portrait of Louise de Chaulieu, given by this young woman to the Baron de Macumer, her future husband; of Lucien de Rubempre for Esther Gobseck; of Charles X. for the Princess of Cadignan, who hung it on the wall of her little salon on rue Miromesnil, after the Revolution of 1830. This last picture bore the inscription, "Given by the King." [Letters of Two Brides. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. The Secrets of a Princess.]
MIROUET (Ursule). (See Portenduere, Vicomtesse Savinien de.)
MIROUET (Valentin), celebrated harpsichordist and instrument-maker; one of the best known French organists; father-in-law of Doctor Minoret; died in 1785. His business was bought by Erard. [Ursule Mirouet.]
MIROUET (Joseph), natural son of the preceding and brother-in-law of Doctor Denis Minoret. He was a good musician and of a Bohemian disposition. He was a regiment musician during the wars in the latter part of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries. He passed through Germany, and while there married Dinah Grollman, by whom he had a daughter, Ursule, later the Vicomtesse de Portenduere, who had been left a penniless orphan in her early youth. [Ursule Mirouet.]
MITANT (La), a very poor woman of Conches in Bourgogne, who was condemned for having let her cow graze on the Montcornet estate. In 1823 the animal was seized by the deputy, Brunet, and his assistants, Vermichel and Fourchon. [The Peasantry.]
MITOUFLET, old grenadier of the Imperial Guard, husband of a wealthy vineyard proprietress, kept the tavern Soleil d'Or at Vouvray in Touraine. After 1830 Felix Gaudissart lived there and Mitouflet served as his second in a harmless duel brought on by a practical joke played on the illustrious traveling salesman, dupe of the insane Margaritis. [Gaudissart the Great.]
MITOUFLET, usher to the minister of war under Louis Philippe, in the time of Cottin de Wissembourg, Hulot d'Ervy and Marneffe. [Cousin Betty.]
MITRAL, a bachelor, whose eyes and face were snuff-colored, a bailiff in Paris during the Restoration, also at the same time a money-lender. He numbered among his patrons Molineux and Birotteau. He was invited to the celebrated ball given in December, 1818, by the perfumer. Being a maternal uncle of Isidore Baudoyer, connected in a friendly way with Bidault—Gigonnet—and Esther-Jean van Gobseck, Mitral, by their good-will, obtained his nephew's appointment to the Treasury, December, 1824. He spent his time then in Isle-Adam, the Marais and the Saint-Marceau section, places of residence of his numerous family. In possession of a fortune, which undoubtedly would go later to the Isidore Baudoyers, Mitral retired to the Seine-et-Oise division. [Cesar Birotteau. The Government Clerks.]
MIZERAI, in 1836 a restaurant-keeper on rue Michel-le-Comte, Paris. Zephirin Marcas took his dinners with him at the rate of nine sous. [Z. Marcas.]
MODINIER, steward to Monsieur de Watteville; "governor" of Rouxey, the patrimonial estate of the Wattevilles. [Albert Savarus.]
MOINOT, in 1815 mail-carrier for the Chaussee-d'Antin; married and the father of four children; lived in the fifth story at 11, rue des Trois-Freres, now known as rue Taitbout. He innocently exposed the address of Paquita Valdes to Laurent, a servant of Marsay, who artfully tried to obtain it for him. "My name," said the mail-carrier to the servant, "is written just like Moineau (sparrow)—M-o-i-n-o-t." "Certainly," replied Laurent. [The Thirteen.]
MOISE, Jew, who was formerly a leader of the rouleurs in the South. His wife, La Gonore, was a widow in 1830. [Scenes from a Courtesan's Life.]
MOISE, a Troyes musician, whom Madame Beauvisage thought of employing in 1839 as the instructor of her daughter, Cecile, at Arcis-sur-Aube. [The Member for Arcis.]
MOLINEUX (Jean-Baptiste), Parisian landlord, miserly and selfish. Mesdames Crochard lived in one of his houses between rue du Tourniquet-Saint-Jean and rue la Tixeranderie, in 1815. Mesdames Leseigneur de Rouville and Hippolyte Schinner were also his tenants, at about the same time, on rue de Surene. Jean-Baptiste Molineux lived on Cour-Batave during the first part of Louis XVIII.'s reign. He then owned the house next to Cesar Birotteau's shop on rue Saint-Honore. Molineux was one of the many guests present at the famous ball of December 17, 1818, and a few months later was the annoying assignee connected with the perfumer's failure. [A Second Home. The Purse. Cesar Birotteau.]
MOLLOT, through the influence of his wife, Sophie, appointed clerk to the justice of the peace at Arcis-sur-Aube; often visited Madame Marion, and saw at her home Goulard, Beauvisage, Giguet, and Herbelot. [The Member for Arcis.]
MOLLOT (Madame Sophie), wife of the preceding, a prying, prating woman, who disturbed herself greatly over Maxime de Trailles during the electoral campaign in the division of Arcis-sur-Aube, April, 1839. [The Member for Arcis.]
MOLLOT (Earnestine), daughter of the preceding couple, was, in 1839, a young girl of marriageable age. [The Member for Arcis.]
MONGENOD, born in 1764; son of a grand council attorney, who left him an income of five or six thousand. Becoming bankrupt during the Revolution, he became first a clerk with Frederic Alain, under Bordin, the solicitor. He was unsuccessful in several ventures: as a journalist with the "Sentinelle," started or built up by him; as a musical composer with the "Peruviens," an opera-comique given in 1798 at the Feydau theatre.[*] His marriage and the family expenses attendant rendered his financial condition more and more embarrassing. Mongenod had lent money to Frederic Alain, so that he might be present at the opening performance of the "Marriage de Figaro." He borrowed, in turn, from Alain a sum of money which he was unable to return at the time agreed. He set out thereupon for America, made a fortune, returned January, 1816, and reimbursed Alain. From this time dates the opening of the celebrated Parisian banking-house of Mongenod & Co. The firm-name changed to Mongenod & Son, and then to Mongenod Brothers. In 1819 the bankruptcy of the perfumer, Cesar Birotteau, having taken place, Mongenod became personally interested at the Bourse,[+] in the affair, negotiating with merchants and discounters. Mongenod died in 1827. [The Seamy Side of History. Cesar Birotteau.]
MONGENOD (Madame Charlotte), wife of the preceding, in the year 1798 bore up bravely under her poverty, even selling her hair for twelve francs that her family might have bread. Wealthy, and a widow after 1827, Madame Mongenod remained the chief adviser and support of the bank, operated in Paris on rue de la Victoire, by her two sons, Frederic and Louis. [The Seamy Side of History.]
MONGENOD (Frederic), eldest of the preceding couple's three children, received from his thankful parents the given name of M. Alain and became, after 1827, the head of his father's banking-house on rue de la Victoire. His honesty is shown by the character of his patrons, among whom were the Marquis d'Espard, Charles Mignon de la Bastie, the Baronne de la Chanterie and Godefroid. [The Commission in Lunacy. The Seamy Side of History.]
MONGENOD (Louis), younger brother of the preceding, with whom he had business association on rue de la Victoire, where he was receiving the prudent advice of his mother, Madame Charlotte Mongenod, when Godefroid visited him in 1836. [The Seamy Side of History.]
MONGENOD (Mademoiselle), daughter of Frederic and Charlotte Mongenod, born in 1799; she was offered in marriage, January, 1816, to Frederic Alain, who would not accept this token of gratitude from the wealthy Mongenods. Mademoiselle Mongenod married the Vicomte de Fontaine. [The Seamy Side of History.]
MONISTROL, native of Auvergne, a Parisian broker, towards the last years of Louis Phillippe's reign, successively on rue de Lappe and the new Beaumarchais boulevard. He was one of the pioneers in the curio business, along with the Popinots, Ponses, and the Remonencqs. This kind of business afterwards developed enormously. [Cousin Pons.]
MONTAURAN (Marquis Alophonse de), was, in the closing years of the eighteenth century, connected with nearly all of the well-known Royalist intrigues in France and elsewhere. He frequently visited, along with Flamet de la Billardiere and the Comte de Fontaine, the home of Ragon, the perfumer, who was proprietor of the "Reine des Roses," from which went forth the Royalist correspondence between the West and Paris. Too young to have been at Versailles, Alphonse de Montauran had not "the courtly manners for which Lauzun, Adhemar, Coigny, and so many others were noted." His education was incomplete. Towards the autumn of 1799 he especially distinguished himself. His attractive appearance, his youth, and a mingled gallantry and authoritativeness, brought him to the notice of Louis XVIII., who appointed him governor of Bretagne, Normandie, Maine and Anjou. Under the name of Gras, having become commander of the Chouans, in September, the marquis conducted them in an attack against the Blues on the plateau of La Pelerine, which extends between Fougeres, Ille-et-Vilaine, and Ernee, Mayenne. Madame du Gua did not leave him even then. Alphonse de Montauran sought the hand of Mademoiselle d'Uxelles, after leaving this, the last mistress of Charette. Nevertheless, he fell in love with Marie de Verneuil, the spy, who had entered Bretagne with the express intention of delivering him to the Blues. He married her in Fougeres, but the Republicans murdered him and his wife a few hours after their marriage. [Cesar Birotteau. The Chouans.]
MONTAURAN (Marquise Alphonse de), wife of the preceding; born Marie-Nathalie de Verneuil at La Chanterie near Alencon, natural daughter of Mademoiselle Blanche de Casteran, who was abbess of Notre-Dame de Seez at the time of her death, and of Victor-Amedee, Duc de Verneuil, who owned her and left her an inheritance, at the expense of her legitimate brother. A lawsuit between brother and sister resulted. Marie-Nathalie lived then with her guardian, the Marechal Duc de Lenoncourt, and was supposed to be his mistress. After vainly trying to bring him to the point of marriage she was cast off by him. She passed through divers political and social paths during the Revolutionary period. After having shone in court circles she had Danton for a lover. During the autumn of 1799 Fouche hired Marie de Verneuil to betray Alphonse de Montauran, but the lovely spy and the chief of the Chouans fell in love with each other. They were united in marriage a few hours before their death towards the end of that year, 1799, in which Jacobites and Chouans fought on Bretagne soil. Madame de Montauran was attired in her husband's clothes when a Republican bullet killed her. [The Chouans.]
MONTAURAN (Marquis de), younger brother of Alphonse de Montauran, was in London, in 1799, when he received a letter from Colonel Hulot containing Alphonse's last wishes. Montauran complied with them; returned to France, but did not fight against his country. He kept his wealth through the intervention of Colonel Hulot and finally served the Bourbons in the gendarmerie, where he himself became a colonel. When Louis Philippe came to the throne, Montauran believed an absolute retirement necessary. Under the name of M. Nicolas, he became one of the Brothers of Consolation, who met in Madame de la Chanterie's home on rue Chanoinesse. He saved M. Auguste de Mergi from being prosecuted. In 1841 Montauran was seen on rue du Montparnasse, where he assisted at the funeral of the elder Hulot. [The Chouans. The Seamy Side of History. Cousin Betty.]
MONTBAURON (Marquise de), Raphael de Valentin's aunt, died on the scaffold during the Revolution. [The Magic Skin.]
MONTCORNET (Marechal, Comte de), Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor, Commander of Saint-Louis, born in 1774, son of a cabinet-maker in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, "child of Paris," mingled in almost all of the wars in the latter part of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries. He commanded in Spain and in Pomerania, and was colonel of cuirassiers in the Imperial Guard. He took the place of his friend, Martial de la Roche-Hugon in the affections of Madame de Vaudremont. The Comte de Montcornet was in intimate relations with Madame or Mademoiselle Fortin, mother of Valerie Crevel. Towards 1815, Montcornet bought, for about a hundred thousand francs, the Aigues, Sophie Laguerre's old estate, situated between Conches and Blangy, near Soulanges and Ville-aux-Fayes. The Restoration allured him. He wished to have his origin overlooked, to gain position under the new regime, to efface all memory of the expressive nick-name received from the Bourgogne peasantry, who called him the "Upholsterer." In the early part of 1819 he married Virginie de Troisville. His property, increased by an income of sixty thousand francs, allowed him to live in state. In winter he occupied his beautiful Parisian mansion on rue Neuve-des-Mathurins, now called rue des Mathurins, and visited many places, especially the homes of Raoul Nathan and of Esther Gobseck. During the summer the count, then mayor of Blangy, lived at Aigues. His unpopularity and the hatred of the Gaubertins, Rigous, Sibilets, Soudrys, Tonsards, and Fourchons rendered his sojourn there unbearable, and he decided to dispose of the estate. Montcornet, although of violent disposition and weak character, could not avoid being a subordinate in his own family. The monarchy of 1830 overwhelmed Montcornet, then lieutenant-general unattached, with gifts, and gave a division of the army into his command. The count, now become marshal, was a frequent visitor at the Vaudeville.[*] Montcornet died in 1837. He never acknowledged his daughter, Valerie Crevel, and left her nothing. He is probably buried in Pere-Lachaise cemetery, where a monument was to be raised for him under W. Steinbock's supervision. Marechal de Montcornet's motto was: "Sound the Charge." [Domestic Peace. Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. The Peasantry. A Man of Business. Cousin Betty.]
MONTCORNET (Comtesse de.) (See Blondet, Madame Emile.)
MONTEFIORE, Italian of the celebrated Milanese family of Montefiore, commissary in the Sixth of the line under the Empire; one of the finest fellows in the army; marquis, but unable under the laws of the kingdom of Italy to use his title. Thrown by his disposition into the "mould of the Rizzios," he barely escaped being assassinated in 1808 in the city of Tarragone by La Marana, who surprised him in company with her daughter, Juana-Pepita-Maria de Mancini, afterwards Francois Diard's wife. Later, Montefiore himself married a celebrated Englishwoman. In 1823 he was killed and plundered in a deserted alley in Bordeaux by Diard, who found him, after being away many years, in a gambling-house at a watering-place. [The Maranas.]
MONTES DE MONTEJANOS (Baron), a rich Brazilian of wild and primitive disposition; towards 1840, when very young, was one of the first lovers of Valerie Fortin, who became in turn Madame Marneffe and Madame Celestin Crevel. He saw her again at the Faubourg Saint-Germain and at the Place or Pate des Italiens, and had occasion for being envious of Hector Hulot, W. Steinbock and still others. He had revenge on his mistress by communicating to her a mysterious disease from which she died in the same manner as Celestin Crevel. [Cousin Betty.]
MONTPERSAN (Comte de), nephew of a canon of Saint-Denis, upon whom he called frequently; an aspiring rustic, grown sour on account of disappointment and deceit; married, and head of a family. At the beginning of the Restoration he owned the Chateau de Montpersan, eight leagues from Moulins in Allier, where he lived. In 1819 he received a call from a young stranger who came to inform him of the death of Madame de Montpersan's lover. [The Message.]
MONTPERSAN (Comtesse Juliette de), wife of the preceding, born about 1781, lived at Montpersan with her family, and while there learned from her lover's fellow-traveler of the former's death as a result of an overturned carriage. The countess rewarded the messenger of misfortune in a delicate manner. [The Message.]
MONTPERSAN (Mademoiselle de), daughter of the preceding couple, was but a child when the sorrowful news arrived which caused her mother to leave the table. The child, thinking only of the comical side of affairs, remarked upon her father's gluttony, suggesting that the countess' abrupt departure had allowed him to break the rules of diet imposed by her presence. [The Message.]
MONTRIVEAU (General Marquis de), father of Armand de Montriveau. Although a knighted chevalier, he continued to hold fast to the exalted manners of Bourgogne, and scorned the opportunities which rank and wealth had offered in his birth. Being an encyclopaedist and "one of those already mentioned who served the Republic nobly," Montriveau was killed at Novi near Joubert's side. [The Thirteen.]
MONTRIVEAU (Comte de), paternal uncle of Armand de Montriveau. Corpulent, and fond of oysters. Unlike his brother he emigrated, and in his exile met with a cordial reception by the Dulmen branch of the Rivaudoults of Arschoot, a family with which he had some relationship. He died at St. Petersburg. [The Thirteen.]
MONTRIVEAU (General Marquis Armand de), nephew of the preceding and only son of General de Montriveau. As a penniless orphan he was entered by Bonaparte in the school of Chalons. He went into the artillery service, and took part in the last campaigns of the Empire, among others that in Russia. At the battle of Waterloo he received many serious wounds, being then a colonel in the Guard. Montriveau passed the first three years of the Restoration far away from Europe. He wished to explore the upper sections of Egypt and Central Africa. After being made a slave by savages he escaped from their hands by a bold ruse and returned to Paris, where he lived on rue de Seine near the Chamber of Peers. Despite his poverty and lack of ambition and influential friends, he was soon promoted to a general's position. His association with The Thirteen, a powerful and secret band of men, who counted among their members Ronquerolles, Marsay and Bourignard, probably brought him this unsolicited favor. This same freemasonry aided Montriveau in his desire to have revenge on Antoinette de Langeais for her delicate flirtation; also later, when still feeling for her the same passion, he seized her body from the Spanish Carmelites. About the same time the general met, at Madame de Beauseant's, Rastignac, just come to Paris, and told him about Anastasie de Restaud. Towards the end of 1821, the general met Mesdames d'Espard and de Bargeton, who were spending the evening at the Opera. Montriveau was the living picture of Kleber, and in a kind of tragic way became a widower by Antoinette de Langeais. Having become celebrated for a long journey fraught with adventures, he was the social lion at the time he ran across a companion of his Egyptian travels, Sixte du Chatelet. Before a select audience of artists and noblemen, gathered during the first years of the reign of Louis Philippe at the home of Mademoiselle des Touches, he told how he had unwittingly been responsible for the vengeance taken by the husband of a certain Rosina, during the time of the Imperial wars. Montriveau, now admitted to the peerage, was in command of a department. At this time, having become unfaithful to the memory of Antoinette de Langeais, he became enamored of Madame Rogron, born Bathilde de Chargeboeuf, who hoped soon to bring about their marriage. In 1839, in company with M. de Ronquerolles, he beame second to the Duc de Rhetore, elder brother of Louise de Chaulieu, in his duel with Dorlange-Sallenauve, brought about because of Marie Gaston. [The Thirteen. Father Goriot. Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. Another Study of Woman. Pierrette. The Member for Arcis.]
MORAND, formerly a clerk in Barbet's publishing-house, in 1838 became a partner; along with Metivier tried to take advantage of Baron de Bourlac, author of "The Spirit of Modern Law." [The Seamy Side of History.]
MOREAU, born in 1772, son of a follower of Danton, procureur-syndic at Versailles during the Revolution; was Madame Clapart's devoted lover, and remained faithful almost all the rest of his life. After a very adventurous life Moreau, about 1805, became manager of the Presles estate, situated in the valley of the Oise, which was the property of the Comte de Serizy. He married Estelle, maid of Leontine de Serizy, and had by her three children. After serving as manager of the estate for seventeen years, he gave up his position, when his dishonest dealings with Leger were exposed by Reybert, and retired a wealthy man. A silly deed of his godson, Oscar Husson, was, more than anything else, the cause of his dismissal from his position at Presles. Moreau attained a lofty position under Louis Philippe, having grown wealthy through real-estate, and became the father-in-law of Constant-Cyr-Melchior de Canalis. At last he became a prominent deputy of the Centre under the name of Moreau of the Oise. [A Start in Life.]
MOREAU (Madame Estelle), fair-skinned wife of the preceding, born of lowly origin at Saint-Lo, became maid to Leontine de Serizy. Her fortune made, she became overbearing and received Oscar Husson, son of Madame Clapart by her first husband, with unconcealed coldness. She bought the flowers for her coiffure from Nattier, and, wearing some of them, she was seen, in the autumn of 1822, by Joseph Bridau and Leon de Lora, who had just arrived from Paris to do some decorating in the chateau at Serizy. [A Start in Life.]
MOREAU (Jacques), eldest of the preceding couple's three children, was the agent between his mother and Oscar Husson at Presles. [A Start in Life.]
MOREAU, the best upholsterer in Alencon, rue de la Porte-de-Seez, near the church; in 1816 furnished Madame du Bousquier, then Mademoiselle Rose Cormon, the articles of furniture made necessary by M. de Troisville's unlooked-for arrival at her home on his return from Russia. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]
MOREAU, an aged workman at Dauphine, uncle of little Jacques Colas, lived, during the Restoration, in poverty and resignation, with his wife, in the village near Grenoble—a place which was completely changed by Doctor Benassis. [The Country Doctor.]
MOREAU-MALVIN, "a prominent butcher," died about 1820. His beautiful tomb of white marble ornaments rue du Marechal-Lefebvre at Pere-Lachaise, near the burial-place of Madame Jules Desmarets and Mademoiselle Raucourt of the Comedie-Francaise. [The Thirteen.]
MORILLON (Pere), a priest, who had charge, for some time under the Empire, of Gabriel Claes' early education. [The Quest of the Absolute.]
MORIN (La), a very poor old woman who reared La Fosseuse, an orphan, in a kindly manner in a market-town near Grenoble, but who gave her some raps on the fingers with her spoon when the child was too quick in taking soup from the common porringer. La Morin tilled the soil like a man, and murmured frequently at the miserable pallet on which she and La Fosseuse slept. [The Country Doctor.]
MORIN (Jeanne-Marie-Victoire Tarin, veuve), accused of trying to obtain money by forging signatures to promissory-notes, also of the attempted assassination of Sieur Ragoulleau; condemned by the Court of Assizes at Paris on January 11, 1812, to twenty years hard labor. The elder Poiret, a man who never thought independently, was a witness for the defence, and often thought of the trial. The widow Morin, born at Pont-sur-Seine, Aube, was a fellow-countrywoman of Poiret, who was born at Troyes. [Father Goriot.] Many extracts have been taken from the items published about this criminal case.
MORISSON, an inventor of purgative pills, which were imitated by Doctor Poulain, physician to Pons and the Cibots, when, as a beginner, he wished to make his fortune rapidly. [Cousin Pons.]
MORTSAUF (Comte de), head of a Touraine family, which owed to an ancestor of Louis XI.'s reign—a man who had escaped the gibbet—its fortune, coat-of-arms and position. The count was the incarnation of the "refugee." Exiled, either willingly or unwillingly, his banishment made him weak of mind and body. He married Blanche-Henriette de Lenoncourt, by whom he had two children, Jacques and Madeleine. On the accession of the Bourbons he was breveted field-marshal, but did not leave Clochegourde, a castle brought to him in his wife's dowry and situated on the banks of the Indre and the Cher. [The Lily of the Valley.]
MORTSAUF (Comtesse de),[*] wife of the preceding; born Blanche-Henriette de Lenoncourt, of the "house of Lenoncourt-Givry, fast becoming extinct," towards the first years of the Restoration; was born after the death of three brothers, and thus had a sorrowful childhood and youth; found a good foster-mother in her aunt, a Blamont-Chauvry; and when married found her chief pleasure in the care of her children. This feeling gave her the power to repress the love which she felt for Felix de Vandenesse, but the effort which this hard struggle caused her brought on a severe stomach disease of which she died in 1820. [The Lily of the Valley.]
MORTSAUF (Jacques de), elder child of the preceding couple, pupil of Dominis, most delicate member of the family, died prematurely. With his death the line of Lenoncourt-Givrys proper passed away, for he would have been their heir. [The Lily of the Valley.]
MORTSAUF (Madeleine de), sister of the preceding; after her mother's death she would not receive Felix de Vandenesse, who had been Madame de Mortsauf's lover. She became in time Duchesse de Lenoncourt-Givry (See that name). [The Lily of the Valley.]
MOUCHE, born in 1811, illegitimate son of one of Fourchon's natural daughters and a soldier who died in Russia; was given a home, when an orphan, by his maternal grandfather, whom he aided sometimes as ropemaker's apprentice. About 1823, in the district of Ville-aux-Fayes, Bourgogne, he profited by the credulity of the strangers whom he was supposed to teach the art of hunting otter. Mouche's attitude and conversation, as he came in the autumn of 1823 to the Aigues, scandalized the Montcornets and their guests. [The Peasantry.]
MOUCHON, eldest of three brothers who lived in 1793 in the Bourgogne valley of Avonne or Aigues; managed the estate of Ronquerolles; became deputy of his division to the Convention; had a reputation for uprightness; preserved the property and the life of the Ronquerolles; died in the year 1804, leaving two daughters, Mesdames Gendrin and Gaubertin. [The Peasantry.]
MOUCHON, brother of the preceding, had charge of the relay post-house at Conches, Bourgogne; had a daughter who married the wealthy farmer Guerbet; died in 1817. [The Peasantry.]
MOUGIN, born about 1805 in Toulouse, fifth of the Parisian hair-dressers who, under the name of Marius, successively owned the same business. In 1845, a wealthy married man of family, captain in the Guard and decorated after 1832, an elector and eligible to office, he had established himself on the Place de la Bourse as capillary artist emeritus, where his praises were sung by Bixiou and Lora to the wondering Gazonal. [The Unconscious Humorists.]
MOUILLERON, king's attorney at Issoudun in 1822, cousin to every person in the city during the quarrels between the Rouget and Bridau families. [A Bachelor's Establishment.]
MURAT (Joachim, Prince). In October, 1800, on the day in which Bartolomeo de Piombo was presented by Lucien Bonaparte, he was, with Lannes and Rapp, in the rooms of Bonaparte, the First Consul. He became Grand Duke of Berg in 1806, the time of the well-known quarrel between the Simeuses and Malin de Gondreville. Murat came to the rescue of Colonel Chabert's cavalry regiment at the battle of Eylau, February 7 and 8, 1807. "Oriental in tastes," he exhibited, even before acceding to the throne of Naples in 1808, a foolish love of luxury for a modern soldier. Twenty years later, during a village celebration in Dauphine, Benassis and Genestas listened to the story of Bonaparte, as told by a veteran, then became a laborer, who mingled with his narrative a number of entertaining stories of the bold Murat. [The Vendetta. The Gondreville Mystery. Colonel Chabert. Domestic Peace. The Country Doctor.]
MURET gave information about Jean-Joachim Goriot, his predecessor in the manufacture of "pates alimentaires." [Father Goriot.]
MUSSON, well-known hoaxer in the early part of the nineteenth century. The policeman, Peyrade, imitated his craftiness in manner and disguise twenty years later, while acting as an English nabob keeping Suzanne Gaillard. [Scenes from a Courtesan's Life.]
NANON, called Nanon the Great from her height (6 ft. 4 in.); born about 1769. First she tended cows on a farm that she was forced to leave after a fire; turned away on every side, because of her appearance, which was repulsive, she became, about 1791, at the age of twenty-two, a member of Felix Grandet's household at Saumur, where she remained the rest of her life. She always showed gratitude to her master for having taken her in. Brave, devoted and serious-minded, the only servant of the miser, she received as wages for very hard service only sixty francs a year. However, the accumulations of even so paltry an income allowed her, in 1819, to make a life investment of four thousand francs with Monsieur Cruchot. Nanon had also an annuity of twelve hundred francs from Madame de Bonfons, lived near the daughter of her former master, who was dead, and, about 1827, being almost sixty years of age, married Antoine Cornoiller. With her husband, she continued her work of devoted service to Eugenie de Bonfons. [Eugenie Grandet.]
NAPOLITAS, in 1830, secretary of Bibi-Lupin, chief of the secret police. Prison spy at the Conciergerie, he played the part of a son in a family accused of forgery, in order to observe closely Jacques Collin, who pretended to be Carlos Herrera. [Scenes from a Courtesan's Life.]
NARZICOF (Princess), a Russian; had left to the merchant Fritot, according to his own account, as payment for supplies, the carriage in which Mistress Noswell, wrapped in the shawl called Selim, returned to the Hotel Lawson. [Gaudissart II.]
NATHAN (Raoul), son of a Jew pawn-broker, who died in bankruptcy a short while after marrying a Catholic, was for twenty-five years (1820-45) one of the best known writers in Paris. Raoul Nathan touched upon many branches: the journal, romance, poetry and the stage. In 1821, Dauriat published for him an imaginative work which Lucien de Rubempre alternately praised and criticized. The harsh criticism was meant for the publisher only. Nathan then put on the stage the "Alcade dans l'Embarras"—a comedie called an "imbroglio" and presented at the Panorama-Dramatique. He signed himself simply "Raoul"; he had as collaborator Cursy—M. du Bruel. The play was a distinct success. About the same time, he supplanted Lousteau, lover of Florine, one of his leading actresses. About this time also Raoul was on terms of intimacy with Emile Blondet, who wrote him a letter dated from Aigues (Bourgogne) in which he described the Montcornets, and related their local difficulties. Raoul Nathan, a member of all the giddy and dissipated social circles, was with Giroudeau, Finot and Bixiou, a witness of Philip Bridau's wedding to Madame J.-J. Rouget. He visited Florentine Cabirolle, when the Marests and Oscar Husson were there, and appeared often on the rue Saint-Georges, at the home of Esther van Gobseck, who was already much visited by Blondet, Bixiou and Lousteau. Raoul, at this time, was much occupied with the press, and made a great parade of Royalism. The accession of Louis Philippe did not diminish the extended circle of his relations. The Marquise d'Espard received him. It was at her house that he heard evil reports of Diane de Cadignan, greatly to the dissatisfaction of Daniel d'Arthez, also present. Marie de Vandenesse, just married, noticed Nathan, who was handsome by reason of an artistic, uncouth ugliness, and elegant irregularity of features, and Raoul resolved to make the most of the situation. Although turned Republican, he took very readily to the idea of winning a lady of the aristocracy. The conquest of Madame the Comtesse de Vandenesse would have revenged him for the contempt shown him by Lady Dudley, but, fallen into the hands of usurers, fascinated with Florine, living in pitiable style in a passage between the rue Basse-du-Rempart and the rue Neuve-des-Mathurins, and being often detained on the rue Feydau, in the offices of a paper he had founded, Raoul failed in his scheme in connection with the countess, whom Vandenesse even succeeded in restoring to his own affections, by very skilful play with Florine. During the first years of Louis Philippe's reign, Nathan presented a flaming and brilliant drama, the two collaborators in which were Monsieur and Madame Marie Gaston, whose names were indicated on the hand-bills by stars only. In his younger days he had had a play of his put on at the Odeon, a romantic work after the style of "Pinto,"[*] at a time when the classic was dominant, and the stage had been so greatly stirred up for three days that the play was prohibited. At another time he presented at the Theatre-Francais a great drama that fell "with all the honors of war, amid the roar of newspaper cannon." In the winter of 1837-38, Vanda de Mergi read a new romance of Nathan's, entitled "La Perle de Dol." The memory of his social intrigues still haunted Nathan when he returned so reluctantly to M. de Clagny, who demanded it of him, a printed note, announcing the birth of Melchior de la Baudraye, as follows: "Madame la Baronne de la Baudraye is happily delivered of a child; M. Etienne Lousteau has the honor of announcing it to you." Nathan sought the society of Madame de la Baudraye, who got from him, in the rue de Chartres-du-Roule, at the home of Beatrix de Rochefide, a certain story, to be arranged as a novel, related more or less after the style of Sainte-Beuve, concerning the Bohemians and their prince, Rusticoli de la Palferine. Raoul cultivated likewise the society of the Marquise de Rochefide, and, one evening of October, 1840, a proscenium box at the Varietes was the means of bringing together Canalis, Nathan and Beatrix. Received everywhere, perfectly at home in Marguerite Turquet's boudoir, Raoul, as a member of a group composed of Bixiou, La Palferine and Maitre Cardot, heard Maitre Desroches tell how Cerizet made use of Antonia Chocardelle, to "get even" with Maxime de Trailles. Nathan afterwards married his misress, Florine, whose maiden name was really Sophie Grignault. [Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. The Secrets of a Princess. A Daughter of Eve. Letters of Two Brides. The Seamy Side of History. The Muse of the Department. A Prince of Bohemia. A Man of Business, The Unconscious Humorists.]
NATHAN,[*] (Madame Raoul), wife of the preceding, born Sophie Grignault, in 1805, in Bretagne. She was a perfect beauty, her foot alone left something to be desired. When very young she tried the double career of pleasure and the stage under the now famous name of Florine. The details of her early life are rather obscure: Madame Nathan, as supernumerary of the Gaite, had six lovers, before choosing Etienne Lousteau in that relation in 1821. She was at that time closely connected with Florentine Cabirolle, Claudine Chaffaroux, Coralie and Marie Godeschal. She had also a supporter in Matifat, the druggist, and lodged on the rue de Bondy, where, after a brilliant success at the Panorama-Dramatique, with Coralie and Bouffe, she received in maginficent style the diplomatists, Lucien de Rubempre, Camusot and others. Florine soon made an advantageous change in lover, home, theatre and protector; Nathan, whom she afterwards married, supplanted Lousteau about the middle of Louis Philippe's reign. Her home was on rue Hauteville intead of rue de Bondy; and she had moved from the stage of the Panorama to that of the Gymnase. Having made an engagement at the theatre of the Boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle, she met there her old rival, Coralie, against whom she organized a cabal; she was distinguished for the brilliancy of her costumes, and brought into her train of followers successively the opulent Dudley, Desire Minoret, M. des Grassins, the banker of Saumur, and M. du Rouvre; she even ruined the last two. Florine's fortune rose during the monarchy of July. Her association with Nathan subserved, moreover, their mutual interests; the poet won respect for the actress, who knew moreover how to make herself formidable by her spirit of intrigue and the tartness of her sallies of wit. Who did not know her mansion on the rue Pigalle? Indeed, Madame Nathan was an intimate acquaintance of Coralie, Esther la Torpille, Claudine du Bruel, Euphrasie, Aquilina, Madame Theodore Gaillard, and Marie Godeschal; entertained Emile Blondet, Andoche Finot, Etienne Lousteau, Felicien Vernou, Couture, Bixiou, Rastignac, Vignon, F. du Tillet, Nucingen, and Conti. Her apartments were embellished with the works of Bixiou, F. Souchet, Joseph Bridau, and H. Schinner. Madame de Vandenesse, being somewhat enamored of Nathan, would have destroyed these joys and this splendor, without heeding the devotion of the writer's mistress, on the one hand, or the interference of Vandenesse on the other. Florine, having entirely won back Nathan, made no delay in marrying him. [The Muse of the Department. Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. The Government Clerks. A Bachelor's Establishment. Ursule Mirouet. Eugenie Grandet. The Imaginary Mistress. A Prince of Bohemia. A Daughter of Eve. The Unconscious Humorists.]
NAVARREINS (Duc de), born about 1767, son-in-law of the Prince de Cadignan, through his first marriage; father of Antoinette de Langeais, kinsman of Madame d'Espard, and cousin of Valentin; accused of "haughtiness." He was patron of M. du Bruel—Cursy—on his entrance into the government service; had a lawsuit against the hospitals, which he entrusted to the care of Maitre Derville. He had Polydore de la Baudraye dignified to the appointment of collector, in consideration of his having released him from a debt contracted during the emigration; held a family council with the Grandlieus and Chaulieus when his daughter compromised her reputation by accepting an invitation to the house of Montriveau; was the patron of Victurnien d'Esgrignon; owned near Ville-aux-Fayes, in the sub-prefecture of Auxerrois, extensive estates, which were respected by Montcornet's enemies, the Gaubertins, the Rigous, the Soudrys, the Fourchons, and the Tonsards; accompanied Madame d'Espard to the Opera ball, when Jacques Collin and Lucien de Rubempre mystified the marchioness; for five hundred thousand francs sold to the Graslins his estates and his Montegnac forest, near Limoges; was an acquaintance of Foedora through Valentin; was a visitor of the Princesse de Cadignan, after the death of their common father-in-law, of whom he had little to make boast, especially in matters of finance. The Duc de Navarrein's mansion at Paris was on the rue du Bac. [A Bachelor's Establishment. The Thirteen. Jealousies of a Country Town. The Peasantry. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. The Country Parson. The Magic Skin. The Gondreville Mystery. The Secrets of a Princess. Cousin Betty.]
NEGREPELISSE (De), a family dating back to the Crusades, already famous in the times of Saint-Louis, the name of the younger branch of the "renowned family" of Espard, borne during the restoration in Angoumois, by M. de Bargeton's father-in-law, M. de Negrepelisse, an imposing looking old country gentleman, and one of the last representatives of the old French nobility, mayor of Escarbes, peer of France, and commander of the Order of Saint-Louis. Negrepelisse survived by several years his son-in-law, whom he took under his roof when Anais de Bargeton went to Paris in the summer of 1821. [The Commission in Lunacy. Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris.]
NEGREPELISSE (Comte Clement de), born in 1812; cousin of the preceding, who left him his title. He was the elder of the two legitimate sons of the Marquis d'Espard. He studied at College Henri IV., and lived in Paris, under their father's roof, on the rue de la Montagne-Sainte-Genevieve. The Comte de Negrepelisse seldom visited his mother, the Marquise d'Espard, who lived apart from her family in the Faubourg Saint-Honore. [The Commission in Lunacy.]
NEGRO (Marquis di), a Genoese noble, "Knight Hospitaller endowed with all known talents," was a visitor, in 1836, of the consul-general of France, at Genoa, when Maurice de l'Hostal gave before Damaso Pareto, Claude Vignon, Leon de Lora, and Felicite des Touches, a full account of the separation, the reconciliation, and, in short, the whole history of Octave de Bauvan and his wife. [Honorine.]
NEPOMUCENE, a foundling; servant-boy of Madame Vauthier, manager and door-keeper of the house on the Boulevard Montparnasse, which was occupied by the families of Bourlac and Mergi. Nepomucene usually wore a ragged blouse and, instead of shoes, gaiters or wooden clogs. To his work with Madame Vauthier was added daily work in the wood-yards of the vicinity, and, on Sundays and Mondays, during the summer, he worked also with the wine-merchants at the barrier. [The Seamy Side of History.]
NERAUD, a physician at Provins during the Restoration. He ruined his wife, who was the widow of a grocer named Auffray, and who had married him for love. He survived her. Being a man of doubtful character and a rival of Dr. Martener, Neraud attached himself to the party of Gouraud and Vinet, who represented Liberal ideas; he failed to uphold Pierrette Lorrain, the granddaughter of Auffray, against her guardians, the Rogrons. [Pierrette.]
NERAUD (Madame), wife of the preceding. Married first to Auffray, the grocer, who was sixty years old; she was only thirty-eight at the beginning of her widowhood; she married Dr. Neraud almost immediately after the death of her first husband. By her first marriage she had a daughter, who was the wife of Major Lorrain, and the mother of Pierrette. Madame Neraud died of grief, amid squalid surroundings, two years after her second marriage. The Rogrons, descended from old Auffray by his first marriage, had stripped her of almost all she had. [Pierrette.]
NICOLAS. (See Montauran, Marquis de.)
NINETTE, born in 1832, "rat" at the Opera in Paris, was acquainted with Leon de Lora and J.-J. Bixiou, who called Gazonal's attention to her in 1845. [The Unconscious Humorists.]
NOLLAND (Abbe), the promising pupil of Abbe Roze. Concealed during the Revolution at the house of M. de Negrepelisse, near Barbezieux, he had in charge the education of Marie-Louise-Anais (afterwards Madame de Bargeton), and taught her music, Italian and German. He died in 1802. [Lost Illusions.]
NISERON, curate of Blangy (Bourgogne) before the Revolution; predecessor of Abbe Brossette in this curacy; uncle of Jean-Francois Niseron. He was led by a childish but innocent indiscretion on the part of his great-niece, as well as by the influence of Dom Rigou, to disinherit the Niserons in the interests of the Mesdemoiselles Pichard, house-keepers in his family. [The Peasantry.]
NISERON (Jean-Francois), beadle, sacristan, chorister, bell-ringer, and grave-digger of the parish of Blangy (Bourgogne), during the Restoration; nephew and only heir of Niseron the cure; born in 1751. He was delighted at the Revolution, was the ideal type of the Republican, a sort of Michel Chrestien of the fields; treated with cold disdain the Pichard family, who took from him the inheritance, to which he alone had any right; lived a life of poverty and sequestration; was none the less respected; was of Montcornet's party represented by Brossette; their opponent, Gregoire Rigou, felt for him both esteem and fear. Jean-Francois Niseron lost, one after another, his wife and his two children, and had by his side, in his old days, only Genevieve, natural daughter of his deceased son, Auguste. [The Peasantry.]
NISERON (Auguste), son of the preceding; soldier of the Republic and of the Empire; while an artilleryman in 1809, he seduced, at Zahara, a young Montenegrin, Zena Kropoli, who died, at Vincennes, early in the year 1810, leaving him an infant daughter. Thus he could not realize his purpose of marrying her. He himself was killed, before Montereau, during the year 1814, by the bursting of a shell. [The Peasantry.]
NISERON (Genevieve), natural daughter of the preceding and the Montenegrin woman, Zena Kropoli; born in 1810, and named Genevieve after a paternal aunt; an orphan from the age of four, she was reared in Bourgogne by her grandfather, Jean-Francois Niseron. She had her father's beauty and her mother's peculiarities. Her patronesses, Madame Montcornet and Madame de Michaud, bestowed upon her the surname Pechina, and, to guard her against Nicholas Tonsard's attentions, placed her in a convent at Auxerre, where she might acquire skill in sewing and forget Justin Michaud, whom she loved unconsciously. [The Peasantry.]
NOEL, book-keeper for Jean-Jules Popinot of Paris, in 1828, at the time that the judge questioned the Marquis d'Espard, whose wife tried to deprive him of the right to manage his property. [The Commission in Lunacy.]
NOSWELL (Mistress), a rich and eccentric Englishwoman, who was in Paris at the Hotel Lawson about the middle of Louis Philippe's reign; after much mental debate she bought of Fritot the shawl called Selim, which he said at first it was "impossible" for him to sell. [Gaudissart II.]
NOUASTRE (Baron de), a refugee of the purest noble blood. A ruined man, he returned to Alencon in 1800, with his daughter, who was twenty-two years of age, and found a home with the Marquis d'Esgrignon, and died of grief two months later. Shortly afterwards the marquis married the orphan daughter. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]
NOURRISSON (Madame), was formerly, under the Empire, attached to the service of the Prince d'Ysembourg in Paris. The sight of the disorderly life of a "great lady" of the times decided Madame Nourrisson's profession. She set up shop as a dealer in old clothes, and was also known as mistress of various houses of shame. Intimate relations with Jacqueline Collin, continued for more than twenty years, made this two-fold business profitable. The two matrons willingly exchanged, at times, names and business signs, resources and profits. It was in the old clothes shop, on the rue Neuve-Saint-Marc, that Frederic de Nucingen bargained for Esther van Gobseck. Towards the end of Charles X.'s reign, one of Madame Nourrisson's establishments, on rue Saint-Barbe, was managed by La Gonore; in the time of Louis Philippe another—a secret affair—existed at the so-called "Pate des Italiens"; Valerie Marneffe and Wenceslas Steinbock were once caught there together. Madame Nourrisson, first of the name, evidently continued to conduct her business on the rue Saint-Marc, since, in 1845, she narrated the minutiae of it to Madame Mahuchet before an audience composed of the well-known trio, Bixiou, Lora and Gazonal, and related to them her own history, disclosing to them the secrets of her own long past beginnings in life. [Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. Cousin Betty. The Unconscious Humorists.]
NOUVION (Comte de), a noble refugee, who had returned in utter poverty; chevalier of the Order of Saint-Louis; lived in Paris in 1828, subsisting on the delicately disguised charity of his friend, the Marquis d'Espard, who made him superintendent of the publication, at No. 22 rue de la Montagne-Sainte-Genevieve, of the "Picturesque History of China," and offered him a share in the possible profits of the work. [The Commission in Lunacy.]
NOVERRE, a celebrated dancer, born in Paris 1727; died in 1807; was the rather unreliable customer of Chevrel the draper, father-in-law and predecessor of Guillaume at the Cat and Racket. [At the Sign of the Cat and Racket.]
NUCINGEN (Baron Frederic de), born, probably at Strasbourg, about 1767. At that place he was formerly clerk to M. d'Aldrigger, an Alsatian banker. Of better judgment than his employer, he did not believe in the success of the Emperor in 1815 and speculated very skilfully on the battle of Waterloo. Nucingen now carried on business alone, and on his own account, in Paris and elsewhere; he thus prepared by degrees the famous house of the rue Saint-Lazare, and laid the foundation of a fortune, which, under Louis Philippe, reached almost eighteen million francs. At this period he married one of the two daughters of a rich vermicelli-maker, Mademoiselle Delphine Goriot, by whom he had a daughter, Augusta, eventually the wife of Eugene de Rastignac. From the first years of the Restoration may be dated the real brilliancy of his career, the result of a combination with the Kellers, Ferdinand du Tillet, and Eugene de Rastignac in the successful manipulation of schemes in connection with the Wortschin mines, followed by opportune assignments and adroitly managed cases of bankruptcy. These various combinations ruined the Ragons, the Aiglemonts, the Aldriggers, and the Beaudenords. At this time, too, Nucingen, though clamorously declaring himself an out-and-out Bourbonist, turned a deaf ear to Cesar Birotteau's appeals for credit, in spite of knowing of the latter's consistent Royalism. There was a time in the baron's life when he seemed to change his nature; it was when, after giving up his hired dancer, he madly entered upon an amour with Esther van Gobseck, alarmed his physician, Horace Bianchon, employed Corentin, Georges, Louchard, and Peyrade, and became especially the prey of Jacques Collin. After Esther's suicide, in May, 1830, Nuncingen abandoned "Cythera," as Chardin des Lupeaulx had done before, and became again a man of figures, and was overwhelmed with favors: insignia, the peerage, and the cross of grand officer of the Legion of Honor. Nucingen, being respected and esteemed, in spite of his blunt ways and his German accent, was a patron of Beaudenord, and a frequent guest of Cointet, the minister; he went everywhere, and, at the mansion of Mademoiselle des Touches, heard Marsay give an account of some of his old love-affairs; witnessed, before Daniel d'Arthez, the calumniation of Diane de Cadignan by every one present in Madame d'Espard's parlor; guided Maxime de Trailles between the hands, or, rather, the clutches of Claparon-Cerizet; accepted the invitation of Josepha Mirah to her reception on the rue Ville-l'Eveque. When Wenceslas Steinbock married Hortense Hulot, Nucingen and Cottin de Wissembourg were the bride's witnesses. Furthermore, their father, Hector Hulot d'Ervy, borrowed of him more than a hundred thousand francs. The Baron de Nucingen acted as sponsor to Polydore de la Baudraye when he was admitted to the French peerage. As a friend of Ferdinand du Tillet, he was admitted on most intimate terms to the boudoir of Carabine, and he was seen there, one evening in 1845, along with Jenny Cadine, Gazonal, Bixiou, Leon de Lora, Massol, Claude Vignon, Trailles, F. du Bruel, Vauvinet, Marguerite Turquet, and the Gaillards of the rue Menars. [The Firm of Nucingen. Father Goriot. Pierrette. Cesar Birotteau. Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life. Another Study of Woman. The Secrets of a Princess. A Man of Business. Cousin Betty. The Muse of the Department. The Unconscious Humorists.]
NUCINGEN (Baronne Delphine de), wife of the preceding, born in 1792, of fair complexion; the spoiled daughter of the opulent vermicelli-maker, Jean-Joachim Goriot; on the side of her mother, who died young, the granddaughter of a farmer. In the latter period of the Empire she contracted, greatly to her taste, a marriage for money. Madame de Nucingen formerly had as her lover Henri de Marsay, who finally abandoned her most cruelly. Reduced, at the time of Louis XVIII., to the society of the Chaussee-d'Antin, she was ambitious to be admitted to the Faubourg Saint-Germain, a circle of which her elder sister, Madame de Restaud, was a member. Eugene de Rastignac opened to her the parlor of Madame de Beauseant, his cousin, rue de Greville, in 1819, and, at about the same time, became her lover. Their liaison lasted more than fifteen years. An apartment on the rue d'Artois, fitted up by Jean-Joachim Goriot, sheltered their early love. Having entrusted to Rastignac a certain sum for play at the Palais-Royal, the baroness was able with the proceeds to free herself of a humiliating debt to Marsay. Meanwhile she lost her father. The Nucingen carriage, without an occupant, however, followed the hearse. [Father Goriot.] Madame de Nucingen entertained a great deal on the rue Saint-Lazare. It was there that Auguste de Maulincour saw Clemence Desmarets, and Adolphe des Grassins met Charles Grandet. [The Thirteen. Eugenie Grandet.] Cesar Birotteau, on coming to beg credit of Nucingen, as also did Rodolphe Castanier, immediately after his forgery, found themselves face to face with the baroness. [Cesar Birotteau. Melmoth Reconciled.] At this period, Madame de Nucingen took the box at the Opera which Antoinette de Langeais had occupied, believing undoubtedly, said Madame d'Espard, that she would inherit her charms, wit and success. [Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. The Commission in Lunacy.] According to Diane de Cadignan, Delphine had a horrible journey when she went to Naples by sea, of which she brought back a most painful reminder. The baroness showed a haughty and scornful indulgence when her husband became enamored of Esther van Gobseck. [Scenes from a Courtesan's Life.] Forgetting her origin she dreamed of seeing her daughter Augusta become Duchesse d'Herouville; but the Herouvilles, knowing the muddy source of Nucingen's millions, declined this alliance. [Modeste Mignon. The Firm of Nucingen.] Shortly after the year 1830, the baroness was invited to the house of Felicite des Touches, where she saw Marsay once more, and heard him give an account of an old love-affair. [Another Study of woman.] Delphine aided Marie de Vandenesse and Nathan to the extent of forty thousand francs during the checkered course of their intrigues. She remembered indeed having gone through similar experiences. [A Daughter of Eve.] About the middle of the monarchy of July, Madame de Nucingen, as mother-in-law of Eugene de Rastignac, visited Madame d'Espard and met Maxime de Trailles and Ferdinand du Tillet in the Faubourg Saint-Germain. [The Member for Arcis.]
NUEIL (De), proprietor of the domain of the Manervilles, which, doubtless, descended to the younger son, Gaston. [The Deserted Woman.]
NUEIL (Madame de), wife of the preceding, survived her husband, and her eldest son, became the dowager Comtesse de Nueil, and afterwards owned the domain of Manerville, to which she withdrew in retirement. She was the type of the scheming mother, careful and correct, but worldly. She matched off Gaston, and was thereby involuntarily the cause of his death. [The Deserted Woman.]
NUEIL (De), eldest son of the preceding, died of consumption in the reign of Louis XVIII., leaving the title of Comte de Nueil to his younger brother, Baron Gaston. [The Deserted Woman.]
NUEIL (Gaston de), son of the Nueils and brother of the preceding, born about 1799, of good extraction and with fortune suitable to his rank. He went, in 1822, to Bayeux, where he had family connections, in order to recuperate from the wearing fatigues of Parisian life; had an opportunity to force open the closed door of Claire de Beauseant, who had been living in retirement in that vicinity ever since the marriage of Miguel d'Ajuda-Pinto to Berthe de Rochefide; he fell in love with her, his love was reciprocated, and for nearly ten years he lived with her as her husband in Normandie and Switzerland. Albert Savarus, in his autobiographical novel, "L'Ambitieux par Amour," made a vague reference to them as living together on the shore of Lake Geneva. After the Revolution of 1830, Gaston de Nueil, already rich from his Norman estates that afforded an income of eighteen thousand francs, married Mademoiselle Stephanie de la Rodiere. Wearying of the marriage tie, he wished to renew his former relations with Madame de Beauseant. Exasperated by the haughty repulse at the hands of his former mistress, Nueil killed himself. [The Deserted Woman. Albert Savarus.]
NUEIL (Madame Gaston de), born Stephanie de la Rodiere, about 1812, a very insignificant character, married, at the beginning of Louis Philippe's reign, Gaston de Nueil, to whom she brought an income of forty thousand francs a year. She was enceinte after the first month of her marriage. Having become Countess de Nueil, by succession, upon the death of her brother-in-law, and being deserted by Gaston, she continued to live in Normandie. Madame Gaston de Nueil survived her husband. [The Deserted Woman.]