[305] Gaill. 399.
[306] From a leaflet printed in English and French for circulation by D’Eon, who added: ‘N.B.—This judgment given by the King himself serves to authenticate the justice of Chevalier D’Eon’s cause, and ought not to leave him a single enemy under the reign of Louis XVI., when the choice of ministers seems to characterise the monarch’s virtues, and to proclaim that the brave and virtuous citizen is assured of a protector.’
[307] One English and ten French ladies are decorated with the cross of the Legion of Honour at the present time.
[308] Gaill. 402.
[309] Morning Post and Daily Advertiser, &c., November 10-11, 1775.
[310] Morning Post and Daily Advertiser, &c., November 13-14, 1775. The Morning Post, established in 1772, was already having a large circulation.
[311] Gaill. 249.
[312] The Count de Broglio remained passive. ‘He is not a genius of the first water, but lively, and sometimes agreeable,’ said Walpole, who met the count in Paris, to the Hon. H. S. Conway.
[313] Loménie, i. 428, 518.
[314] The Chevalier’s debt to Lord Ferrers was represented as amounting to 5,333l. minus interest, &c. Beaumarchais paid the earl about 5,000l., and gave a bill for the balance, which, however, he failed to meet. D’Eon stated his liabilities to be 13,933l.
[315] It is certain that D’Eon did not deliver every paper of importance. Having dined with M. Hirsinger, French Chargé d’Affaires, on February 1, 1792, she consigned to that minister ‘a valise containing papers of the Court and King.’—Journal for 1792. D’Eon MSS. B.M.
[316] Gaill. 414.
[317] Loménie, i. 432.
[318] Madame de Courcelles to D’Eon, January 1, 1776. Gaill. 396.
[319] February 3, 1776. B.M. MSS.
[320] Déclaration qui prouve que les Sieurs Morande et de Beaumarchais voulaient absolument, et malgré le Chevalier D’Eon, s’établir une fortune par les polices sur son sexe. B.M. MSS. ii. 341.
[321] This, and subsequent correspondence between Beaumarchais, D’Eon, and the Count de Vergennes was published under the title:—Pièces relatives aux démêlés entre Mademoiselle d’Eon de Beaumont, Chevalière de l’Ordre Royal et Militaire de Saint-Louis, et Ministre Plénipotentiaire de France, &c., et le Sieur Caron dit de Beaumarchais, &c., 1778 (12mo). B.M. MSS. ii. 341, and reproduced in de la Fortelle’s latest edition (1779) of La Vie Militaire, Politique, et Privée de Mademoiselle, &c., D’Eon de Beaumont, &c.
[322] The Westminster Gazette, August 6-10, 1776.
[323] Gaill. 196.
[324] Public Ledger, August 24, 1776.
[325] Beaumarchais to D’Eon, August 18, 1776. Loménie, i. 518.
[326] Archives des affaires étrangères. Gaill. 292.
[327] Le Gueux would have been a more suitable name, as the sequel will show.
[328] Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. xliv.
[329] Scots Magazine, vol. xxxix.
[330] Campan, i. 190.
[331] Ch. MSS.
[332] Archives des affaires étrangères. Gaill. 296.
[333] Preamble to Will. Ch. MSS.
[334] This was the prelate who supported the curé of Saint-Sulpice in his refusal to inter the remains of Voltaire.
[335] Marie Louise, daughter of Louis XV., was received into the Convent of St. Denis.
[336] Ch. MSS. 954, 1,154.
[337] Daughters of M. Genest, at whose house the Chevalière was residing.
[338] I will quote from one among the several sensational descriptions of D’Eon’s personal appearance, scarcely thinking it necessary to remind the reader that she was not a colonel, nor had she been at Fontenoy. ‘... He was at the period referred to about forty-seven years of age, tall and muscular, swarthy, sunburnt, weather-beaten, scarred, having been wounded in several engagements, since, as a youth of fifteen, he began his career at Fontenoy.... For many years this bold colonel of dragoons has been known as the Chevalier Eon de Beaumont.... From under the shade of his thick shaggy eyebrows gleam a pair of bright bold-looking eyes ... in his triple row of ruffles, mantelet à la reine, and bonnet à la baigneuse surmounting a row of grizzly curls, he looks a very odd figure of fun.’—French Court and Society, Reign of Louis XVI. and First Empire, by Catherine Charlotte, Lady Jackson. 1881.
[339] Gudin, quoted by Loménie, i. 417, says it was ‘une voix de femme.’
[340] Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. xlviii. Scots Magazine, vol. xl.
[341] In allusion to Beaumarchais’ early apprenticeship.
[342] Pièces Relatives, &c. 243.
[343] An Epistle from Mademoiselle D’Eon to the Right Hon. L——d M——d, C——f J——e of the C——t of K——g’s B——h, on his determination in regard to her sex. London, 1778.
[345] March 17, 1777.
[346] Ch. MSS.
[347] Ch. MSS. 719. European Magazine, 1791.
[348] Bibliothèque de Tonnerre. Gaill. 310-316.
[349] Bibliothèque de Tonnerre. Gaill. 307.
[350] Ch. MSS.
[351] A drawn battle was fought between Keppel and d’Orvilliers off Ushant, in July 1778, previous to which the French admiral in command of the combined squadrons of France and Spain, consisting of sixty-five ships of the line, besides frigates, &c., had ridden master of the Channel for a considerable time.
[352] This unpublished letter, dated Rue de Noailles, Versailles, February 8, 1779, in the Egerton Collection at the B.M., appears to be the original. At the top of the first page is written in another hand: ‘Parler à M. le Comte de Vergennes.’ How did it get into the Egerton Collection?
[353] Ch. MSS. Courier de l’Europe, November 9, 1784.
[354] Of Kavenmally, near Newport, Monmouthshire. Lord Mount Edgecumbe humorously observed one day, that ‘D’Eon was her own widow!’
[355] Robineau, a French artist, executed a painting on this subject, from which a print was published.
[356] Ch. MSS. Old newspapers.
[357] D’Eon played Mr. Phillidor at another great match on April 13, 1793. Phillidor, a composer of music, was one of the greatest chess players who ever lived, and founder of a school which has proved itself second to none. He died almost literally in a garret. He was the author of a Treatise on Chess, 1749.
[358] This sale was held on May 24, 1793.
[359] To the Public. An Historical Account of the Facts, Motives, and Reasons which lay Mademoiselle la Chevalière D’Eon under the necessity of making, in her lifetime, a public sale of all she possesses in London, in order to satisfy and pay her creditors, before her departure for Paris.—Justitiæ Soror Fides!
[360] Earl Ferrers had rebuilt the mansion of Staunton Harold according to a plan of his own, and lived to see it nearly finished.
[361] This lady was put upon her trial for bigamy.
[362] His lordship’s superintendent.
[363] His lordship’s secretary, residing at Loughborough.
[365] Morning Post, April 23-27, 1787.
[366] Ch. MSS.
[367] ‘I am a great friend to these public amusements, sir,’ said Dr. Johnson, (who often went to Ranelagh, which he deemed a place of innocent recreation) to Boswell; ‘they keep people from vice.’ And a few years later we read of Walpole’s four nieces being at Ranelagh the night of the Gordon riots, together with the Duke of Gloucester.
[368] Catalogue of sale.
[369] By a strange contradiction, D’Eon purchased later in the year, at Christie’s rooms, the Mead and Douglas collections of Horace in 8vo, 4to, and folio; for which she paid 100l., having herself assisted in the preparation of the catalogue.
[370] Scots Magazine, vol. liv. Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. lxii.
[371] M. Beauvais, père, Jermyn Street, January 12, 1793. Ch. MSS.
[372] Beaten at Nerwinde, on March 18. It was said of this general under the Republic: ‘Qu’il cherchait à sauver sa tête en négociant au dehors avec le Général Cobourg, et dedans avec la faction d’Orléans.’
[374] Old newspapers.
[375] John Taylor freely expresses it as his opinion that D’Eon disgraced his character by exhibiting himself with Mrs. Bateman in fencing matches at several provincial towns. In March 1794, D’Eon wrote to ask Warren Hastings, with whom he was well acquainted, for a letter of introduction to Mr. Peter Speke, of the Supreme Council at Calcutta, in behalf of the Batemans, who were proceeding to India to claim some property. After Mr. Bateman’s death, his widow was married to Mr. Ester, and died at Calcutta in 1801.
[376] B.M. MSS.
[377] D’Eon Papers. B.M.
[378] Mrs. Cole, a native of Lorraine, born in the same year as D’Eon, was the widow of Mr. W. Cole, pump maker to the Royal Navy, and an ingenious inventor. She had long been on intimate terms of friendship with Mrs. Robinson, of Denston Hall, Suffolk, the daughter of Lord Clive.
[379] D’Eon had sold to Major Clive, in 1794, Marshal Saxe’s sword, a huge sabre and a large carbine, for which she received sixty pounds.
[380] B.M. MSS.
[381] Ch. MSS.
[382] The Times, May 25, 1810.
[383] See Cansick’s interesting and painstaking work, A Collection of curious and interesting Epitaphs ... in the Ancient Church and Burial Grounds of St. Pancras. London, 1869. ‘It is lamentable,’ says the author, ‘to see the dilapidated state of the monuments in this ground, belonging to wealthy and well-known families, which for a few pounds might be restored and made a credit to the churchyard.’
[384] The Baroness Burdett-Coutts who is here, there, and everywhere in the practice of benevolence, not unmindful of the desecration to which the remains of the illustrious dead had been subjected, caused to be erected at considerable expense, in St. Pancras churchyard, a monument which bears the names of those whose ashes lie scattered about the parish playground.
[385] In the possession of Mr. Christie.
[386] Ch. MSS.
[387] Histoire de France pendant le dix-huitième siècle. Paris, 1819.
[388] Mr. Thomas William Plummer, intimately acquainted with the Chevalier, had undertaken, in 1804, to translate the ample material placed at his disposal, and produce a biography. From some unexplained cause this was never done.
[389] History and Topography of the Parish of St. Pancras. London, 1729-1830.
[390] Ch. MSS.
[391] Ibid.
[392] See p. 213. D’Eon to the Count de Broglio, February 10, 1775. Broglie, ii. 563, also pp. 218, 235.
[393] Vandal, 264.
[394] Frequent errors have been made in the Chevalier’s age. The date of birth on his coffin-plate was October 17, 1727; and the Duke de Broglie imputes to him forty-three years, bien sonnés, in 1775.
[395] Angelica Kauffmann was for a long time a neighbour of the Chevalier, her residence being in Golden Square.
[396] This is an error. Bradel was born in 1750.