PAZ
(LA FAUSSE MAITRESSE)
I
In September, 1835, one of the richest heiresses of the faubourg
Saint-Germain, Mademoiselle du Rouvre, the only daughter of the
Marquis du Rouvre, married Comte Adam Mitgislas Laginski, a young
Polish exile.
We ask permission to write these Polish names as they are pronounced,
to spare our readers the aspect of the fortifications of consonants by
which the Slave language protects its vowels,--probably not to lose
them, considering how few there are.
The Marquis du Rouvre had squandered nearly the whole of a princely
fortune, which he obtained originally through his marriage with a
Demoiselle de Ronquerolles. Therefore, on her mother's side Clementine
du Rouvre had the Marquis de Ronquerolles for uncle, and Madame de
Serizy for aunt. On her father's side she had another uncle in the
eccentric person of the Chevalier du Rouvre, a younger son of the
house, an old bachelor who had become very rich by speculating in
lands and houses. The Marquis de Ronquerolles had the misfortune to
lose both his children at the time of the cholera, and the only son of
Madame de Serizy, a young soldier of great promise, perished in Africa
in the affair of the Makta. In these days rich families stand between
the danger of impoverishing their children if they have too many, or
of extinguishing their names if they have too few,--a singular result
of the Code which Napoleon never thought of.
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