FISCHER (Lisbeth), known as "Cousin Betty"; born in 1796; brought up a
peasant. In her childhood she had to give way to her first cousin, the
pretty Adeline, who was pampered by the whole family. In 1809 she was
called to Paris by Adeline's husband and placed as an apprentice with
the well-known Pons Brothers, embroiderers to the Imperial Court. She
became a skilled workwoman and was about to set up for herself when
the Empire was overthrown. Lisbeth was a Republican, of restive
temperament, capricious, independent and unaccountably savage. She
habitually declined to wed. She refused in succession a clerk of the
minister of war, a major, an army-contractor, a retired captain and a
wealthy lace-maker. Baron Hulot nick-named her the "Nanny-Goat." A
resident of rue du Doyenne (which ended at the Louvre and was
obliterated about 1855), where she worked for Rivet, a successor of
Pons, she made the acquaintance of her neighbor, Wenceslas Steinbock,
a Livonian exile, whom she saved from poverty and suicide, but whom
she watched with a jealous strictness. Hortense Hulot sought out and
succeeded in seeing the Pole; a wedding followed between the young
people which caused Cousin Betty a deep resentment, cunningly
concealed, but terrific in its effects. Through her Wenceslas was
introduced to the irresistible Mme. Marneffe, and the happiness of a
young household was quickly demolished. The same thing happened to
Baron Hulot whose misconduct Lisbeth secretly abetted. Lisbeth died in
1844 of a pulmonary phthisis, principally caused by chagrin at seeing
the Hulot family reunited. The relatives of the old maid never found
out her evil actions. They surrounded her bedside, caring for her and
lamenting the loss of "the angel of the family." Mlle. Fischer died on
rue Louis-le-Grand, Paris, after having dwelt in turn on rues du
Doyenne, Vaneau, Plumet (now Oudinot) and du Montparnasse, where she
managed the household of Marshal Hulot, through whom she dreamed of
wearing the countess' coronet, and for whom she donned mourning.
[Cousin Betty.]
FITZ-WILLIAM (Miss Margaret), daughter of a rich and noble Irishman
who was the maternal uncle of Calyste du Guenic; hence the first
cousin of that young man. Mme. de Guenic, the mother, was desirous of
mating her son with Miss Margaret. [Beatrix.]