Ninon's Friendships
Mademoiselle de l'Enclos never forgot a friend in a lover, indeed, the
trait that stands out clear and strong in her character, is her whole
hearted friendship for the men she loved, and she bestowed it upon
them as long as they lived, for she outlived nearly all of them, and
cherished their memories afterward. As has been said, Ninon de
l'Enclos was Epicurean in the strictest sense, and did not rest her
entire happiness on love alone, but included a friendship which went
to the extent of making sacrifices. The men with whom she came in
contact from time to time during her long life, were nothing to her
from a pecuniary point of view, for she possessed an income
sufficiently large to satisfy her wants and to maintain the social
establishment she never neglected.
There was never, either directly or indirectly, any money
consideration asked or expected in payment of her favors, and the man
who would have dared offer her money as a consideration for anything,
would have met with scorn and contempt and been expelled from her
house and society without ever being permitted to regain either. The
natural wants of her heart and mind, and what she was pleased to call
the natural gratifications of physical wants, were her mentors, and to
them she listened, never dreaming of holding them at a pecuniary
value.
One of her dearest friends was Scarron, once the husband of Madame de
Maintenon, the pious leader of a debased court and the saintly
mistress of the king of France. In his younger days, Scarron
contributed largely to the pleasures of the Oiseaux des Tournelles,
the ecclesiastical collar he then wore not being sufficient to prevent
his enjoying worldly pleasures.
In the course of time Scarron fell ill, and was reduced to a dreadful
condition, no one coming to his succor but Ninon. Like a tender,
compassionate friend, she sympathized deeply with him, when he was
carried to the suburb Saint Germain to try the effects of the baths as
an alleviation of his pains. Scarron did not complain, on the
contrary, he was cheerful and always gay even when suffering tortures.
There was little left of him, however, but an indomitable spirit
burning in a crushed tenement of mortal clay. Not being able to come
to her, Ninon went to him, and passed entire days at his side. Not
only that, she brought her friends with her and established a small
court around his bed, thus cheering him in his pain and doing him a
world of good, which finally enabled his spirit to triumph over his
mortal shell.
Instances might be multiplied, enough to fill a volume, of her
devotion to her friends, whom she never abandoned and whom she was
always ready with purse and counsel to aid in their difficulties. A
curious instance is that of Nicolas Vauquelin, sieur de Desyvetaux,
whom she missed from her circle for several days. Aware that he had
been having some family troubles, and that his fortune was menaced,
she became alarmed, thinking that perhaps some misfortune had come
upon him, for which reason she resolved to seek him and help him out
of his difficulties. But Ninon was mistaken in supposing that so wise
and gay an Epicurean could be crushed by any sorrow or trouble.
Desyvetaux was enjoying himself in so singular a fashion that it is
worth telling.
This illustrious Epicurean, finding one night a young girl in a
fainting condition at his door, brought her into his house to succor
her, moved by an impulse of humanity. But as soon as she had recovered
her senses, the philosopher's heart was touched by her beauty. To
please her benefactor the girl played several selections on a harp and
accompanied the instrument with a charming and seductive voice.
Desyvetaux, who was a passionate admirer of music, was captivated by
this accomplishment, and suddenly conceived the desire to spend the
rest of his days in the company of this charming singer. It was not
difficult for a girl who had been making it her business to frequent
the wineshops of the suburbs with a brother, earning a precarious
living by singing and playing on the harp, to accept such a
proposition, and consent to bestow happiness upon an excessively
amorous man, who offered to share with her a luxurious and tranquil
life in one of the finest residences in the suburb Saint Germain.
Although most of his life had been passed at court as the governor of
M. de Vendôme, and tutor of Louis XIII, he had always desired to lead
a life of peace and quiet in retirement. The pleasures of a sylvan
life which he had so often described in his lectures, ended by leading
his mind in that direction. The young girl he found on his doorstep
had offered him his first opportunity to have a Phyllis to his Corydon
and he eagerly embraced it. Both yielded to the fancy, she dressed in
the garb of a shepherdess, he playing the rôle of Corydon at the age
of seventy years.
Sometimes stretched out on a carpet of verdure, he listened to the
enchanting music she drew from her instrument, or drank in the sweet
voice of his shepherdess singing melodious pastorals. A flock of
birds, charmed with this harmony, left their cages to caress with
their wings, Dupuis' harp, or intoxicated with joy, fluttered down
into her bosom. This little gallantry in which they had been trained
was a delicious spectacle to the shepherd philosopher and intoxicated
his senses. He fancied he was guiding with his mistress innumerable
bands of intermingled sheep; their conversation was in tender eclogues
composed by them both extemporaneously, the attractive surroundings
inspiring them with poetry.
Ninon was amazed when she found her "bon homme," as she called him, in
the startlingly original disguise of a shepherd, a crook in his hand,
a wallet hanging by his side, and a great flapping straw hat, trimmed
with rose colored silk on his head. Her first impression was that he
had taken leave of his senses, and she was on the point of shedding
tears over the wreck of a once brilliant mind, when Desyvetaux,
suspending his antics long enough to look about him, perceived her and
rushed to her side with the liveliest expressions of joy. He removed
her suspicions of his sanity by explaining his metamorphosis in a
philosophical fashion:
"You know, my dear Ninon, there are certain tastes and pleasures which
find their justification in a certain philosophy when they bear all
the marks of moral innocence. Nothing can be said against them but
their singularity. There are no amusements less dangerous than those
which do not resemble those generally indulged in by the multitude."
Ninon was pleased with the amiable companion of her old friend. Her
figure, her mental attainments, and her talents enchanted her, and
Desyvetaux, who appeared in a ridiculous light when she first saw him
in his masquerade, now seemed to her to be on the road to happiness.
She made no attempt to persuade him to return to his former mode of
life, which she could not avoid at this moment, however, as
considering more agreeable than the new one he had adopted. But what
could she offer in the way of superior seductive pleasures to a pair
who had tasted pure and natural enjoyments? The vain amusements and
allurements of the world have no sympathy with anything but
dissipation, in which, the mind, yielding to the fleeting seductions
of art, leaves the heart empty as soon as the illusion disappears.
The strange conduct of Desyvetaux gave birth to numerous reflections
of this nature in Ninon's mind, but she did not cease to be his
friend, on the contrary, she entered into the spirit of his simple
life and visited him from time to time to enjoy the spectacle of such
a tender masquerade which Desyvetaux continued up to the time of his
death. It gave Mademoiselle Dupuis nearly as much celebrity as her
lover attained, for when the end came, she obeyed his desire to play a
favorite dance on her harp, to enable his soul to take flight in the
midst of its delicious harmony. It should be mentioned, that
Desyvetaux wore in his hat as long as he lived, a yellow ribbon, "out
of love for the gentle Ninon who gave it to me."
Socrates advises persons of means to imitate the swans, which,
realizing the benefit of an approaching death, sing while in their
death agony. The Abbé Brantôme relates an interesting story of the
death of Mademoiselle de Lineul, the elder, one of the queen's
daughters, which resembles that of Desyvetaux.
"When the hour of her death had arrived," says Brantôme, "Mademoiselle
sent for her valet, Julian, who could play the violin to perfection.
'Julian,' quoth she, 'take your violin and play on it until you see me
dead--for I am going--the Defeat of the Swiss, and play it as well as
you know how; and when you shall reach the words "tout est perdu,"
play it over four or five times as piteously as you can:' which the
other did. And when he came to 'tout est perdu' she sang it over
twice; then turning to the other side of the couch, she said to those
who stood around: 'Tout est perdu à ce coup et à bon escient;' all is
lost this time, sure.'"