DEAR A.,--Mother will have written to you of my engagement to Charles
Moulton. I wish you would come and see me married, and that I could
present all my future family to the most lovable of aunts.
I think I shall have everything to make me happy. In the first place, my
fiancé is very musical, composes charming things, and plays delightfully
on the piano; my future mother-in-law is a dear old lady, musical and
universally talented; my future father-in-law is a _bona-fide_ American, a
dear quixotic old gentleman who speaks the most awful French. Although he
has lived in Paris for forty years, he has never conquered the
pronunciation of the French language, but has invented a unique dialect of
his own. Every word that can be pronounced in English he pronounces in
English, as well as all numbers. For instance, a phrase such as _La
guerre de mille huit cent quinze était une démonstration de la liberté
nationale_ would sound like this: "La gur de 1815 (in English) était
une demonstration (in English) de la liberty national." It is almost
impossible to understand him; but he will read for hours unabashed, not
only to us, the drowsy and inattentive members of his family, but to the
most fastidious and illustrious Frenchmen. There are two brothers and a
sweet little sister. I shall have a beautiful home, or rather homes,
because they have not only a handsome hotel in Paris, but an ideal country
place (Petit Val) and a villa in Dinard.
Good-by. Greet all the united family from me, and tell them not to worry
over my future, as you wrote they were doing. I have renounced forever the
pomps and allurements of the stage, and I trust the leaves on the
genealogical tree will cease their trembling, and that the Fays, my
ancestors, will not trouble themselves to turn in their graves, as you
threatened they would if I did anything to disgrace them.