destination of the pavilion as a place of education. Her first care was
to secure the possibility of exercising her _surveillance_ over the
little princesses by day, and by night. A glass door separated her room
from their nursery, and it was so arranged that even from her bed she
could see what was going on in their room. The decorations of the place
had all an educational aim. The walls of the Princesses’ room were
adorned with frescoes, representing the seven kings of Rome and the
emperors and empresses up to the time of Constantine, each with the date
and name beneath it. Above the doors were depicted scenes taken also
from Roman history. “Two large screens bore representations of the Kings
of France, the hand screens depicted incidents taken from mythology.”
The staircase was hung with maps. A long gallery was devoted to Grecian
history, and certain other rooms were frescoed with scenes taken from
the history of France.
Into this peaceable retreat Madame de Genlis was accompanied by her
mother and her two daughters, Caroline and Pulchérie de Genlis, the
completion of whose education she thus found an opportunity of
directing, before their early marriages to the Marquis de La Woestine
and the Viscount de Valence respectively.
In 1782 one of the little twin princesses died of smallpox, and in the
same year Madame de Genlis was appointed “Governor” to the young
princes, their brothers—the first woman to hold such a post of honour
and responsibility.
From this moment Bellechasse became a regular academy. In addition to
the three princes, the Duke de Valois (afterwards Louis Philippe, King
of the French), the Duke de Montpensier, the small Duke de Beaujolais,
and their sister Mlle. d’Orléans (afterwards known to history as Madame
Adélaïde), the Countess had also, under her care her nephew, César de
Crest, her niece, Henrietta de Sercey, and the two mysterious little
girls, Pamela and Hermione. Of Hermione’s parentage nothing is known;
but she was thought by some people to be a sister of Pamela.
The education given by Madame de Genlis in this academy has been
chronicled by her in considerable detail in her _Mèmoires_, and in her
celebrated pedagogical novel, _Adèle et Théodore_, and its spirit very
finely analysed by her latest biographer, Jean Harmand. M. Harmand
traces the main body of her educational doctrines to the great
educationists of the seventeenth century, Fénélon and Madame de
Maintenon, but finds them profoundly modified by the influence of
Rousseau.
In order to have a free hand to carry them out Madame de Genlis got rid
of the Princes’ tutor, M. de Bonnard, and substituted M. Lebrun, a
former secretary of her husband. Their second master, M. l’Abbé Guyot,
was allowed to remain, though he and the Countess were anything but
kindred spirits.
The princes lived at the _Palais Royal_ and came to Bellechasse every
day at eleven. In the earlier portion of the day they had their
religious instruction, and their Latin Course from the Abbé, and M.
Lebrun was asked to keep a record of each morning’s work for the
“Governor’s” information. The rest of the day Madame herself took
charge, the masters being merely expected to dine with their pupils at
two, and after supper at nine, to escort them back to the _Palais
Royal_.
The Countess, according to herself, had her work cut out for her to
correct the defects of the little boys’ previous education. They knew
nothing at all, and the eldest, in particular, was wanting in
application to an unheard-of degree. Their new teacher began by reading
history for them. “M. le duc de Valois paid no attention, yawned,
stretched himself and finally lay back on the sofa with his heels on the
table.” The Countess put him “in penance” immediately. But the good
sense of the little boy, which even at that period of his development,
was easily appealed to, made him take it in good part. He was very much
addicted to slang, and had some very peculiar foibles: he was in terror
of dogs, and could not endure the smell of vinegar. The Countess
succeeded in ridding him of these peculiarities.
Modern languages, taught on the direct method, were a strong point in
the Bellechasse system. There was a German Valet de Chambre to speak
German to the children; an Italian to speak Italian; an Englishman to
help them to a conversational knowledge of English. It was ostensibly to
speak English with Mademoiselle that Pamela, as we have seen, was added
to the establishment.
The children’s father, who spared no money to carry out the “Governor’s”
ideas, bought for them a country place, Saint Leu, and there they passed
the summer each year. In the beautiful park the Countess had assigned to
each the ground for a little garden, which they dug and planted for
themselves—with the help of a German gardener, who gave his gardening
instruction in German. During their afternoon walks nothing was spoken
but English, and this was the language of the dinner table. At supper
Italian was spoken.
A clever chemist and a good botanist, M. Alyon, was also engaged for
Bellechasse. He accompanied the children on their walks, and gave them
practical lessons in botany while under his direction they gathered the
wayside flowers and plants. He gave them a course of Chemistry every
summer at which the Countess delighted to assist.
For their training in the fine arts a Pole, named Merys, was employed,
and under his presidency an “Academy” of industrious little artists met
every evening in the Salon. At the request of the Countess, M. Merys
painted a series of slides for an educational magic lantern. Each series
furnished illustrations for a lecture on Scripture History, Ancient
History, Roman History, and the History of China and Japan—and the
youngsters took turns, once a week, in showing the magic lantern and
giving a little lecture with the aid of it. Can anything be more modern
and up-to-date?
In order to teach her pupils geography, Madame de Genlis invented for
them a game in which they took the keenest delight. She made them
dramatise, and act, all the celebrated voyages of discovery. Everybody
in the establishment had a share in these representations. They used
wooden horses for cavalcades, the river in the park stood for the sea
and a fleet of pretty little boats took the place of ships. Their
theatrical wardrobe was as complete as possible. The “voyages” they
staged with the greatest success were those of Vasco da Gama, and
Snelgrave. They had, moreover, a moveable theatre which was first housed
in the large dining room, and on which they staged historical
_tableaux_. M. Merys grouped the actors behind the curtains, and the
spectators guessed what each _tableau_ represented. A dozen _tableaux_
were thus often staged in the course of one evening. The great painter,
David, took the greatest delight in this amusement, and often grouped
the little actors. After some time the Countess had a regular theatre
built at Saint Leu and here all her own pieces were staged—as well as a
series of _tableaux vivants_. One of these represented Psyche persecuted
by Venus, and the _rôles_ were taken by Caroline and Pulchérie de Genlis
and Pamela—a ravishing little god of love. No wonder David in his
enthusiasm pronounced the picture “le perfection du beau idéal.”
There were many who thought that the theatre played too great a _rôle_
in the system of Bellechasse, and that the education given to the
children was too theatrical. The Marquise de Laroche-Jaquelin relates in
her Memoirs how, being taken one day, as a little girl, by her
grandmother, for a private view of the new pictures in the Louvre, she
saw there Madame de Genlis with all her _élèves_. The Marquise’s
grandmother and the Countess were old friends, and their delight at
meeting each other was mutual—and the little girl who had read so many
of the Countess’s books for children, and acted in so many of her pieces
was enchanted to see the author of them in the flesh. She thought the
little princes, who were all dressed in the English fashion, with their
hair in ringlets and unpowdered, very odd looking. While the royal
children were viewing the pictures Madame de Genlis presented to her old
friend her daughter Pulchérie—but said nothing of an exquisite looking
little girl of about seven years, who was on her other side, until her
friend enquired who she was. “Ah!” replied Madame de Genlis in a low
tone, “it is a very touching and interesting story—which I must reserve
for another occasion.” Then turning to the little girl she said,
“Pamela, act Héloise.” Immediately Pamela took out her comb; her fine
hair, without powder, fell in disorder upon her shoulders. She threw
herself to the ground on her knees, raised her eyes to Heaven, as also
one of her arms, and her whole figure expressed an ecstasy of passion.”
For days afterwards the Marquise’s grandmother entertained her friends
with a humorous account of Madame de Genlis, and the sort of education
she was giving her pupils.
Nevertheless, it is doubtful if any of those who made a joke of the
Countess’s system, had an idea of how eminently practical it was in
certain respects. During the winter season, which was passed at Paris,
she aimed at utilising for her pupils every moment of their time—above
all, that devoted to recreation. She had got a lathe installed in one of
the ante-chambers, and at recreation time all her pupils, as well as
herself, learned to turn it. She had them taught all the handicrafts
that did not require much bodily force: leather-work, basket-making, the
manufacture of bootlaces, ribbons, gauze, cardboard boxes, raised maps,
artificial flowers, wire-netting, marbled paper, gilding, all sorts of
hair work that it is possible to imagine, even to the making of wigs.
The boys in addition were taught carpentry—and they succeeded so well in
this that the two elder, quite unassisted, made a large wardrobe and a
table with drawers in it for a poor woman of St. Leu in whom they were
interested, and these articles are said to have been as well made as if
they had come from the workshop of a first-class joiner. All their
play-things had an educational scope—and all their walks and excursions
had a similar end in view. At Paris they only went out to see the
picture galleries (it was in one of these expeditions the future
Marquise de Laroche-Jaquelin encountered them) or museums. They visited
workshops and saw the various manufactures of Paris in different stages
of their production. Previous to these excursions they read together the
article in the _Encyclopedia_ dealing with the particular manufacture
they were going to inspect.
For the “_corpus sanum_” in which she wished the “_mens sana_” of each
pupil to develop, Madame de Genlis had invented a whole system of
gymnastics, which demanded an elaborate installation of pulleys,
horizontal bars, etc. In addition she made her pupils walk with weighted
shoes; carry graduated loads on their backs, or heads, or in their arms,
etc. In addition dancing was taught with the greatest care, and the
famous _danseur_ of the Opera, d’Auberval, gave lessons to Mademoiselle,
Pamela and Henrietta—whose dancing was something exquisite. They were
also taught riding and swimming, and Madame, herself, one of the finest
performers of her time, taught them the harp.
At a certain hour every evening the children assembled for their reading
lesson. Each pupil read aloud for a quarter of an hour, Madame
correcting their pronunciation when necessary, and making suitable
comments on the subject matter which was always of an improving nature.
At the end of the lesson the Countess read aloud for a few minutes
herself, just to give the correct model.
When the children were a little older their “Governor” hired a box at
the theatre for them, and thither they went about once a week to see the
masterpieces of the French stage played by the greatest actors of the
age.
Every Saturday the Princes and their sister held a reception at
Bellechasse, so as to form them early to habits of polite conversation.
At the end of her account of her “academy,” Madame de Genlis sketches a
series of portraits of her _élèves_. We are only interested in that of
Pamela: “Pamela was loveliness itself; candour and sensibility were the
chief traits of her character. She never told a falsehood, or employed
the slightest deceit. She was a fascinating talker. Her chief fault was
want of application. She had a very bad memory, and was thoughtless and
impulsive. In person she was very active and light of foot. She ran like
a wood nymph.”
* * * * *
It was part of the system of Bellechasse to interest its pupils in the
great currents of thought which agitated the day. As early as 1786 the
Countess had shown the popular and democratic direction she gave to the
education of the princes of Orleans when the young Duke of Chartres,
acting under her influence, destroyed the famous iron cage of Saint
Michel.
When the States General met in May, 1789, Madame de Genlis threw open
the salon of Bellechasse to some of the more noted deputies. Among the
names of its _habitués_ figure Barère and Brissot, Pétion, Tallyrand,
Alexandre Lameth, and even Volney, Barneve, Alguié, the painter
David—and Camille Desmoulins.
The outbreak of the Revolution found the young princes and their father
on the popular side, and their choice has been traced to the influence
of Madame de Genlis.
We get brief but very vivid glimpses of Pamela amid the gossip,
enshrined in contemporary memoirs, which the Countess’s political action
inspired. When the Duke of Orleans settled an annuity on her, she is
said to have chosen Barère, then present at one of the Bellechasse
Sunday receptions, as her guardian. She was seen, a striking figure on
horseback, in riding habit and large black hat laden with black plumes,
followed by two grooms in the Orleans livery of blue and red riding up
and down between two lines of shrieking populace who proclaimed:
“there’s the queen we want.” And on the day of the fall of the Bastille
she was said to have been seen moving among the people all dressed in
red, destined to draw all eyes to her.
It seems much more probable that she assisted at this historic spectacle
with the rest of Madame de Genlis’s pupils from the terrace of the new
gardens of Beaumarchais which the latter had put at their disposition.
* * * * *
The indignation of the Duchess of Orleans at the direction given to her
children’s political education by their “Governor” led to the latter’s
dismissal in 1791. But the separation from her teacher had such a
disastrous effect on the health of Mademoiselle d’Orléans that Madame de
Genlis had to be recalled.
In October, 1791, the Countess escorted Mademoiselle to England,
accompanied by Pamela, Henriette de Sercey, and her little
grand-daughter, Eglantine de Lawoestine. During this visit the Countess
made the acquaintance of Sheridan, who had recently lost his beautiful
wife. The resemblance of Pamela to his lost love (which is said to have
later attracted Lord Edward) gained the heart of Sheridan, and he begged
for her hand. His offer, it is said was accepted, and when the Duke of
Orleans recalled his daughter to France, in order to avoid the penalties
designed for “_émigrés_,” Pamela left England as the affianced bride of
the distinguished dramatist.
But there was waiting in Paris another lover than Sheridan—and it was
he, though they had never seen each other up to this, with whom Pamela’s
lot was to be bound up.
One night at the theatre in Paris Lord Edward Fitzgerald saw in a _loge
grillée_ an exquisite looking girl. He made inquiries, and having
learned her identity, had himself presented to Madame de Genlis and her
beautiful charge. The following day Madame de Genlis and Pamela, acting
on the instructions of the Duke of Orleans, set out for Flanders, with
Mademoiselle d’Orléans. They were followed by that ardent and impetuous
wooer, Lord Edward Fitzgerald.
At Tournay Lord Edward made formal proposals for Pamela’s hand, and his
suit was accepted, on the condition of him receiving his family’s
consent to the marriage.
This consent the Duchess of Leinster, wise mother that she was, gave
very readily, and within a fortnight, Lord Edward was back in London
with his bride.
The “good family” gave the warmest of welcomes to its new member. The
diary of Lady Sophia Fitzgerald records the impression made on them by
“Eddy’s dear little wife.” “We all took a prodigious fancy to her, and I
do hope and trust Dearest Edward has met with a woman that will fix him
at last, and likely to make him happy the remainder of his life. Besides
being very handsome she is uncommonly sensible and agreeable, very
pretty, with the most engaging pleasing manner I ever saw, and very much
accomplished. They spent a fortnight with us in London before they went
to Ireland where they are now.” Lady Sarah Napier, who was to be
Pamela’s true friend to the end, fell in love with her at first sight.
“I never saw,” she wrote to Lady Susan O’Brien, “such a sweet little,
engaging, bewitching creature as Ly. Edward is, and childish to a degree
with the greatest sense. The upper part of her face is like poor Mrs.
Sheridan, the lower part like my beloved child Louise; of course I am
disposed to dote upon her. I am _sure_ she is not _vile Egalité’s_
child; it is impossible.”
That letter of Lady Sarah’s is dated from Celbridge, February, 1793, and
showed that by that time Pamela and her husband had arrived in Ireland.
Into the gay social round of the Irish capital, the beautiful French
girl entered _con brio_. “Dublin has been very gay,” Lord Edward writes
to his mother in April, 1793, “a great number of balls, of which the
lady misses none. Dancing is a great passion with her; I wish you could
see her dance, you would delight in it, she dances so with all her heart
and soul. Everybody seems to like her, and behave civilly and kindly to
her. There was a kind of something about visiting with Lady Leitrim, but
it is all over now. We dined there on Sunday, and she was quite
pleasant, and Pamela likes her very much.”
Unfortunately for Pamela’s happiness, her husband was wrong in thinking
everybody seemed to like her. The ladies of the Ascendancy party hated
her with all their hearts, and behaved with inconceivable rudeness to
her. Her husband, ever since his return from Paris (whence the stories
of his “revolutionary” doings had preceded him), had been a marked man
for the “Old Gang,” and his bride’s supposed relationship to Egalité
(who had recently been guilty of the infamy of voting for Louis XVI’s
death) was not calculated to re-establish him with them. The vilest
stories were set in circulation about poor Pamela. One lady is supposed
to have seen her in the streets of Dublin “with a handkerchief on her
neck spotted with Louis XVI’s blood; that some of her friends had sent
from Paris.” When everybody else was in mourning for Louis, she is said
to have worn red ribbons “which she said were _couleur du sang des
Aristocrats_.”
On one occasion the whim took her to go to a ball, dressed all in black
with nothing to relieve the sombre effect, except the pink upon her
head. The _Doblin Lidies_, according to her sister-in-law, Lady Lucy,
“stared her out of countenance” and sent her home in a rage to Eddy.
Her sisters-in-law, and specially Lady Sophia, were quick to see that it
was jealousy of Pamela’s beauty and charm, her exquisite dancing, her
French toilettes, her husband’s undisguised admiration—far more than
their hatred of her and Lord Edward’s politics which made Dublin society
so hostile to her. Other sections of Irish society worshipped her. We
have a pretty picture of Lord Edward and her driving in a very high
phaeton one day through College Green and Dame Street, amid the
enthusiastic cheers of the multitude, who were raised to congenial
heights of enthusiasm as much by her beauty as Lord Edward’s conspicuous
green neck-cloth. Lord Edward’s boyish delight at the reception accorded
them, and the impression produced by his bride’s beauty, was very
delightful to witness.
Nor was it the populace alone whom Pamela won by her beauty. Lord
Charlemont, whose authority in all matters of taste was regarded as
second to none in Europe, was charmed by her. Jepham was with him one
day in 1793 in Charlemont house, when Pamela and Lord Edward came to
view its treasures, and he wrote to his uncle describing the visit. “She
is elegant and engaging in the highest degree, and showed the most
judicious taste in her remarks about the library and curiosities. The
Dublin ladies wish to put her down. She promised Lord Charlemont with
great good humour to assist him in keeping her husband in order.... She
was dressed in a plain riding habit, and they came to the door in a
curricle.”[82]
Footnote 82:
Moore tells us that Lord Edward first introduced this style of vehicle
into Ireland.
The attitude of the women of her class whom she met in society, probably
spoiled her party-going for her, and doubtless she was eager enough,
before long, to share with her husband the quiet country life, which he
loved so well. After a few months in the Duchess of Leinster’s charming
seaside residence, Frescati, Blackrock (where Pamela had plenty of
opportunity, in conjunction with the enthusiastic gardener, who was her
husband, to put into practice the gardening lore she had acquired at
Saint Leu) the young couple settled in a lodge belonging to Mr. Connolly
(husband of Lady Louisa Connolly, Lord Edward’s aunt), in Kildare. Lord
Edward has left in a letter to his mother, dated June 23rd, 1794, a
charming description of the place, which was to be the setting for their
lives during the short years that were destined for them to spend
together. In that little cottage a good deal of Irish history was to be
made in the short space of four years. Let us then look in it as Lord
Edward has painted it for us—for, alas! no trace of it now remains.
“After going up a little lane, and in at a close gate, you come on a
little white house, with a small gravel court before it. You see but
three small windows, the court surrounded by large old elms; one side of
the house covered with shrubs, on the other side a tolerable large ash;
upon the stairs going up to the house, two wicker cages, in which there
are at this moment two thrushes, singing _à gorge déployée_. In coming
into the house you find a small passage-hall very clean, the floor
tiled; upon your left a small room; on the right, the staircase. In
front you come into the parlour, a good room, with a bay window looking
into the garden, which is a small green plot, surrounded by good trees,
and in it three of the finest thorns I ever saw, and all the trees so
placed that you may shade yourself from the sun all hours of the day;
the bay window covered with honeysuckle, and up to the window some
roses.
“Going upstairs you find another bay-room, the honeysuckle almost up to
it, and a little room the same size as that below; this, with a kitchen
or servants’ hall below, is the whole house. There is, on the left, in
the courtyard another building which makes a kitchen; it is covered by
trees, so as to look pretty; at the back of it there is a yard, which
looks into a lane. On the side of the house opposite the grass-plot,
there is ground enough for a flower-garden, communicating with the front
garden by a little walk.
“The whole place is situated in a kind of rampart, of a circular form
surrounded by a wall; which wall, towards the village, and lane is high,
but covered with trees and shrubs—the trees old and large, giving a
great deal of shade. Towards the country the wall is not higher than
your knee, and this covered with bushes; from these open parts you have
a view of a pretty cultivated country, till your eye is stopped by the
Curragh. From our place there is a back way to these fields, so as to go
out and walk without having to do with the town.
“This, dearest mother, is the spot as well as I can give it to you, but
it don’t describe well; one must see it and feel it; it is all the
little peeps and ideas that go with it that make the beauty of it to me.
My dear wife dotes on it, and becomes it. She is busy in her little
American jacket, planting sweet peas and mignonette. Her table and
workbox, with the little one’s caps, are on the table. I wish my dearest
mother was here, and the scene to me would be complete.”