The French Connection- Pascalina Plantation founded in 1835 by Nova Scotian Elizabeth McKlintock Pascalis

The Pascalis family was a talented group. The man who was to lay out the city of Aiken, Cyril Pascalis, had a sister Francesca Anna Pascalis Canfield who was a poet, born in Philadelphia, who moved with her parents to New York City as a child. The family is in the 1810 census in Philadelphia. Francesca died in the sping of 1833 in New York. Her father Dr. Felix Alex Pascalis-Ouviere died July 1933 and Francesca's husband Palmer Canfield died that fall. By 1835 Francesca's mother Elizabeth Harris McKlintock Pascalis had moved to SC with her orphaned granddaughters, Theodocia and Felicia Canfield, to be with her son Cyril who was laying out the RR in Aiken, along with his friend Andrew Dexter. The plantation house was built at was was called Johnson's Turnout at some point in time. But it was in Barnwell County till 1871. Later the house was considered to be in Windsor, Aiken County.

There is probably a French connection between the founder of The Vale in Montmorenci and  Dr. Felix Pascalis, Elizabeth's husband, born French.
From a brochure about Aiken-
http://www.aikencountysc.gov/tourism/otherareas.htm
James Achille de Caradueuc surveyed the railroad route
while Cyril Pascalis and Andrew Dexter designed the
nearby city streets of Aiken. Pascalis built a home for his
mother and sisters’ children at Johnson’s Turnout in 1832.
The home was Union headquarters during the Battle of
Aiken. By 1853, James Achille de Caradeuc owned over
800 acres in “Conway’s Valley”. He renamed the estate
“Vale on Mont Morency”, as it reminded him of the French
countryside where he lived after his parents’ death. He 
produced wine for years in the area of Polecat Pond. The
Civil War claimed his two sons and he gave up the wine 
business. He became engineer-in-chief and land agent for 
the South Carolina Railroad until his death in 1895.

Elizabeth McKlintock was the daughter of Susanna Harris b between 1730 and 1741 and Mathew McKlintock.   Susanna married between 1745 and 1758. On 4 March 1778 Mathew bought part of the property of Capt. Thomas Harris in Juniata County, PA. (Stewart, p. 101) They had daughter Elizabeth Harris McKlintock who is mentioned in the will of her aunt, Dolly Harris Turbett.  Susanna's parents were William Harris and Elizabeth Glen whose children seem to have been born in Pennsylvania. How Susannah ended up in Nova Scotia to have Elizabeth I dont know but perhaps they went there for a holiday. Elizabeth Harris McClintock was born 1782 in Nova Scotia and later lived in Philadelphia, PA. She died 16 Aug 1864 in Aiken, SC. Elizabeth married 1801 in Philadelphia, PA to the much older and well regarded writer and researcher, Felix Alex Ouviere Pascalis born 1759 in France and who died 20 Jul 1833 in New York, New York

Two children from her marriage:
A. Cyril Ouviere Pascalis was born 1810 in Philadelphia, PA, graduate of Harvard, built his home at Johnsons Turnout (outside of now Aiken) in 1832, designed Aiken 1834, joined by his mother and 2 neices in 1835.  Death 1836 on the Mississippi River unmarried and no issue
B. Francesca Anna Pascalis was born August 1803 Philadelphia, PA and died 28 May 1833 New York, NY. She married the older Palmer Canfield who was born 1791and died 17 Sept 1833 a few months later than she.

Cyril was a civil engineer and was the resident engineer on the Charleston Hamburg Railroad which was the longest railroad in the world when completed in 1833. Cyril also laid out the town of Aiken. Some time later Cyril returned north to settle some of his father and sister’s investments. On his return South, he decided to make a detour west. While on a steamboat traveling on the Mississippi River, he disappeared. For months Cyril’s fate was undetermined, but then some of his possessions were found and a man confessed to the murder. A marker for Cyril is beside his mother, buried at Saint Thaddeus Cemetery in Aiken, South Carolina.  At that time the cemetery may have been on the Edgefield side of the line with Barnwell Co.. The line being drawn down Whiskey right on to Silver Bluff to the Savannah River. But not sure if that.


“At the request of Major Alex Black Ag’t of the S. Carolina Canal & Rail Road Company we have surveyed and laid off 27 Squares or Blocks in the Town of Aiken bounded on the North by Edgefield St., on the East by Williams St., on the South by Rail Road Avenue and on the West by Newberry St, as in the above plat represented – This 19th September 1834.”
(signed) Cyril O. Pascalis
(signed) Andrew Alfred Dexter

Pascalis Plantation / Pascalina

By Mike Stroud, July 2008 1. Pascalis Plantation Marker Inscription. Pascalis Plantation Elizabeth Pascalis purchased these 790 acres in 1835, settled here with her son Cyril Ouviere, and brought the orphaned children of her poet daughter, Francesca Canfield here, to live. Cyril, a civil engineer, was a resident engineer constructing the Charleston-Hamburg railroad (world’s longest when completed in 1833). In 1834 he helped lay out and survey streets in nearby Aiken. Pascalina Elizabeth Pascalis, born in Philadlephia and widow of the brilliant Dr. Felix Pascalis-Ouviere, MD, willed this house, once know as Pascalina, to her granddaughter, Theodosia Canfield, and husband John C. Wade, in 1863. The Wades were living here in February of 1865 when Union general Hugh Judson Kilpatrick used the house as headquarters during the Battle of Aiken. Theodosia's mother was a young poet Francesca Canfield. The house remained in the family until 1944.

The following article is from a book, but the death date for Anna Francesca Pascalis Canfield is wrong and put at 1823 instead of 28 May 1833 (1823 was 2 years before she married)- death notice 1833 appeared as Mrs. Frances Anna Canfield in the New York Post, "wife of Palmer Canfield (married Nov 9, 1825), of 78 Cedar St.."  Not only did she have at least 2 children, but she published poems and helped her husband in a business and all of that could not have been done by age 20. She had consumption for 10 years from 1823 to 1833 and died 28 May 1833. Her father died according to the New York Evening Post 20 July 1833, perhaps of grief, at 78 Cedar St.. Cyril her brother was working on the plan for Aiken and the railroad from Charleston to Aiken and urged his mother to join him in the good climate of Aiken where they built a house. Cyril moved south later for awhile..

FRANCESCA CANFIELD (FRANCESCA ANNA PASCALIS) a daughter of Dr Felix A. Pascalis -b 1762 New Orleans or France- died July 1833 at 78 Cedar St,  but had an office at 71 Liberty St NY,NY-New York, Death Newspaper Extracts, 1801-1890  (Barber Collection- Felix Alex Cuviere Pascalis MD Publication: 22 Jul 1833) an Italian physician and scholar who had married a  native of Philadelphia (Elizabeth) and resided several years in Philadelphia. Francesca was born in August 1803 in Philadelphia. In 1810 NY NY her father had a boy and a girl under 10. In 1827

Annals of the Lyceum of Natural History of New York, Band 2   mentions that Dr Mitchell and Cyril Pascalis excavate the Delaware and Chesapeake Canals to find Ammonite.http://books.google.de/books?id=CJPOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA273&lpg=PA273&dq=Cyril+Pascalis&source=bl&ots=MkPHqkMZ8R&sig=oNfdwdGpHmM26UQ-0dwBH7mxFRs&hl=de&sa=X&ei=TpTtT6GxI47jtQa_p7X2Dg&sqi=2&ved=0CE4Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=Cyril%20Pascalis&f=false

While she was a child her parents removed to New York where Dr Pascalis was conspicuous  not only for his professional abilities but for his writings upon various curious and abstruse subjects in the medical field and philosophy  and was intimate with many eminent persons among whom was Dr Samuel L Mitchill who was so pleased with Francesca that in 1815, when she was in the twelfth year of her age, he addressed to her the following playful and characteristic Valentine -

Descending snows the earth o'erspread Keen blows the northern blast
Condensing clouds scowl over head
The tempest gathers fast
But soon the icy mass shall melt
The winter end his reign
The sun's reviving warmth be felt
And nature smile again.
The plants from torpid sleep shall wake
And nursed by vernal showers.
Their yearly exhibition make
Of foliage and of flowers
So you an opening bud appear
Whose bloom and verdure shoot
To load Francesca's growing year
With intellectual fruit
The feathered tribes shall flit along
And thicken on the trees
Till air shall undulate with song
Till music stir the breeze
Thus like a charming bird your lay
The listening ear shall greet.
And render social cireles gay
Or make retirement sweet
Then warblers chirp and roses open
To entertain my fair
Till nobler themes engage her hope
And occupy her care 

In school Miss Pascalis was particularly distinguished for the facility with which she acquired languages. At an early period she translated with ease and elegance from the French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese and her instinctive appreciation of the harmonies of her native tongue was so delicate that her English compositions in both prose and verse were singularly musical as well as expressive and correct. The version of a French song Quand reverrai je en un jour ete is among the memorials of her fourteenth year and though much less compact than the original it is interesting as an illustration ol her own fine and precocious powers. While yet at school Miss Pascalis translated for a friend a volume from Lavater and soon afterward she made a beautiful English version of the Roman Nights from Le Notti Romane al Sepolcro Dei Scipioni of Ales sandroVerri.  She also translated The Solitary and The Vine Dresser from the French and wrote some original poems in Italian which were much praised by judicious crities.

She was a frequent contributor under various signatures to the literary journals and among her pieces for this period that are preserved in Mr Knapp's biography is an address to her friend Mitchill which purported to be from Le Brun. A marriage of convenience was arranged for Miss Pascalis with Mr Canfield a broker who after a few months became a bankrupt and could never retrieve his fortunes. She bore her disappointments without complaining and when her husband established a financial and commereial gazette she labored industriously to make it attractive by literature but there was a poor opportunity among tables of currency and trade for the display of her graceful abilities and her writings probably attracted little attention.

She was a good pianist and she painted with such skill that some of her copies of old masters deceived clever artists. Her accomplishments however failed to invest with happiness a life of which the ambitious flowers had been so early blighted and yielding to consumption which can scareely enter the home of a cheerful spirit she died on the 28th of May 1823 before completing the twentieth year of her age. [sic- 28 May 1833 before age 30]. Dr Pascalis whose chief hopes were centred in his daughter abandoned his pursuits  and after lingering through ten disconsolate years died in the summer of 1833. The death of her husband [Palmer Canfield on 17 Sep 1833] in the following autumn prevented the publication of an edition of her works which he had prepared for that purpose. 

above from_

The female poets of America By Rufus Wilmot Griswold



REFERENCE: Cyril Obierre Shuler, From Mayflower to Pole Cat Pond, S.C .: A Family History Which Includes the Cushman, Lemar, Martin, Pascalis, Shuler, Wade and Woodward Families (Clemson, S.C.: the author, 1997), p. 10 7, 301.

========================================

Elizabeth H. Pascalis, native of Philadlephia but born in Nova Scotia, was born Elizabeth Harris McClintock. She was the widow of Dr. Felix Alex Pascalis-Ouviere MD, writer, researcher, scholar and silk culturist. After the death of her daughter in 25 May 1833, her husband 20 July 1833 and her son in law 17 Sept 1833, she purchased these 790 acres in 1835, settling here with her son Cyril Ouviere Pascalis, and brought the orphaned children of her daughter, the poetess Anna Francesca who married Palmer Canfield on 9 November 1825, to the newly laid out town of Aiken SC from New York City to live. Dr. Felix Pascalis' son Cyril, a civil engineer graduate of Harvard at a young age, was a resident engineer constructing the Charleston-Hamburg railroad (world’s longest when completed in 1833). In 1834 Cyrus helped lay out and survey streets in nearby Aiken. His father Dr Pascalis was a well known contemporary of Dr Benjamin Rush of Philadlephia and corresponded about the 1797 epedemic. Dr. Pascalis also corresponded briefly with Thomas Jefferson.

Folder 49

11 May 1824 ALS Samuel L. Mitchell and Felix Pascalis, New York, to Thomas Jefferson. Write as members of the Linneau Society of Paris, and invite

Jefferson to be present at the anniversary of their “titular sage.” (2 pages)

Folder 50

17 May 1824 ALS Thomas Jefferson [initials only], Monticello, to Dr. Samuel Mitchell and Dr. Felix Pascalis. Thanks them for their invitation, and

believes that he will soon be meeting the great Naturalist himself. (2 pages, polygraph)

Document #61
Date: 16 August 1806
Reel #: 27
Film Counter: 396-397
LWS #: 1273
To: Dr. Felix Pascalis
From: Thomas Jefferson
Location: New York
Number of Pages: 2
Type of Manuscript: handwritten by Jefferson
Content:
– No signature on letter
– Mentions Dr. Paschalis and Jefferson in 3rd person several times
– Jefferson returns the subscription paper to Dr. Paschalis
– Feels the doctrine that the doctor proposes is founded 'in fact' and would be of interest to American Commerce

Pascalina
Dr. Felix Pascalis' widow Elizabeth H. Pascalis willed this house, once know as Pascalina, to her granddaughter, Theodosia Wade, and husband John C. Wade, in 1863.

1850: Barnwell, South Carolina (now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -Aiken Co formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
W D Wade           50
Temperance Wade 45
Robert Wade       22
John Wade          20 married Theodosia Canfield
Hampton Wade   18
Martha Wade      13
Richard Wade     10
Laura Wade        12
Wm Wade           7
Louisana Wade    5
Washington Wade 3

1850: Barnwell, South Carolina
(now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
(Adaline Wade 18 is next door with married May Wilson 23)
Eliza Paschallas   70 SC (actually born PA)
Felicia Paschallas 18 SC  (Canfiled born NY)
Thoodise Paschallas 25 SC    " (Canfield b 29 Sept 1826 in New York buried Bethany
Cem Aiken SC)

1850: Barnwell, South Carolina
This is a private school-  (now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -Aiken Co formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
Julia Dupree 50 scholarship
Henry Bonsteine 45
Sarah Hudson 40
Lina Whiskeynaure 21
Felicia Camfield 18
Henrietta Harden 14
Cynthia Prichard  16
Ann Duncan          12
Ann Sartigue         10
Fanny Sartigue      8

1860: Barnwell, South Carolina  (now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
Post Office: Aiken
E H Pascallis       78 Nova Scotia $5500 $1260

1860 Barnwell SC  (now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
PO Woodwards
J C Wade           27 SC
Theadotia Wade 31 SC (born NY)
John Wade  7 SC
Louisa Wade 5
Francisco Wade 3 (named after her grandmother Francesca Pascalis)
Hemans Wade 1      (Felicia Hemans Wade b 7 FEB 1859, named after her aunt Felicia Canfield)

1880: Windsor, Aiken, South Carolina  (now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
J. C. Wade          50 Farmer SC SC SC
Theodosia Wade 53 NY NY NY  (the only time she gives a correct birth state)
Fannie Wade       22 SC
Edward M. Wade 19 SC
Jas. M. Wade       17 SC
Florence Wade     14 SC     

1900: Windsor, Aiken, South Carolina  (now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
Birth Date: Aug 1828
Marriage Year: 1852
years Married: 48
John C Wade 71 SC SC SC
Theodsia Wade 72
Fanny Wade 42 dau
Edward Shuler 14 grandson
John Shuler 12 grandson     

1910: Windsor, Aiken, South Carolina  (now on rt 302 in Aiken,SC -formed 1871 out of Barnwell, Edgefield, Lexington and Orangeburg counties)
Marital Status: Widowed
J C Wade    85
John E Shuler 22

( see 2006 clip of article below) It mentions the daughter of John Martin Hitt who was born 29 AUG 1880 at Aiken Co., South Carolina Death: 12 AUG 1925 in Aiken Co., South Carolina- Ola Ruth Hitt b: 18 APR 1910 in Martinez, Columbia Co., Georgia

Aiken resident Ola Hitt, 95, who lived in the house during the 1920s, said she and her four siblings picked cotton in nearby fields and waved to the conductors of trains that passed on the tracks..... Cyril Pascalis moved into the home with his mother, Elizabeth, who purchased the 790-acre property in 1835, and came to live with the (just) orphaned children of his sister, Francesca (Pascalis) Canfield.    Mrs. Eliza (Elizabeth) Pascalis willed the house to her granddaughter Theodosia Wade and her husband, John Calhoun Wade (b 1827), in 1863. In 1865, Union Gen. Hugh Judson Kilpatrick used the house as his headquarters during the Battle of Aiken. Ms. Hitt, who is Mrs. Wade's granddaughter, said her grandmother hid the family valuables in the woods before the Union soldiers arrived. "My grandmother (sic- she may mean great grandmother) took off her ring and tied it in a handkerchief and buried it by the trunk of the trees," Ms. Hitt said. She said the Union soldiers tied their horses to the trees and "they pawed it up." The ring was lost for two decades, she said, until her grandmother found it while she was working in the garden 20 years to the day after she had hidden it."

Augusta Chronicle Article 2
Augusta Chronicle article 3

Another reference -
REFERENCE: Cyril Obierre Shuler, From Mayflower to Pole Cat Pond, S.C.: A Family History Which Includes the Cushman, Lemar, Martin, Pascalis, Shuler, Wade and Woodward Families (Clemson, S.C.: the author, 1997), p. 107, 301.

Her is another account of  Francesca's life, again with the death date wrong and put before the birth of her children:

http://www.archive.org/stream/femalebiographyc01knap/femalebiographyc01knap_djvu.txt

Francisca Anna Pascalis Canfield, was born in Phila- 
delphia, in August 1803. She was the daughter of Felix 
Pascalis, M. D., distinguished in the medical and philosophical 
world, for his numerous dissertations on abstruse subjects, for 
his practice in the yellow fever, and other extraordinary disor- 
ders, and as a political economist, who has made great exer- 
tions in introducing into the United States, the Chinese mulberry 
tree, in order to encourage the making of silk in this country. Her 
parents resided for some years after their marriage in Philadel- 
phia, of which place her mother was a native, and afterwards 
removed to New York. Miss Pascalis was remarkable for her 
intellectual acquirements, when quite a child, although she had 
not any extraordinary advantages of education. Her father was 
too busy in his professional and philosophical pursuits, to pay 
much attention to his daughter's education, and her mother went 
no farther in the course of her studies, than to see that she was 
industrious, and could give a good account of her time. When 
only ten years of age, she attracted the attention of that sagacious 
philosopher, and deep judge of human nature, Dr. Samuel L. 
Mitchill, who playfully became her Valentine, and wrote her 
the following in 1815. It clearly proves that he foresaw that 
distinction awaited his youthful friend. 

In school Miss Pascalis was at the head of her class, and 
mastered languages with such readiness, that her instructors 
often suspected her father of devoting his time in bringing her 
forward, when he hardly knew what she was studying at the 
time. She made translations from the French, Italian, Spanish, 
and Portuguese, for mere amusement, or for school exercises; 
and many of them have been preserved by her friends, and show 
unquestionable evidences of genius. She early caught the spirit 
of universal grammar, and found no difficulty in getting posses- 
sion of the beauties, and idiom of a language. Her poetical 
taste early appeared, and at a very tender age she wrote sonnets, 
criticisms, satires, hymns, and epistles to her friends in verse. 
There are many of her productions preserved, which she wrote 
between the ages of eleven and fifteen, that are excellent. The 
following translation from the French, she wrote when she was 
only thirteen; it is difficult to pour the soul of a song into a 
translation, but certainly there is much in this that might remind 
others besides soldiers of their home. 

Q,uand reverrai-je en un jour, 
Tous les objets de mon amour? 

Nos clairs ruisseaux ; 

Nos coteaux ; 

Nos hameaux ; 

Nos montagnes, 
Et I'ornement de nos campagnes 1 
La si gentille Isabeau, 
A I'ombre d'un ormeau ; 
Quand danserai-je au son du chalumeau 1 

Quand reverrai-je en un jour, 
Tous les objets de mon amour 1 

Mon pere, 

Ma mere, 

Mon frere, 

Ma SQBur, 

Mes agneaux, 

Mes troupeaux, 

Ma bergere ; 
Q,uand reverrai-je en un jour, 
Tous ces objets de mon amour 1 

(translated by request.) 

The day how blissful will it be, 
When each loved object I shall see. 
The clear and purling rill. 

The mountain top so grey. 
The verdure-covered hill, 

The distant hamlets gay. 
The glacier's summits pale, 
And my native sheltered vale, 
Of my ancestors the grave, 
Where the elm's hoar branches wave, 
To the gale. 
When to the soft breathing sound of the lute 
Shall I merrily dance with the light-bounding foot, 
Graze with delight on my Isabel's smile, 
That lightened my labor, and sweetened my toil 1 
That day how bhssful will it be, 
When each loved object I shall see. 
My father — my mother, 
My sister — my brother. 
My sheep which love the shade, 
Of the flower-cinctured glade ; 
The woodbine o'er the thatch which creeps, 
The rose which round my dwelling weeps ; 
And she, my fond and charming maid ! — 
That day with bliss shall crowned be, 
When each loved object I will see. 

Before Miss Pascalis had left school, she translated from the 
French a volume of Lavater's work for a friend, who had 
engraved the plates of the work from the original. Soon after 
this, she translated the " Solitaire," from the French, and the 
•' Roman Nights," from the Italian of Alexander Verri, and the 
" Vine Dresser," from the French, at a subsequent period. The 



112 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

English of her works are extolled as excellent. In the " Roman 
Nights," as it appears in the English dress, there is much of the 
noble flow of Tully, with the delicacy of the best Italian writers. 
A splendid Italian scholar, Dr. William Taylor, of the catholic 
church, considered Miss Pascalis' " Roman Nights," as the best 
translation he had ever read of any work from his beloved 
Italian, and was of opinion also that she was a most delightful 
poet in her own language. 

We quote the introduction of this splendid work of Verri as 
a specimen of her talent at translation. 

" On my first acquaintance with the writings of the ancients, 
my admiration became fixed by the grandeur and elevation of 
their style, and the extraordinary times which they commemo- 
rated. But gigantic Rome towered above all the other nations 
of antiquity, as superior by a heroic strength and a noble pride of 
character, as by the magnitude and extent of her conquests. 
After having been long habituated to the study and contempla- 
tion of her heroes, my infatuated mind peopled my solitary 
retirement with their society. I felt their presence in lonely 
and quiet groves, or when wandering by some meandering 
rivulet : there, beyond all intrusion on my thoughts, save the 
warbling of a bird, or the whispers of the breeze, my spirit, 
absorbed in deep meditation, seemed to forget my present being, 
and would soar away to those distant ages. This bias of my 
imagination so increased by indulgence, that at length I began 
to cherish a strange and strong desire, and secret hope, of being 
able to invoke from the dead, some of the celebrated characters 
of the once mistress of the world; to view them face to face, and 
hold communion with them. Petrarch undoubtedly felt the 
same aspiration ; for we know that he composed letters to 
Cicero, Seneca, Livy, and Varro, thus enabling himself to pass 
over the intermediary interval of ages, and establish an inter- 
course with the greatest of the ancients. The enthusiasm also 
of Pomponius Letus was a precedent for mine : deeply versed 
in the antiquities of his country, he w^as often seen standing 
motionless among ruins, bedewing them with the tears of admi- 
ration. Attracted by the same taste, and ardently desirous of 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 113 

yielding to my mind the most lively gratification of which it was 
susceptible, I left the plains of Lombardy for Rome, on which 
my fancy so continually rested. 

" Those only who have tasted the delights of classic erudition, 
can comprehend the multitude of sensations that crowd upon the 
traveller, when, from the heights of the Appenines, he sees the 
road descend before him to the Eternal City ! The eye, with 
eager curiosity, seeks for the summits of the Seven Hills ; the 
heart, still more impatient, swells with anticipation ; and every 
fragment of ruins on the road, becomes the object of learned 
conjecture and of complacent speculation, 

" When I found myself on the Flaminian Way, I thought of 
its ancient magnificent extent from Rome to Rimini, and of the 
consul from whom it derived its name, who fell in the me- 
morable battle with Hannibal, at the lake of Thrasymene. I 
was still absorbed in the reveries these thoughts induced, when 
I passed through the noble gate which terminates the Flaminian. 
Its majestic architecture seemed to continue the pleasing illusion 
with which I persuaded myself, that I was entering the marble 
city of the emperor Augustus. I will not attempt to detail all 
my feelings during the first moments of my residence at Rome, 
for there are impressions to which the most able description 
could not render justice. It were better to pass over in silence 
my overw^helming emotions at the first sight of the sacred Tiber ; 
the Egyptian obelisks ; temples still black with the smoke of 
ancient sacrifices ; the Flavian amphitheatre, resting in ruins like 
an overthrown colossus ; the columns on which the military regu- 
lations were graven ; the site of the forum ; the mausoleums ; 
ihe thermal baths; the triumphal arches; the stupendous 
remains of the circi ; and all the other monuments of Roman 
grandeur and magnificence, which command our wonder and 
admiration. 

" It was in that season of the year when the vapors of 

autumn moisten the earths after the burning heats of summer. 

The sky, where it gleamed through the piles of snowy clouds, 

was deeply blue ; the parched plants had resumed their former 

verdure, and the green turf wore the freshness of spring 

10* 



114 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

Instead of the shrill monotonous chirp of the field-cricket, the 
ear was now saluted by the musical warbling of a thousand 
birds, that wantoned on the balmy air in innocent security, 
ignorant of the snares of the fowler. At this time there was a 
rumor in Rome, that the sepulchre of the Scipios, which had 
been the object of so much useless research, was at length dis- 
covered. This interesting fact made me immediately renounce 
every other object ; for the monuments of great men penetrate 
the soul that loves the calm of reflection, with a pleasing melan- 
choly, far preferable to the exultation of gayety and the turbu- 
lence of mirth. When nio-ht came, brinsfing: the silence and 
obscurity favorable to my design, I repaired to the spot, which 
was marked by a rustic hovel ; thence a narrow and irregular 
excavation leads to the catacombs. Through this steep and 
rocky passage, I entered the tomb of the valiant race of the 
Scipios. The remains of some of them had been disinterred 
from the earth and ruins, under which others were still buried. 
I approached them, carrying a flambeau to guide my steps ; and 
by its glimmering light I perceived the mouldering remains 
mingled together among the stones and the loose earth. Slowly 
moving my torch around me, I marked with dissatisfaction 
and pain the inroads of the spade on these spoils of the grave, 
worthy of being enshrined in sarcophagi of alabaster, but now 
become toys for the vulgar curious, and the sport of the populace. "" 
But learned travellers, attracted to Rome from all parts of the 
globe, by an enlightened taste for antiquity, had been willing to 
express a due veneration for these precious relics ; and had 
hastened to gather and transfer some to distant cabinets as 
pledges of their respect to the memory of the Scipios. Even 
foreign ladies of rank, on hearing of this discovery, had fear- 
lessly exposed their delicate feet to the rugged soil of the cavern; 
and had touched with their fair and soft hands these crumbling 
bones, sad evidences of human caducity. As for me, I could 
not avoid feeling a shudder of reluctance to tread under foot 
the remains of that race of heroes ; and as I walked, to crush 
perhaps the head or the arm of one of those triumphant sons 
of victory. 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 115 

" These venerable tombs bear in their simplicity the stamp of 
those better days of the republic, when the Romans sought not 
to distinguish themselves by vain magnificence, but by the splen- 
dor of their virtues. They are built only of coarse stone, rough 
hewn ; and the names and actions of the dead are traced simply 
in red ochre, fortunately yet uninjured. The monumental 
inscriptions are in the ancient Latin tongue, and modestl}^ record, 
in a concise style, the famous actions of those deposited within 
them. The pyramid of Caius Cestius still stands, I said, as I 
gazed around me, though his fame is so obscure that scarce 
a trace of it is found in history. Thus his pompous tomb has 
transmitted, from age to age, a name unaccompanied with any 
title to glorious distinction ; while, by the vicissitude of events, 
these ashes are disturbed, which for so many centuries have 
been buried from human eye. While my mind was immersed 
in reflections of this nature, the night breeze suddenly rushed 
through the mouth of the cavern, and in a moment my torch 
was extinguished. This accident was not unpleasing ; by shut- 
ting out all visible images it seemed to lend new vigor to my 
soul, more deeply devoted to contemplation in the midst of total 
darkness. The gloomy domains of death seemed to open before 
me, and again I was seized with the desire of communing with 
their pale inhabitants Suddenly, I heard a plaintive mur- 
muring of inarticulate sounds, slowly extending and increasing; 
it resembled the noise of the winds roaring through ravines. 
The earth shook under my feet; and my ears rung as with the 
hum of bees. The bones of the dead striking against the sides 
of the tombs, rattled like the crashing of dry branches. The 
tablets of the sepulchres seemed to be slightly raised, and then 
to fall back to their places ; at least such a sound caught my 
attention in that obscurity. I confess that human fears then pre- 
vailed over noble desires, and a cold chill froze the current in 
my veins. There are none but would have shared my awe ; 
none who would not have trembled at a trial so far above the 
ordinary strength of human nature. By degrees the air became 
calm, the earth grew firm beneath me, and at intervals a phos- 
phoric light expanded around, by which I began to discern a 



115 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

few human faces slowly appearing in the tombs. I next distin- 
guished their arms supporting the lids of stone which covered 
them. At length every sarcophagus seemed to hold a spectre, 
standing and disclosing the upper parts of the body. I saw the 
head and shoulders of children and young persons, and the 
upper half of the forms of men. The females with modest de- 
meanor stood shrouded in veils, which some of them drew aside. 
There were youths whose thick locks shaded their brows ; they 
divided them on their foreheads, or flung them back upon their 
shoulders ; while other spectres by their baldness and white hair, 
seemed to have died in the decline of their years. The faces 
of young virgins, cut off in the dawn of their loveliness, though 
shaded by death, were still blooming with a faint carnation, like 
the tender tints of the cropped flower. But the eyes of the phan- 
toms were heavy, and as if weighed down by the slumber of 
ages. While they gradually raised their heads, and fixed their 
glances on me with a sIoav and confused expression, like sleepers 
just awakened, I perceived a phosphoric glare in the distant part 
of the cavern. It accompanied a spectre who advanced with a 
majestic mien, clothed in the white toga, and resembling the con- 
sular statues. His countenance was replete with mild dignity: 
he seemed past the prime of manhood ; and his aspect inspired 
respect and reverence. No sooner was he perceived by the 
spectres among the tombs, than they hurried to meet him, and 
pressed around him with admiration and homage ; but there was 
something in their low voices too melancholy for language to ex- 
press. Alone in the midst of the immense crowd that surrounded 
him, he stood proudly erect, with conscious superiority, and 
seemed preparing to address them. Almost breathless in anxious 
suspense, I leaned myself against the side of a tomb, subdued to 
silence by sentiments of surprise and veneration." 

Many of the periodicals of the day were adorned by compo- 
sitions from her pen both in prose and verse. The Minerva, 
the Mirror, and other papers w^ere much indebted to her pen 
for some of their most attractive articles. There are many of 
her tales which purport to be translations that were known to 
be originally from her study, never having seen the light before 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. llT 

they appeared in an English dress. She changed the signa- 
ture affixed to her poetical effusions, as well as to her prose 
works, for concealment, not wishing it to be known that she 
wrote so much. One of her signatures was " Salonina." By 
this signature she addressed to her friend Dr. Mitchill, a poetical 
epistle, purporting to be a translation from Le Brun. It is a 
paraphrase more properly. 

Mitchill, although the envious frown, 

Their idle wrath disdain ! 
Upon thy bright and pure renown, 

They cannot cast a stain. 
Ida, the heaven-crown'd, feels the storm 
Rave fiercely round her towering form. 

Her brow it cannot gain, 
Calm, sunny, in majestic pride. 
It marks the powerless blast subside. 

And didst thou ever hope to stand, 

So glorious and so high, 
Receive all honor and command, 

Nor meet a jealous eye? 
No, thou must expiate thy fame. 
Thy noble, thy exalted name ; 

Yet pass thou proudly by ! 
The torrent may with vagrant force. 
Disturb, but cannot change thy course. 

Or, should thou dread the threats to brave 

Of malice, wilful — dire. 
Break thou the sceptre genius gave. 

And quench thy spirit's fire ; 
Down from thy heights of soul descend, 
Thy flaming pinions earthward bend, 

Fulfil thy foes' desire ; 
Thy immortaUty contemn, 
And walk in common ways vdth them. 

The lighter tasks of wit and mind, 

Let fickle taste adore ; 
But Genius' flight is unconfin'd, 

O'er prostrate time to soar. 
How glows he, when Ambition tears, 
The veil from gone and coming years ' 

While ages past before. 
To him their future being trust. 
Though empires crumble into dust. 



il8 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

Without this magic, which the crowd 

Nor comprehend, nor feel. 
Could Genius' son have ever vow'd. 

His ductile heart to steel, 
'Gainst all that leads the human breast, 
To turn to indolence and rest ; 

From Science' haunts to steal, 
To Beauty, Wealth, and Ease, and Cheer, 
All that delight the senses here? 

And thus he earns a meed of praise, 

From nations yet unborn ; 
Still he, whom present pomp repays, 

His arduous toil may scorn ; 
But wiser, sure, than hoard the rose, 
Which low for each way-farer blows, 

And lives a summer morn, 
To climb the rocky mountain way. 
And gather the unfading bay. 

Yet wo for him whose mental worth 

Fame's thousand tongues resound ! 
While living, every worm of earth, 

Seems privileged to wound. 
His victory not the less secure. 
Let him the strife with nerve endure, 

In death his triumph found ; 
Then worlds shall with each other vie, 
To spread the name that cannot die. 

Miss Pascalis was married to Mr. Canfield, a lottery vender 
and exchange broker. He was a man of enterprise, but failed 
soon after their marriage. The union of such an accomplished 
woman with Mr. Canfield was not hailed as a very suitable 
one, and so it proved. On the change of his fortunes she en- 
treated him to come down to his situation, and make safe and 
sure efforts to rise again. This did not agree with his views, 
and her advice was disregarded. Mrs. Canfield was never 
heard to repine. She made the best of every thing. Among 
other attempts to retrieve his fortunes, her husband published a 
paper called " Canfield's Lottery Argus, Commercial and 
Exchange Telegraph, or National Miscellany." The great 
object of the paper was, of course, to give the public all such 
matters and things as are necessarily connected with banks 
and brokerage, and in this department he was an adept. To 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 119 

this he added a literary department of which his wife took 
charge. But few readers of miscellaneous literature, thought 
of looking into such a paper for matters of taste and genius, 
and of course her efforts were almost entirely " wasted on the 
desert air." Many editors plundered her columns, thinking 
that they should never be detected. It was not the proper situ- 
ation for one so well calculated to fill a higher sphere. But as 
editor of this department she continued a helpmate to her hus- 
band, while the paper existed, and it was continued for several 
years. 

Among other accomplishments, she was an excellent painter, 
and if she had confined her attention to that branch of the fine 
arts, she would have been the first female painter of the age. 
She drew a landscape, a flower, a stream, or a human being, 
all with equal ease. She sketched with readiness, and finished 
with taste. Some of her copies of old pictures have deceived 
professional painters. One of her copies was sold at auction 
for an original, and the mistake was not discovered until men- 
tioned by her father. She was a tolerable musician, and 
played with some science and skill, although she had no passion 
for the art. Her imagination was powerful, and her invention 
often surprising, yet her logical powers were always controling 
when in connection with her imagination. There is a depth of 
thought in her reasoning which gives strength to her argu- 
ments, and an elegance of expression in her language which 
should be denominated eloquence. In reasoning, her heart was 
a vassal to her understanding. In Avriting, she seemed to have 
been constantly under the influence of the advice thus given to 
Pindar : " Moderate your fire ; the axle of your chariot wheels 
burns too soon." 

Mrs. Canfield was, from infancy, fond of retirement, and pre- 
ferred solitude, and a small circle of warm and admiring 
friends, to all the pleasures of the gay and fashionable world. 
Though modest and retiring, and almost bashful, when curiosity 
was investigating her merits, or she thought herself gazed at by 
the public, yet she was open, free, eloquent, and enchanting, 
when she was with her chosen few. Nature had given her the 



120 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

power of a satirist, and sometimes she was induced to show 
that she possessed it; but she preferred to praise the good, rather 
than to censure the blamable. She wrote some critical notices 
of reviews, which cut deep, and were felt long. She was not 
destined to long life ; for some time previous to her dissolu- 
tion, she knew that her life-blood was on the lees, and that her 
days would soon be finished, but she was not alarmed; she 
knew that the debt of nature must sooner or later be paid, and 
she was ready to meet it. Mrs. Canfield by some was called 
handsome, others who think prettiness makes beauty, would not 
concur in the opinion. Her large hazle eye beamed with the 
lustre of genius, and the combination of her features gave a re- 
fined, intellectual and expressive cast to her countenance when 
in repose; but it was in the gentle agitation of her soul, that her 
beauty was seen and acknowledged. Misfortune had made 
some inroads upon her face, but still its ethereal character was 
softened, not changed. She wasted away by that consumption 
which comes from a broken heart, and which gives the sufferer 
a full gaze of death, as he approaches ; but she saw his grim 
visage without dismay. She left four children to feel the want 
of a mother's care ; and although she was assured that others 
would faithfully discharge the duties she was not allowed by 
divine providence to pay herself, still it must have been hard 
for a mother to part with four infant children. The most 
gifted of the daughters of men must pass away like the humblest, 
and the places that knew them shall know them no more. The 
most delicate and lovely of all earth-born flowers bursts upon 
us in the shades of night, and is not, when the morning sun 
arises. Many a cactus grandijiorus of the moral and intel- 
lectual world appear and die, known only to a few. 

It should be remembered, in estimating her powers of mind, 
that she wrote most of her com^munications for the Argus, when 
poverty had sickened her heart and destroyed the harmony of 
the social circle, and the wolves of the law were at the door ; 
yet, there is no sighing, no repining, to be found in a single sen- 
tence from her pen. Nothing escaped her by which one could 
divine that a cloud had rested upon her house, or a shade upon 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 121 

her future hopes. Dr. Pascalis was an ambitious man, and 
indulged the fond belief, that he should see his daughter sought 
for, and distinguished, in the first circles of mind and accom- 
plishments, and never enjoyed himself a moment after this vision 
of his hopes had disappeared, by the marriage of his daughter 
to Mr. Canfield. There seems to be, in the inscrutable laws of 
divine providence, in his moral government, a blight upon the 
expectations and prospects of those who disregard, the deep 
feelings of parental advice, in the choice of a partner for life. 
The kindest attentions of a fond husband, and the innocent 
prattle of sweetest babes, and all the enjoyment of fortune, can- 
not efface from the mind of a woman the frowns of a father at 
her disobedience, long after the face on which the frown has 
settled, has mouldered into dust. Mrs. Canfield died on the 
twenty-eighth of May, 1823. Her father was disconsolate at 
her loss, and never again resumed his cheerfulness, or his 
pursuits. He lingered until July, 1833, when he followed 
his daughter to the grave. Her husband died in September 
following. He had collected many of her productions, and 
intended to publish them in one or two volumes. This, pro- 
bably, will not be done at present. We present a few of them, 
selected more in regard to our limits than to their respective 
merits. The old money broker is a graphic sketch, bold, severe 
but just. 

THE OLD MONEY-BROKER. 

I wish I could make you catch the likeness, — his face pale 

and tawny, a complexion that I would call mooney, it looks so 

much like badly washed Sheffield. His hair, brushed smooth, is 

ashen grey, and lies close to his head. His features are as 

settled and unruffled as if moulded in bronze. There are 

scarcely any lashes to his small grey eyes, which are as yellow 

as weasels' ; his nose is sharp, his lips thin ; and his sight always 

protected against the glare of broad day by a green lining to the 

front of his old jockey cap. He speaks with a low voice, and 

never looses his temper in an argument with his customers. He 

is always apparalled in sable. What his age may be, is all a 

11 



122 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

guess ; you cannot tell whether he has become old before his 
time, or whether he has so husbanded his youth and vigor as to 
be wearing them out at the slowest possible rate. 

His room is as neat as an Englishman's coat ; but every thing 
in it is threadbare, from the coverlit on the bed to the green 
baize of the secretary. It seems the cold recess of one of those 
ancient spinsters, who spend the livelong day in rubbing up the 
old furniture. And every thing in it is defective or cross-grained; 
even to the very fire-brands, in the coldest winter's day, I have 
never seen them blazing; but they smoulder away without flame, 
half smothered in the bed of ashes. 

The life of this man passes away as noiselessly as the sands 
of an antique hour-glass. From the hour he rises, to his fit of 
coughing in the evening, all his actions are as regular as the 
movements of a clock. He is nothing better than the model of 
a man, running down and wound up from sun to sun. If you 
touch a wood-louse, crawling over a piece of paper, it stops and 
feigns death ; just so, if a carriage rattles by when this man is 
speaking, he pauses, until it has passed, as if he called in his 
powers, lest he should expend the smallest degree more than 
what is exactly necessary. He is for economising the vital 
movement, and concentrates every thought and feeling within 
the orbit of I myself. Sometimes the victims on whom he 
preys, talk loud in his room, and get very high and angry ; and 
to that there succeeds an unbroken quiet ; as in a kitchen, where 
the pitiless cook is not to be turned from her purpose by the 
noisy clatter of a duck, who suffers — and all is once more still. 

Until seven o'clock in the evening, he is reserved and serious; 
but about eight o'clock he unbends from his business-like gra- 
vity, and the man of notes becomes a very ordinary personage, 
and not to be distinguished in a crowd from any other man. 
The change seems a mystery more secret than the transmuting 
of gold ; for, indeed, it is the transmuting of a heart of metal 
into one of flesh. Then he will sometimes rub his hands 
together, and has a mirthful style of his own, in a small way, 
with a cackling, hollow laugh, that can be seen by his mouth 
agape, but Avhich can be scarcely heard. But in his gayest 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 123 

moments, his conversation is carried on in monosyllables, here a 
word, and there a word, for assent or dissent. 

He is my neighbor ; that is to say, he occupies a part of the 
house where I lodge. The house is gloomy and damp. It has 
neither yard-room nor court, and the rooms are only lighted from 
the street. The building is distributed like a cloister, into rooms 
of equal dimensions, tier above tier, each with only one door, 
which opens on a long and common corridor or hall, lighted by 
loop-hole windows. So repulsive is the aspect of the house that 
the volatility of a high spirited heir generally sobers down into 
something like dejection before he reaches the landing place of 
my fellow-lodger. Well do the house and he resemble each 
other — they are like the submarine rock, and the oyster which 
clings to it. His whole life is clandestine. The sole being with 
whom he holds communion, socially speaking, is myself Some- 
times he comes to my apartment to ask for a little fire, to borrow 
a book or a newspaper ; and of evenings, I am the only one 
permitted to enter his den, or to whom he will speak of his own 
accord. These marks of his confidence are the fruits of a seven 
years neighborhood. If he has any relatives or friends, I am 
ignorant of them; neither have I ever seen a penny in his posses- 
sion, but I know that he has an immense fortune in the vaults of 
the bank. But any how, he has sometimes been a martyr to his 
prudence; one day he chanced to have gold in his pocket, and a 
doubloon made its way out and fell on the stairs; a fellow-tenant, 
who was coming up at the same time, picked it up and handed 
it to him — " that dosn't belong to me !" said he, Avith a gesture 
of repulse and surprise ; " I never have gold — never have it 
about me, — nor in my house." 

He makes the cofiee for his own breakfast in a small boiler in 
the jamb, from which black corner of the hearth the utensil 
never stirs. His dinner is brought to him from a cook-shop. 
The old woman who attends to the door, at a fixed hour, regu- 
larly goes up stairs and arranges his room. Finally, by one of 
those chances which Sterne would call predestination, my fellow 
lodger, who so much interests me, is named Gobsech. 

If the social virtues are a religion, this man, thought I to 



124 ^ FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

myself, must be pronounced an atheist recreant. To satisfy 
myself, concerning the mystery of his nature and pleasures, I 
determined to study him more closely, homo duplex, the man 
and his mind. I like facts better than systems. Instead, then, 
of being discursive in theory. I shall be brief in narrative. 

Last evening I paid a visit to this curious mortal, who has 
made gold his all in all. I found him seated in his easy chair, 
still and fixed as a statue, and his eyes rivetted on the mantel- 
piece, where he seemed to be reading tables of discounts. A 
hand lamp, smutty, smoky, with a foot that had once been lacker- 
ed green, cast a dull red glare on his bloodless complexion. He 
lifted his eyes, but spoke not ; however, as my chair was drawn 
out beside him, it was evident that I was expected and welcome. 

" Does this being," said I to myself, "ever think? Believes he 
in a Deity, Creator, and Preserver? Does he know what sensi- 
bility is ? Is woman dear to him ? Have emotions of pleasure 
ever fluttered or unfixed that rigid soul?" Thus did I pity him 
as an object, a sick man, a cripple. Still, I felt, that with a million 
in bank, he must luxuriate in a sense of power that was equal to 
possessing the whole world at a grasp. 

" Good day, Gaffer Gobsech !" said I to him. 

He turned his face towards me, and slightly drew together 
his broad, black eye-brows. This characteristic inflexion was 
equivalent to the gayest smile of one of warmer temperament. 

" You are as dull to-day," continued I, " as the time when 

they told you of the failure of the bookseller. Have you 

met any bad drafts to-day — this is the 31st, I think — " 

It was the first time I had ever spoken to him concerning 
money matters. He looked me full in the face ; and, with that 
soft, low-tuned voice, which does not ill resemble the irresolute 
breathings on the flute of a learner, he replied, " I was taking 
a little recreation." 

" What," cried I, " do you ever take recreation ?" 

He shrugged his shoulders, and gave me a look of pity, and 
scorn. 

" Do you think," said he, " that there are no persons of fancy 
and taste, except poets that print verses ?" 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 125 

Verses in such a head ! thought I. He continued, " There is 
none whose lot is more animated and soul-stirring than mine. 

" Listen," said he. "By what I shall tell you of this morning's 
adventures you will be able to form an idea of my enjoyments." 

He then rose and bolted the door, and drew before it an old 
tapestry curtain, the rusty rings of which grated on the rod. He 
seated himself beside me, and began thus : 

" This morning I had only two bills to collect, because I had 
passed off all the others yesterday as cash to my customers. 
One of the notes was given me by a dashing young fellow who 
rode in a tilbury. It was signed by one of the handsomest ladies 

in , the wife of a great landholder and nobleman. It 

was drawn, to pay — I dont know what debt ; the amount w^as 
two hundred crowns. The other note was for the same sum, 

and drawn by a lady also, for it was signed Fanny . It 

came into my possession from a linen draper. The drawer of 

one note lived in square, and the other in street. 

Could you but know the romantic conjectures that filled my mind 
as I left my home this morning! What proud delight thrilled 
my bosom, as I foresaw, that if these two women were not ready, 
they would receive and treat me with as much respect as if I 

were their own father. What politenesses Lady would 

shower on me for the sake of two hundred crowns! She would 
stoop to address me with an affectionate air, she would speak to 
me in those soft and gentle tones which she reserves — perhaps 
for the endorser of the draft ; she would lavish upon me words 
of endearment, fond expressions ; entreat me even, and I " 

Here the old man, facing me, gave his countenance an expres- 
sion, freezingly obdurate and inexorable. 

" And I," he resumed, " not to be moved ! There I am — like 
any avenger, like conscience, Avhich is not to be put off! But 
let us have done Avith my reveries. By and by I reached the 
mansion of Lady . 

" A fernme de chambre answered me that her ladyship was 
sleeping. ' Is her ladyship sick ?' said I. ' No,' she replied, 
* but she did not return from the ball last night until three 
o'clock.' 



126 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

" ' My name is Gobsech ; tell her my name, I shall be here at 
noon.' And I went my way, after leaving marks of my pre- 
sence on the sumptuous carpeting that covered the staircase. 

" When I reached street, I found at the number, a house 

of mean appearance. I pushed open the crazy gangway gate, 
and saw one of those dark court-yards to which the sun never 
penetrates. The porter's lodge was fairly black with age and 
neglect, and the window panes, like a rusty fustian sleeve, listed 
with greasy brown stripes. 

" I asked for Miss Fanny . 

*' ' She is out ; but if you come about a draft, the money is 
here.' ' I'll call again,' said I ; for when I found that the money 
was ready, I wanted to know a little more of the young lady ; 
I had made up my mind that she was young. I passed the 
morning in looking at the engravings displayed in the print 
shops, and as twelve o'clock struck, I was just crossing the anti- 
chamber of the bed -room of my Lady . 

*' ' Her ladyship has but just rung,' said the waiting-maid ; • I 
do not think she can be seen.' 

" ' I shall wait,' was my answer ; and I sat down on a gilded 
sofa. The blind-doors had scarcely been more than opened, w^hen 
the femme de chambre returned. ' Will you walk in, sir.' — 
There was that in the words and the tone, which assured me 
that the lady fell short. 

" But what a magnificent woman met my sight ! She had has- 
tily thrown over her bare shoulders a cashmere shawl, the folds 
of which she gathered round her with just that ravishing art 
that the beautiful proportions of her bust were distinctly mani- 
fest. A tasty morning-gown, white as snow, was her only dress. 
Her black tresses escaped, here and there in rich confusion, 
from underneath a choice Madras handkerchief, capriciously 
fastened round her head in the fashion of the Creoles. Her 
bed was a scene of picturesque disorder; and certainly her 
slumbers had been uneasy and agitated. The draperies were 
cast with most voluptuous and bewitching negligence, and her 
pillow lay in the midst of the eider-down quilt of blue silk, the 
splendid lace relieving admirably from the azure ground. A 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 127 

painter would have paid a price to have stood where I did. On 
the large bear-skin, spread beneath the carved mahogany lion's 
claws of the bedstead, glittered two small slippers of white satin, 
thrown one here the other there, as weary feet will do, on 
returning from a ball. Over a chair lay a rumpled dress, the 
sleeves hanging to the floor. Spider-net stockings, such as the 
slightest breath of wind might carry away, were twisted about 
the leg of an easy chair, as if flung there from the hand ; and 
along a couch lay a pair of garters, artificial flowers, diamonds, 
gloves, a nosegay and belt, scattered confusedly. There was a 
delicate, a scarcely perceptible odor of aromatics in the air. 
A costly fan, half open, lay on the mantel ; the drawers of the 
bureau were open. This mingled luxury and carelessness, 
every thing rich and elegant, yet all displaced, impressed the 
mind with a sense of discomfort in the midst of wealth. The 
lassitude, betrayed by the countenance of her ladyship, was in 
keeping with the room thus strewed with the cast ofl' attire of 
the festival. Such unseasonable disorder excited my contempt; 
the same objects harmoniously assembled the evening previ- 
ously, might have raised in me some emotion. They seemed 
to tell of a heart that was burning with a passion that was 
blasted by conscience ; they showed as the image of a life of 
show, expense, and dissipation ; a tantalizing pursuit of unsub- 
stantial pleasures. There were some spots of unnatural redness 
on the face of the lady, that set ofl" the delicacy of her skin ; her 
features seemed swelled, and the brown circle around her dark 
eyes, rather heavy. But nevertheless, these indications of folly 
did not lessen her beauty, such was the energy of health and 
nature that seemed glowing in her whole frame. Her eyes 
sparkled; she reminded me of a Herodias, by Leonardo da 
Vinci — for I have been a picture-broker once. She was full 
of life and strength ; nothing meagre in the contour, or feeble 
or mean in the outline of her person, scanted the sense of 
admiration. Her appearance inspired love ; and yet there was 
a power developed in her brilliant and haughty consciousness of 
beauty, by no means akin to the fragility and delicacy that wins 
and wakes the tender passion. It was just the style to please 



128 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

me ; and it was long since my heart had throbbed before ; th 
value of the note was already paid ; for I would give more thai 
two hundred crowns for a sensation that reminds me of the days 
of my youth. 

" ' Sir,' said she, as she handed me a chair, ' will you have 
the kindness to allow me time' 

•' ' Till to-morrow at noon, your ladyship ; I have not the 



right,' said I, as I folded up the note, 'to protest before the 
hour.' 

" Then I said within myself — pay for your luxury — pay for 
your rank — pay for your happiness — pay for the monopoly 
Avhich you enjoy. For wretches without bread, there are courts, 
judges, and executioners; but for you, who sleep on downy 
pillows canopied with silk, let there be the pangs of regret 
and the gnashing of the teeth hidden under a smile, and the cold 
clutch upon the heart of a concealed anguish. 

" ' A protest !' she exclaimed, ' do you intend that !' said she, 
looking at me with a Avild gaze; 'will you have so little con- 
sideration for me ?' 

" ' If the king, your ladyship, were in my debt, and did not pay 
me, I would make him take the benefit of the act.' 

" At that instant, there was a slight tap at the door of the room. 
• I am not within !' imperiously exclaimed the young wife. 

" ' Emily, I wish very much to see you,' said a voice outside, 
' Not at present my dear,' she replied, in a tone less harsh, but 
still peremptory. 

" ' O, you are only jesting, for you are speaking to a stranger,' 
answered the voice, and the door was suddenly thrust open by 
a man who must have been her husband. Her ladyship gave 
me a look — I understood it ; she had made herself my slave. 
Ha ! ha ! there was a time once, when I was stupid enough not 
to protest. 

'" What is your business?' said the count to me. 

" I saw the lady shiver. The white and satiny skin of her 
neck became rough, or as we say in common parlance, like 
goose flesh. As for me, I laughed, without ever a muscle 
moving. 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 129 

" • This person,' said she, ' is one of my tradesmen.' 

*' The noble gentleman straightway turned his back upon me, 
but I drew the note half way out of my pocket. At this pitiless 
motion the young lady stepped near to me, and offered me a 
diamond. ' Take it,' said she, ' and begone.' 

" We exchanged the two values, I made her bow and retired. 
The diamond was fully worth two hundred and forty crowns. 
I passed, in going out, two superb chariots that the lackeys 
were cleaning, and footmen brushing their liveries and polishing 
their boots. So, said I to myself, this is what brings these people 
to me, makes them steal and rob millions in a decent way, or 
else betray their country. That they may not make their shoe- 
soles dusty, they go over head and ears into the mud ! Just at 
that very moment the great gate was thrown open, and the 
young man who gave me the note, passed through in his stylish 
tilbury. As soon as he descended, I went to him and said, 
' Here, sir, are forty crowns, which I would thank you to hand 
to her ladyship, and tell her that I shall keep at her disposal, for 
eight days, the pledge that she left in my hands this morning.' 
He took the forty crowns and a mocking smile stole over his 
countenance, as if he would have said, ' She has paid, has she, 
so much the better !' I read in that face the desolation of the 
countess. 

" I then went to street, to Miss Fanny . I had to 

ascend a very narrow stair-case, and when I reached the fifth 
story, I was introduced into an apartment, newly fitted up, where 
every thing wore an air of miraculous neatness. I could not 
detect a trace of dust on the simple furniture of the chamber, 
where I was received by Miss Fanny. She was young and city- 
bred ; her head youthful and elegant, with a becoming air of 
gentility and kindness ; her well combed chesnut hair w^as fast- 
ened in two bow^s on her temples, and shaded a pair of blue 
eyes clear as crystal. She was dressed plain. The light, falling 
through small white curtains, stretched across the window, threw 
a softened luster over her angelic face. She was unfolding 
pieces of linen, and the cuttings of linen over the floor, showed 
what were her usual occupations. She looked the very personi- 



130 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

fication of solitude. When I handed her the note, I told her 
that she had not been at home when I first called. 

" ' But I left the money with the porter,' said she. 

" I pretended not to hear her. 

" ' You go out rather early, it seems,' said I. 

" ' I am away from home but rarely,' replied she, ' but work- 
ing so late at night, I am sometimes obliged, for my health, to go 
bathing.' 

" At a glance I understood her history. The daughter, doubt- 
less, of a family once rich, and obliged by adversity to labor for 
her subsistence. There was an indescribable air of virtue, of 
modesty, and native nobleness in her mien. Every thing around 
her partook of that character. It seemed that I was set down in 
the midst of an atmosphere of sincerity and candor, and could 
breath at my ease. I perceived in an alcove a simple couch of 
painted wood, surmounted by a crucifix, and then a branch of 
box. I felt affected, and wanted to leave the money she had just 
handed me, and the diamond of the countess ; but I thought the 
present would perhaps be doing her a harm ; and every thing 
considered, I thought it best to keep back both ; the more so, as 
the diamond is worth two hundred and fifty crowns for an actress 
or a bride. And then, as like as not, she too has some fellow of 
a cousin, who would wear the diamond as a breast-pin, and use 
up the two hundred and forty crowns in his own way. When 
you came in, I was just thinking what a good little wife Fanny 

would make for somebody. It will be a fortnight too, 

before I shall get that countess out of my head, and she has one 
foot, at least over the brink of perdition." 

"Well !" cried he, resuming the. thread of his reflections after 
a moment of deep silence, during which I had been watching 
his looks, " think you this is nothing to penetrate thus into the 
most secret folds of the human heart, and thus espouse the for- 
tunes of others, and see their lives exposed like a nudity to your 
searching eye ? It is a spectacle of multifarious shiftings ; ghastly 
wounds eating into life at the core ; silent, but death-dealing sor- 
rows ; or scenes of love ; or distresses, over which the waves of 
the river are waiting to close; or rapture^; of the youthful pulse 



FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 131 

that will end in the g-ibbet and the axe ; the insane laughter of 
despair ; the sumptuous and splendid revel ; a tragedy yester- 
day — a father of a family who suffocated himself with charcoal, 
because he could not get bread for his children ; to-morrow it 

will be some farce or other, some young- C r playing off 

the pranks of Pea Green Jacket, with variations. I have heard 
many brags of the force of parliamentary eloquence ; I have 
listened to one at least of those boasted orators — he never moved 
me ; but often has it happened, that a loving young girl, in the 
holy zeal of a plighted attachment ; an aged merchant on the 
brink of a failure ; a mother wishing to conceal the fault of a 
son ; a laborer famishing with hunger ; or a politician without 
principle, have made my soul reel and shudder with the potency 
of their language. They were sublime actors, and played for 
me alone. But I am not to be played upon. My eye is as keen 
as ubiquity ! I read the very heart. Nothing is hidden from 
me. What do I lack ? I have every thing that is wanted. No- 
thing is refused or denied to him who has the control of the 
purse strings, if there be enough in the purse for temptation. 
Ministers and their consciences can be bought — there's power 
for you ; accomplished and delicate women, ay, and their hearts 
too, can be bought — there's pleasure and beauty for you. In 
fact everything is on sale, and money can buy every thing. We 
are kings, without title, incognito, I grant you ; but the kings 
of life, for what is existence without money ? But, Avhile I have 
enjoyed every thing, I have become sated with every thing. 
There are thirty of us, such as I, in this city. A common inte- 
rest is the tie between us ; we meet weekly in a coffee-house in 

street, and form a sort of board of finance, where every 

mystery connected with the rise and fall of stocks, and interest, 
is divulged, and canvassed. There is no show of fortune that 
can blind us, we have a key to the secrets of every family, and 
we keep a sort of black book, in Avhich Ave minute down the 
most important items concerning public credit, bankers, and 
trade. We analyze the most indiiferent actions. We are the 
casuists of exchange. Like me, also, the rest care for power 
and money, not so much to exercise, as to possess them. 



132 FEMALE BIOGRAPHY. 

" Here," continued he, pointing around to his cold, and narrow 
apartment, " here the fiery lover, who is jealous of a word, and 
draws his sword for a speech — here he begs with folded hands ; 
here begs the haughtiest merchant ; here begs the beauty, vainest 
of the vain ; here begs the fiercest soldier, the most famous ar- 
tist, the writer whose name is pledged to posterity and renown ; 
and here," added he, laying his hand on his forehead, " is the 
balance that weighs, not only in a few solitary cases, the things 
to come, but for every one, for all! — 

" Do you still think there are no recreations, no amusements 
to be enjoyed under that blank and dingy mask, whose unalter- 
able stillness has so often excited your surprise?" asked he, 
stretching his neck, and advancing nearer to me his pallid 
countenance, which smelt of silver. 

I returned to my room, stupified. In my fancy, the little 
withered, spindly old man, grew in dimensions, until he changed 
into a fantastic apparition — like the spirit of gold incarnate. The 
perfidies of life, and my fellow-men, weighed upon me with 
horror. Can it indeed, be true, that every thing thus resolves 
itself into money, money, money ?