Eugene de Rothelin, par l’auteur d’Adele de Senange. Tome Premier [-Second.] Paris, Nicolle, 1808.
First Edition. Two volumes, 12mo (155 x 88 mm), pp. [iv], 182; [iv], 161, [1], in contemporary pale half calf over yellow boards, flat spine gilt in compartments, letterd in gilt, with small circular brown morocco numbering piece, pink endpapers.
An attractive copy of the first edition of this popular novel. Having lost her first husband to the scaffold in 1793, the comtesse de Flahaut fled France with her young son and escaped across Germany to England. On her trying to return to France some years later, she met M. de Souza at one of the barricades and married him. The two then returned to Paris where she was welcomed for her pure spirit, the delicacy of her judgements and the charm of her conversation. She wrote a number of animated and agreeable novels, the most famous of which is Adele de Senage, which established her reputation, although many critics have preferred Eugene de Rothelin. It is a novel which paints aristocratic society as it was before the revolution, seen without its faults and presented as a thing of grace, amiability and distinction.
'Aperçus très-fins sur la société; tableaux vrais et bien terminés; style orné avec mesure... l'esprit qui ne dit rien de vulgaire et le goût qui ne dit rien de trop' (Mme de P, NBG).
Cioranescu 60573; Barbier II, p. 322.