thus qualify her sensible database

much easier it would be to bend the will of the
Agamemnon of the holy alliance[31] to his wishes, when he should have
him in hand, as it were, day and night. In offering the emperor his
hospitality, it was Talleyrand's intention to make him his prisoner,
body and soul, and to use him to his own advantage.

[Footnote 31: Memoires d'une Femme de Qualite.]

It was therefore to Talleyrand that Countess Ducayla hastened to concert
measures with the Bonapartist of yesterday, who had transformed himself
into the zealous legitimist of to-day.

Talleyrand undertook to secure the countess an audience with the Russian
emperor, and he succeeded.

While conducting the beautiful countess to the czar's cabinet,
Talleyrand whispered in her ear: "Imitate Madame de Lemalle--endeavor
to make a great stroke. The emperor is gallant, and what he denies to
diplomacy he may, perhaps, accord to the ladies."

He left her at the door, and the countess entered the emperor's cabinet
alone. She no sooner saw him, than she sank on her knees, and stretched
out her arms.

With a knightly courtesy, the emperor immediately hastened forward to
assist her to rise.

"What are you doing?" asked he, almost in alarm. "A noble lady never has
occasion to bend the knee to a cavalier."

"Sire," exclaimed the countess, "I kneel before you, because it is my
purpose to implore of your majesty the happiness which you alone can
restore to us; it will be a double pleasure to possess Louis XVIII. once
more, when Alexander I. shall have given him to us!"

"Is it then true that the French p


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