Manon only became acquainted with the latter's works after her mother's death, and they made as great an epoch in her life at one-and-twenty as Plutarch had done at nine.

These grave studies were occasionally varied by a walk in the Tuileries Gardens on Sunday afternoons. Her mother loved to dress her as if she had been a doll. Though herself very simply attired, she spared no expense in the little girl's bravery, and would deck her out in a fashionable silk corps-de-robe, fitting tightly and displaying the figure to advantage, while made full below the waist and sweeping in a long train behind. These gala days were anything but festive to the studious Manon; for she used to shrink from the hair-dressing operations which often forced tears from her eyes. On such occasions her dark abundant locks would be pulled about and put into curl-papers, and frizzed and burned with hot irons according to the custom of the day. These silken splendours and hair-crimpings were only displayed on Sundays, holidays and birthdays; on ordinary occasions Manon wore a plain linen frock, in which she frequently accompanied her mother to market, or was even sent across the way to buy a little salad or parsley. And the future heroine of the Gironde would infuse so much courtesy and dignity into her manner of making these purchases, that the astonished fruiterer always served her before his other customers. She was also at times called into the kitchen, where her mother taught her to make omelettes and other dishes, an acquirement which proved useful afterwards, when her husband's delicate digestion frequently induced her to prepare with her own hands the food he took.

Madame Phlipon, who was pious without being a