LENCLOS, Ninon de (1615-1705), was the daughter of a gentleman of good position in Touraine. Her long and eventful life divides into two periods, during the former of which she was the typical Frenchwoman of the gayest and most licentious society of the 17th century, during the latter the recognized leader of the fashion in Paris, and the friend of wits and poets. Of her earlier life the less said the better, and in her defence all that can be pleaded is that she had been educated by her father in the epicurean and sensual beliefs made popular by Montaigne, and that she retained throughout the frank demeanour, and disregard of money, which won from Saint Évremond the remark that she was an honnête homme. Against her, and the numerous specious defences set up for her by contemporaneous and subsequent French writers, must be mentioned her absolute want of maternal feeling and even of natural shame. The well-known visit of Queen Christina to her attests the extent of her renown, or infamy, and the inefficacy of the threats of Anne of Austria prove her power. Of a perfectly different character was her later life, when, though she had continued her career of debauchery for a preposterous length of time, she settled down to the social leadership of Paris. Then there were to be found in her salon all that was most witty and refinedin France,—“ladies as well as gentlemen of the highest birth,” remarks a correspondent to Madame de Sevigné, poets like Molière, abbés like Chateauneuf, Genevese preachers like Turretin, the protégé of Saint Évremond. It became the fashion for young men as well as old to throng round her, and the best of all introductions for a young man who wished to make a figure in society was an introduction to Mdlle. de Lenclos. The cause for this ...