Repertory of The Comedie Humaine Part 45

[The Gondreville Mystery.]

SIMEUSE (Paul-Marie and Marie-Paul), twin sons of the preceding couple, born in 1773; grandsons on the father's side of the admiral who was as famous for his dissipation as for his valor; descended from the original owners of the famous Gondreville estate in Aube, and belonged to the n.o.ble Champagne family of the Chargeboeufs, the younger branch of which was represented by their mother, Berthe de Cinq-Cygne. Paul-Marie and Marie-Paul were among the emigrants; they returned to France about 1803. Both being in love with their cousin, Laurence de Cinq-Cygne, an ardent Royalist, they cast lots to decide which should be her husband; fate favored Marie-Paul, the younger, but circ.u.mstances prevented the consummation of the marriage. The twins differed only in disposition, and there in only one point: Paul-Marie was melancholy, while Marie-Paul was of a bright disposition. Despite the advice of their elderly relative, M. de Chargeboeuf, Messieurs de Simeuse compromised themselves with the Hauteserres; being watched by Fouche, who sent Peyrade and Corentin to keep an eye on them, they were accused of the abduction of Malin, of which they were not guilty, and sentenced to twenty-four years of penal servitude; were pardoned by Napoleon, entered as sub-lieutenants the same cavalry regiment, and were killed together in the battle of Sommo-Sierra (near Madrid, November 30, 1808). [The Gondreville Mystery.]

SIMONIN let carriages on the rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore, Cour des Coches, Paris; about 1840, he let a berlin to Madame de G.o.dollo, who, in accordance with the instructions of Corentin, the police-agent, was pretending to be taking a journey, but went no further than the Bois de Boulogne. [The Middle Cla.s.ses.]

SIMONNIN, in the reign of Louis XVIII., was "errand-boy" to Maitre Derville on the rue Vivienne, Paris, when that advocate received Hyacinthe Chabert. [Colonel Chabert].

SINARD, a Paris physician, was called, in May, 1830, together with Messieurs Desplein and Bianchon, to the bedside of Leontine de Serizy, who had lost her reason after the tragic end of her lover, Lucien de Rubempre. [Scenes from a Courtesan's Life.]

SINET (Seraphine), a celebrated lorette, born in 1820, known by the sobriquet of Carabine, was present at Josepha Mirah's house-warming on the rue de la Ville-l'Eveque, in 1838. Five years later, being then mistress of the wealthy F. du Tillet, Mademoiselle Sinet supplanted the vivacious Marguerite Turquet as queen of the lorettes. [Cousin Betty.] A woman of splendid appearance, Seraphine was one of the marching chorus at the Opera, and occupied the fine apartment on the rue Saint-Georges, where before her Suzanne du Val-n.o.ble, Esther van Gobseck, Florine, and Madame Schontz had reigned. Of ready wit, dashing manners, and impish brazenness, Carabine held many successful receptions. Every day her table was set in magnificent style for ten guests. Artists, men of letters, and society favorites were among her frequent visitors. S.-P. Gazonal was taken to see her, in 1845, by Leon de Lora and Bixiou, together with Jenny Cadine of the Theatre du Gymnase; and there he met Ma.s.sol, Claude Vignon, Maxime de Trailles, Nucingen, F. du Bruel, Malaga, Monsieur and Madame Gaillard, and Vauvinet, with a mult.i.tude of others, to say nothing of F. du Tillet.

[The Unconscious Humorists.]

SINOT, attorney at Arcis-sur-Aube, commanded the patronage of the "Henriquinquistes" (partisans of Henri V.) in 1839, when the district had to elect a deputy to replace M. Francois Keller. [The Member for Arcis.]

SOCQUARD, during the Empire and the Restoration, kept the Cafe de la Paix at Soulanges (Bourgogne). The Milo of Crotona of the Avonne Valley, a stout little man, of placid countenance, and a high, clear voice. He was manager of the Tivoli, a dancing-hall adjoining the cafe. Monsieur Vermichel, violin, and Monsieur Fourchon, clarinet, const.i.tuted the orchestra. Plissoud, Bonnebault, Viallet, and Amaury Lupin were steady patrons of his establishment, which was long famous for its billiards, its punch, and its mulled wine. In 1823, Socquard lost his wife. [The Peasantry.]

SOCQUARD (Madame Junie), wife of the preceding, had many thrilling love-affairs during the Empire. She was very beautiful, and her luxurious mode of living, to which the leading men of Soulanges contributed, was notorious in the Avonne valley. Lupin, the notary, had been guilty of great weakness in her direction, and Gaubertin, who took her away from him, unquestionably had by her a natural son, little Bournier. Junie was the secret of the prosperity of the Socquard house. She brought her husband a vineyard, the house he lived in, and the Tivoli. She died in the reign of Louis XVIII. [The Peasantry.]

SOCQUARD (Aglae), daughter of the preceding couple, born in 1801, inherited her father's ridiculous obesity. Being sought in marriage by Bonnebault, whom her father esteemed highly as a customer, but little as a son-in-law, she excited the jealousy of Marie Tonsard, and was always at daggers drawn with her. [The Peasantry.]

SODERINI (Prince), father of Madame d'Argaiolo, who was afterwards the d.u.c.h.esse Alphonse de Rhetore; at Besancon, in 1834, he demanded of Albert Savarus his daughter's letters and portrait. His sudden arrival caused a hasty departure on the part of Savarus, then a candidate for election to the Chamber of Deputies, and ignorant of Madame d'Argaiolo's approaching second marriage. [Albert Savarus.]

SOLIS (Abbe de), born about 1733, a Dominican, grand penitentiary of Toledo, vicar-general of the Archbishopric of Malines; a venerable priest, una.s.suming, kindly and large of person. He adopted Emmanuel de Solis, his brother's son, and, retiring to Douai, under the acceptable protection of the Casa-Reals, was confessor and adviser of their last descendant, Madame Balthazar Claes. The Abbe de Solis died in December, 1818. [The Quest of the Absolute.]

SOLIS (Emmanuel), nephew and adopted son of the preceding. Poor, and of a family originally from Granada, he responded well to the excellent education that he received, followed the teacher's calling, taught the humanities at the lyceum at Douai, of which he was afterwards princ.i.p.al, and gave lessons to the brothers of Marguerite Claes, whom he loved, the feeling being reciprocated. He married her in 1825; the more fully to enjoy his good fortune, he resigned the position as inspector of the University, which he then held. Shortly afterwards he inherited the t.i.tle of Comte de Nourho, through the house of Solis. [The Quest of the Absolute.]

SOLIS (Madame Emmanuel de), wife of the preceding, born Marguerite Claes, in 1796, elder sister of Madame Felicie Pierquin, whose husband had first sought her hand, received from her dying mother the injunction to contend respectfully, but firmly, against her father's foolish efforts as inventor; and, in compliance with her mother's injunctions, by dint of great perseverance, succeeded in restoring the family fortunes that had been more than endangered. Madame de Solis gave birth to a child, in the course of a trip to Spain, where she was visiting Casa-Real, the cradle of her mother's family. [The Quest of the Absolute.]

SOLONET, born in 1795, obtained the decoration of the Legion of Honor for having made very active contribution to the second return of the Bourbons; was the youthful and worldly notary of Bordeaux; in the drawing up of the marriage contract between Natalie Evangelista and Paul de Manerville, he triumphed over the objections raised by his colleague, Mathias, who was defender of the Manerville interests.

Solonet paid the most devoted attentions of a lover to Madame Evangelista, but his love was not returned, and he sought her hand in vain. [A Marriage Settlement.]

SOLVET, a handsome youth, but addicted to gaming and other vices, loved by Caroline Crochard de Bellefeuille and preferred by her to Monsieur de Granville, her generous protector. Solvet made Mademoiselle Crochard very unhappy, ruined her, but was none the less adored by her. These facts were known to Bianchon, and related by him to the Comte de Granville, whom he met, one evening, in the reign of Louis Philippe, near rue Gaillon. [A Second Home.]

SOMMERVIEUX (Theodore de), a painter, winner of the prix de Rome, knight of the Legion of Honor, was particularly successful in interiors; and excelled in chiaro-oscuro effects, in imitation of the Dutch. He made an excellent reproduction of the interior of the Cat and Racket, on the rue Saint-Denis, which he exhibited at the Salon at the same time with a fascinating portrait of his future wife, Mademoiselle Guillaume, with whom he fell madly in love, and whom he married in 1808, almost in spite of her parents, and thanks to the kind offices of Madame Roguin, whom he knew in his society life. The marriage was not a happy one; the daughter of the Guillaumes adored Sommervieux without understanding him. The painter often neglected his rooms on the rue des Trois-Freres (now a part of the rue Taitbout) and transferred his homage to the Marechale de Carigliano. He had an income of twelve thousand francs; before the Revolution his father was called the Chevalier de Sommervieux. [At the Sign of the Cat and Racket.] Theodore de Sommervieux designed a monstrance for Gohier, the king's goldsmith; this monstrance was bought by Madame Baudoyer and given to the church of Saint-Paul, at the time of the death of F. de la Billardiere, head clerk of the administration, whose position she desired for her husband. [The Government Clerks.] Sommervieux also drew vignettes for the works of Ca.n.a.lis. [Modeste Mignon.]

SOMMERVIEUX (Madame Theodore de), wife of the preceding, born Augustine Guillaume, about 1792, second daughter of the Guillaumes of the Cat and Racket (a drapery establishment on the rue Saint-Denis, Paris), had a sad life that was soon wrecked; for, with the exception of Madame Roguin, her family never understood her aspirations to a higher ideal, or the feeling that prompted her to choose Theodore de Sommervieux. Mademoiselle Guillaume was married about the middle of the Empire, at her parish church, Saint-Leu, on the same day that her sister was married to Lebas, the clerk, and immediately after the ceremony referred to. A little less coa.r.s.e in her feelings than her parents and their a.s.sociates, but insignificant enough at best, without being aware of it she displeased the painter, and chilled the enthusiasm of her husband's studio friends, Schinner, Bridau, Bixiou, and Lora. Gra.s.sou, who was very much of a countryman, was the only one that refrained from laughing at her. Worn out at last, she tried to win back the heart that had become the possession of Madame de Carigliano; she even went to consult her rival, but could not use the weapons supplied her by the coquettish wife of the marshal, and died of a broken heart shortly after the famous ball given by Cesar Birotteau, to which she was invited. She was buried in Montmartre cemetery. [At the Sign of the Cat and Racket. Cesar Birotteau.]

SONET, marble-worker and contractor for tombstones, at Paris, during the Restoraton and Louis Philippe's reign. When Pons died, the marble-worker sent his agent to Schmucke to solicit an order for statues of Art and Friendship grouped together. Sonet had the draughtsman Vitelot as partner. The firm name was Sonet & Co. [Cousin Pons.]

SONET (Madame), wife of the preceding, knew how to lavish attentions no less zealous than selfish on W. Schmucke, when he returned, broken-hearted, from Pere-Lachaise, in April, 1845, and suggested to him, with some modifications however, to take certain allegorical monuments which the families of Marsay and Keller had formerly refused, preferring to apply to a genuine artist, the sculptor Stidmann.

[Cousin Pons.]

SOPHIE, rival, namesake and contemporary of the famous Sophie, Doctor Veron's "blue ribbon," about 1844, was cook to the Comte Popinot on the rue Ba.s.se-du-Rempart, Paris. She must have been a remarkable culinary artist, for Sylvain Pons, reduced, in consequence of breaking with the Camusots, to dining at home, on the rue de Normandie, every day, often exclaimed in fits of melancholy, "O Sophie!" [Cousin Pons.]

SORBIER, a Parisian notary, to whom Chesnel (Choisnel) wrote, in 1822, from Normandie, to commend to his care the rattle-brained Victurnien d'Esgrignon. Unfortunately Sorbier was dead, and the letter was sent to his widow. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]

SORBIER (Madame), wife of the preceding, mentioned in Chesnel's (or Choisnel's) letter of 1822, concerning Victurnien d'Esgrignon. She scarcely read the note, and simply sent it to her deceased husband's successor, Maitre Cardot. Thus the widow unwittingly served M. du Bousquier (du Croisier), the enemy of the D'Esgrignons. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]

SORIA (Don Ferdinand, Duc de), younger brother of Don Felipe de Mac.u.mer, overwhelmed with kindness by his elder brother, owing him the duchy of Soria as well as the hand of Marie Heredia, both being voluntarily renounced by the elder brother. Soria was not ungrateful; he hastened to his dying brother's bedside in 1829. The latter's death made Don Ferdinand Baron de Mac.u.mer. [Letters of Two Brides.]

SORIA (d.u.c.h.esse de), wife of the preceding, born Marie Heredia, daughter of the wealthy Comte Heredia, was loved by two brothers, Don Ferdinand, Duc de Soria, and Don Felipe de Mac.u.mer. Though betrothed to the latter, she married the former, in accordance with her wishes, the Baron de Mac.u.mer having generously renounced her hand in favor of Don Ferdinand. The d.u.c.h.ess retained a feeling of deep grat.i.tude to him for his unselfishness, and at a later time bestowed every care on him in his last illness (1829). [Letters of Two Brides.]

SORMANO, the "shy" servant of the Argaiolos, at the time of their exile in Switzerland, figures, as a woman, under the name of Gina, in the autobiographical novel of Albert Savarus, ent.i.tled "L'Ambitieux par l'Amour." [Albert Savarus.]

SOUCHET, a broker at Paris, whose failure ruined Guillaume Grandet, brother of the well-known cooper of Saumur. [Eugenie Grandet.]

SOUCHET (Francois), winner of the prix de Rome for his sculpture, about the beginning of Louis XVIII.'s reign; an intimate friend of Hippolyte Schinner, who confided to him his love for Adelaide Leseigneur de Rouville, and was rallied on it by him. [The Purse.]

About 1835, with Steinbock's a.s.sistance, Souchet carved the panels over the doors and mantels of Laginski's magnificent house on the rue de la Pepiniere, Paris. [The Imaginary Mistress.] He had given to Florine (afterwards Madame Raoul Nathan) a plaster cast of a group representing an angel holding an aspersorium, which adorned the actress's sumptuous apartments in 1834. [A Daughter of Eve.]

SOUDRY, born in 1773, a quartermaster, secured a valuable friend in M.

de Soulanges, then adjutant-general, by saving him at the peril of his own life. Having become brigadier of gendarmes at Soulanges (Bourgogne), Soudry, in 1815, married Mademoiselle Cochet, Sophie Laguerre's former lady's-maid. Six years later, he was put on the retired list, at the request of Montcornet, and replaced in his brigade by Viallet; but, supported by the influence of Francois Gaubertin, he was elected mayor of Soulanges, and became the formidable enemy of the Montcornets. Like Gregoire Rigou, his son's father-in-law, the old gendarme kept as his mistress, under the same roof with his wife, his servant Jeannette, who was younger than Madame Soudry. [The Peasantry.]

SOUDRY (Madame), wife of the preceding, born Cochet in 1763.

Lady's-maid to Sophie Laguerre, Montcornet's predecessor at Aigues, she had an understanding with Francois Gaubertin, the steward of the estate, to make a victim of the former opera singer. Twenty days after the burial of her mistress, La Cochet married the brigadier, Soudry, a superb specimen of manhood, though pitted with small-pox.

During the reign of Louis XVIII., Madame Soudry, who tried awkwardly enough to imitate her late mistress, Sophie Laguerre, reigned supreme in the society of Soulanges, in her parlor which was the meeting ground of Montcornet's enemies. [The Peasantry.]

SOUDRY, natural son of Soudry, the brigadier of gendarmes; legitimized at the time of his father's marriage to Mademoiselle Cochet, in 1815.

On the day on which Soudry became legally possessed of a mother, he had just finished his course at Paris. There he knew Gaubertin's son, during a stay which he had at first intended to make long enough to ent.i.tle him to be registered as an advocate, and eventually to enter the legal profession; but he returned to Bourgogne to take charge of an attorney's practice for which his father paid thirty thousand francs. However, abandoning pettifoggery, Soudry soon found himself deputy king's attorney in a department of Bourgogne, and, in 1817, king's attorney under Attorney-General Bourlac, whom he replaced in 1821, thanks to the influence of Francois Gaubertin. He then married Mademoiselle Rigou. [The Peasantry.]

SOUDRY (Madame), wife of the preceding, born a.r.s.ene Rigou, the only daughter of wealthy parents, Gregoire Rigou and a.r.s.ene Pichard; resembled her father in cunningness of character, and her mother in beauty. [The Peasantry.]

SOULANGES (Comte Leon de), born in 1777, was colonel of the artillery guard in 1809. In the month of November of that year, he found himself the guest of the Malin de Gondrevilles, in their mansion in Paris, on the evening of a great party; he met there Montcornet, a friend of his in the regiment; Madame de Vaudremont, who had once been his mistress, accompanied by the Martial de la Roche-Hugon, her new lover; and finally his deserted wife, Madame de Soulanges, who had abandoned society, but who had come to the senator's house at the instigation of Madame de Lansac, with a view to a reconciliation, which was successfully carried out. [Domestic Peace.] Leon de Soulanges had several children as a result of his marriage; a son and some daughters; having refused one of his daughters in marriage to Montcornet, on the ground that she was too young, he made an enemy of that general. The count, remaining faithful to the Bourbons during the Hundred Days, was made a peer of France and a general in the artillery corps. Enjoying the favor of the Duc d'Angouleme, he was allowed a command during the Spanish war (1823), gained prominence at the seige of Cadiz and attained the highest degrees in the military hierarchy.

Monsieur de Soulanges, who was very rich, owned, in the territory of the commune of Blangy (Bourgogne), a forest and a chateau adjoining the Aigues estate, which had itself once belonged to the house of Soulanges. At the time of the Crusades, an ancestor of the count had created this domain. Soulanges's motto was: "Je soule agir." Like M.

de Ronquerolles he got on badly enough with his neighbor Montcornet and seemed to favor Francois Gaubertin, Gregoire Rigou and Soudry, in their opposition to the future marshal. [The Peasantry.]

SOULANGES (Comtesse Hortense de), wife of the preceding, and niece of the d.u.c.h.esses de Lansac and de Marigny. In November, 1809, at a ball given by Malin de Gondreville, acting on the advice of Madame de Lansac, the countess, then on bad terms with her husband, conquered her proud timidity, and demanded of Martial de la Roche-Hugon a ring that she had received originally from her husband; M. de Soulanges had afterwards pa.s.sed it on to his mistress, Madame de Vaudremont, who had given it to her lover, M. de la Roche-Hugon; this rest.i.tution effected the reconciliation of the couple. [Domestic Peace.] Hortense de Soulanges inherited from Madame de Marigny (who died about 1820) the Guebriant estate, with its enc.u.mbrance of an annuity. [The Thirteen.]

Madame de Soulanges followed her husband to Spain at the time of the war of 1823. [The Peasantry.]

SOULANGES (Amelie de), youngest daughter of the preceding couple, would have married the Comte Philippe de Brambourg, in 1828, but for the condemning revelations made by Bixiou concerning Joseph Bridau's brother. [A Bachelor's Establishment.]

SOULANGES (Vicomte de), probably a brother of the preceding, was, in 1836, commander of a squad of hussars at Fountainebleau; then, in company with Maxime de Trailles, he was going to be second to Savinien de Portenduere in a duel with Desire Minoret, but the duel was prevented by the unforeseen death of the latter; the underlying cause was the disgraceful conduct of the Minoret-Levraults towards Ursule Mirouet, future Vicomtesse de Portenduere. [Ursule Mirouet.]

SOULAS (Amedee-Sylvain-Jacques de), born in 1809, a gentleman of Besancon, of Spanish origin (the name was written Souleyas, when Franche-Comte belonged to Spain), succeeded in shining brightly in the capital of Doubs on an income of four thousand francs, which allowed him to employ the services of "Babylas, the tiger." Such discrepancy between his means and his manner of living may well convey an idea of this fellow's character, seeing that he sought in vain the hand of Rosalie de Watteville, but married, in the month of August, 1837, Madame de Watteville, her widowed mother. [Albert Savarus.]

SOULAS (Madame Amedee de), born Clotilde-Louise de Rupt in 1798, stern in features and in character, a blonde of the extreme type, was married, in 1815, to the Baron de Watteville, whom she managed with little difficulty. She did not find it so easy, however, to govern her daughter, Rosalie, whom she vainly tried to force to marry M. de Soulas. The pressure, at Besancon, of Albert Savarus, who was secretly loved by Mademoiselle de Watteville, gave a political significance to the salon of Rosalie's parents during the reign of Louis Philippe.

Tired of her daughter's obstinacy, Madame de Watteville, now a widow, herself married M. de Soulas; she lived in Paris, in the winter at least, and knew how to be mistress of her house there, as she always had been elsewhere. [Albert Savarus.]

SPARCHMANN, hospital surgeon at Heilsberg, attended Colonel Chabert after the battle of Eylau. [Colonel Chabert.]

SPENCER (Lord), about 1830, at Balthazar Claes's sale, bought some magnificent wainscoting that had been carved by Van Huysum, as well as the portrait of President Van Claes, a Fleming of the sixteenth century,--family treasures which the father of Mesdames de Solis and Pierquin was obliged to give up. [The Quest of the Absolute.]

SPIEGHALTER, a German mechanician, who lived in Paris on the rue de la Sante, in the early part of Louis Philippe's reign, made unsuccessful efforts, with the aid of pressure, hammering and rolling, to stretch the anomalous piece of s.h.a.green submitted to him by Raphael de Valentin, at the suggestion of Planchette, professor of mechanics.

[The Magic Skin.]

SPONDE (Abbe de), born about 1746, was grand vicar of the bishopric of Seez. Maternal uncle, guardian, guest, and boarder of Madame du Bousquier--_nee_ Cormon--of Alencon; he died in 1819, almost blind, and strangely depressed by his niece's recent marriage. Entirely removed from worldly interests, he led an ascetic life, and an uneventful one, entirely consumed in thoughts of salvation, mortifications of the flesh, and secret works of charity. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]

STAEL-HOLSTEIN (Anne-Louise-Germaine Necker, Baronne de), daughter of the famous Necker of Geneva, born in Paris in 1766; became the wife of the Swiss minister to France; author of "l'Allemagne," of "Corinne,"

and of "Delphine"; noted for her struggle against Napoleon Bonaparte; mother-in-law of the Duc Victor de Broglie and grandmother of the generation of the Broglies of the present day; died in the year 1817.

At various times she lived in the Vendomois in temporary exile. During one of her first stays in the Loire, she was greeted with the singular formula of admiration, "Fameuse garce!" [The Chouans.] At a later period, Madame de Stael came upon Louis Lambert, then a ragged urchin, absorbed in reading a translation of Swedenborg's "Heaven and h.e.l.l."