STAËL (de), Germaine (1766-1817)

STAËL (de), Germaine (1766-1817)

Autograph letter signed “N de Staël H” to Claire de Duras
N.p., n.d.,“this Saturday” [September 1815], 1 p. in-12° on laid paper, in brown ink
Autograph address on verso [delivered by hand]: « pour Madame la duchesse de duras »
Slight creasing and soiling, scattered brown spotting, traces of a black wax seal
One word crossed out in Madame de Staël’s hand

A warm letter from Madame de Staël to her “dear Duchess,” expressing her gratitude for the assistance given in the restitution of the two million livres that her father, Jacques Necker, had been forced to leave in the Royal Treasury in 1790

« que vous êtes bonne ! cette audience je vous la dois et je me sens fort à l’aise de vous la devoir. je vous aime par de là toute reconnaissance. – Pardon de ne pas pouvoir partir, vous êtes une des causes de mon refus. – je ne vous tiens point pour engagée, ainsi vous répondrez quand vous voudrez mais vous êtes engagée pour demain soir. –
Mille hommages
N[ecker] de Staël H[olstein] »

Closely bound during the First Restoration to Claire de Duras, whom she “had distinguished above all others,” Germaine de Staël had at the same time sought—and found—the perfect husband for her daughter Albertine in the person of the Duke de Broglie, a republican grand seigneur. Having no choice but to secure a considerable fortune to make the marriage possible, Madame de Staël endeavored, through the intervention of the Comte de Blacas, the favorite of Louis XVIII, to obtain assurance that her father’s deposit—the famous two million livres of Necker—would be returned to her.
When Napoleon, in the meantime, returned from the Island of Elba, Madame de Staël could only despair over the Hundred Days and the fatal postponement of a project so dear to her heart.
Taking refuge at her château of Coppet, she wrote to her “dear Duchess” on 23 April 1815: “What I have suffered and what I suffer now goes beyond all that I knew of pain. Those last moments, in which the kindness of the King and of M. de B[lacas] had arranged my happiness, have made me more keenly feel that old sorrow which has returned to me in the same places and under the same forms.”
Once the Restoration was newly re-established, Madame de Duras wrote to her on 1 September: “M. de Duras has delivered your letter to the King. Nothing now delays your affair but the extreme embarrassment of the finances and the difficulty of making Abbé Louis change his mind on any decision.” The restitution was at last granted—the very one for which Madame de Staël had fought all her life.
The matter came to a happy conclusion: the Duke de Broglie promptly made his proposal, and the news spread through Paris and beyond. Astolphe de Custine wrote to his mother on 26 September: “So Albertine is getting married!”