In a letter to her adopted daughter, she says,—­“I hope you will be more happy than I have been”; and she confessed to Sainte-Beuve, that more than once in her most brilliant days, in the midst of fetes where she reigned a queen, she disengaged herself from the crowd surrounding her and retired to weep in solitude.  Surely so sad a woman was not to be envied.

Another friend of Madame Recamier’s youth, whose friendship in a marked degree influenced her life, was Matthieu de Montmorency.  He was seventeen years older than she, and may with emphasis be termed her best friend.  A devout Roman Catholic, he awakened and strengthened her religious convictions, and constantly warned her of the perils surrounding her.  Much as he evidently admired and loved her, he did not hesitate to utter unwelcome truths.  Vicomte, afterward Duc de Montmorency, belonged to one of the oldest families of France, but, espousing the Revolutionary cause, he was the first to propose the abolition of the privileges of the nobility.  He was married early in life to a woman without beauty, to whom he was profoundly indifferent, and soon separated from her, though from family motives the tie was renewed in after-years.  In his youth he had been gay and dissipated; but the death of a favorite brother, who fell a victim to the Revolution, changed and sobered him.  From an over-sensibility, he believed himself to be the cause of his brother’s death on account of the part he had taken in hastening the Revolution, and he strove to atone for this mistake, as well as for his youthful follies, by a life of austerity and piety.  While his letters testify his great affection for Madame Recamier, they are entirely free from those lover-like protestations and declarations of eternal fidelity so characterise of her other masculine correspondents.  He always addressed her as “amiable amis”, and his nearest approach to gallantry is the expression of a hope that “in prayer their thoughts had often mingled, and might continue so to do.”  He ends a long letter of religious counsel with this grave warning:—­“Do what is good and amiable, what will not rend the heart or leave any regrets behind.  But in the name of God renounce all that is unworthy of you, and which under no circumstances can ever render you happy.”

Adrien de Montmorency, Duke of Laval, if not so near and dear a friend, was quite as devoted an admirer of Madame Recamier as his cousin Matthieu.  His son also wore her chains, and frequently marred the pleasure of his father’s visits by his presence.  In reference to the family’s devotion, Adrien wrote to her,—­“My son is fascinated by you, and you know that I am so also.  It is the fate of the Montmorencys,—­

    “‘Ils ne mouraient pas tous, mais tout etaient frappes.’”

Adrien was a man of wit, and he had more ability than Matthieu.  “Of all your admirers,” writes Madame de Stael, in a letter given in Chateaubriand’s Memoirs, “you know that I prefer Adrien de Montmorency.  I have just received one of his letters, which is remarkable for wit and grace, and I believe in the durability of his affections, notwithstanding the charm of his manners.  Besides, this word durability is becoming in me, who have but a secondary place in his heart.  But you are the heroine of all those sentiments out of which grow tragedies and romances.”