LITERARY SPECTATOR.
THE MEMOIRS OF THE COUNTESS DU BARRI.
WE have lately been much taken up with the Memoirs of Madame du BARRI, which are certainly the most delightful of all books—if they are genuine. Unfortunately the reader asks himself this question at the end of every page ; and as he cannot answer it satisfactorily, the pleasure of perusal is enormously diminished : for the fact is, that more than half the value of the book is in its truth—in its being a portrait, and not a fancy piece, however true to general nature. If Du BARRI is genuine, it lets us further into the mysteries of history than all the volumes in the Pritish Museum. These Memoirs are a most witty and spirited history of daily life, daily manners, daily feelings, in the court of Louis the Fifteenth during the latter part of the life of that monarch. They are full of charming stories, traits of character, historical secrets, and sketches of character, drawn either from nature happily and ably, or else from the invention of a great master : either Du BARRI wrote these Memoirs, and was a charming compound of beauty and wit ; or France possesses a man of ingenuity and talent far beyond any we supposed at this moment existing in that country. The publishers vouch for the genuineness of the book, and they have deposited the MSS. at the office of a notary in Paris in order to he verified. We have ourselves seen a gentleman who has examined them: but who now knows the handwriting of Du BARRI? who can tell a MS. of 1789 from one of 1820, provided the matters of paper and ink are ingeniously contrived? And yet, can we suppose an individual with the powers necessary to write this uncommonly clever book, would condescend to so gratuitous a farce ? Undoubtedly, reckoning up in our minds both sides of the question, we were never so nearly in a state of balance in any critical question. In every page there are traits which force an exclamation of their truth—of the impossibility of forgery ; and yet every page perhaps contains something or other which we cannot help thinking above Du BARRI'S powers, or at least with too much the air of the experience of the last forty years. However, of this we feel clear—either these are the genuine Memoirs of DU BARRI, or France has produced another BEAUMARCHAIS. This is the unique book of all the boudoirs of France at this.moment. It is not one we should recommend to the females of our own country ; all men, however, who are interested in the late history of France—all men who have a taste for the most spirited of French memoirs—all men who love to see corruption, profligacy, misgovernment, and baseness, exposed, ridiculed and laughed down—must follow our recommendation, and read this book. It is a fortnight of delight to the amateur of books of manners. • The Countess Du BARRI, the last Mistress of Louis the Fifteenth, was guillotined in the Revolution. The Memoirs are said to have been originally written in the form of letters to a M. de V—, who also fell a victim to revolutionary fury. The MSS. he had concealed in a secret closet in his house, with a view to avoid the mischief they might have drawn upon him had they been found in -his possession.
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