ABSTRACT
IT appears ridiculous to include a woman’s name in the list of “Literary and Scientific Men.” This blunder must be excused; we could not omit a name so highly honourable to her country as that of madame de Sevigne, in a series of biography whose intent is to give an account of the persons whose genius has adorned the world. The subject of this memoir herself would have been very much surprised to find her name included in the list of French writers. She had no pretensions to authorship; and the delightful letters which have immortalised her wit, her sense, and the warm affections of her heart, were written without the slightest idea intruding that they would ever be read, except by her to whom they were addressed. The Bretons even scarcely consider themselves French.
