Note 132 — Aphrodisiacs and Anti-Aphrodisiacs: (continued 2)

Née dans une condition obscure, vouée au libertinage dés sa plus tendre jeunesse, autant par goût que par état, Made. Du Barry ne put offrir à son auguste amant, malgré la fleur de la jeunesse et les brillants appas dont elle étoit encore pourvue, que les restes de la plus vile canaille, de la prostitution." Vie privée des maîtresses de Louis XV., p. 153.—"You are no doubt curious to hear an opinion of Madame Du Barri's beauty from the lips of one who has seen her both in her days of prosperity and after her downfall. She was a person of small, almost diminutive stature, extremely frail and delicate in feature, which saved her from being vulgar; but even from the first, she always wore that peculiarly fane look which she owed to a youth of dissipation, a maturity of unbounded indulgence. At the period of my visit she was about thirty-six years of age, but, from her child-like form and delicacy of countenance, appeared much younger, and her gambades and unrestrained gestures of supreme delight on having, as she said, quelqu'un à qui parler, did not seem displaced. Although alone, and evidently not in expectation of visitors, her toilet was brilliant and recherché, the result of the necessity of killing time."—"Talleyrand Papers."