In fact I was so delicate that the doctors held out little hope of my living, and on their advice I was left in the country with my nurse until I was two years old.
While my aunt had had a remarkable education, my mother had not been so widely taught.

But she made up for any lack by the display of an imagination and an eager power of assimilation which bordered on the miraculous.

She often told me about an uncle who was very fond of her--he had been ruined in the cause of Philippe Egalite.

This uncle was an artist, but he was, nevertheless, passionately fond of music.

He had even built with his own hands a concert organ on which he used to play.
My mother used to sit between his knees and, while he amused himself by running his fingers through her splendid black hair, he would talk to her about art, music, painting--beauty in every form.