Part 39

SOMMERVIEUX (Theodore de), a painter, winner of the prix de Rome, knight of the Legion of Honor, was particularly successful in interiors; and excelled in chiaro-oscuro effects, in imitation of the Dutch. He made an excellent reproduction of the interior of the Cat and Racket, on the rue Saint-Denis, which he exhibited at the Salon at the same time with a fascinating portrait of his future wife, Mademoiselle Guillaume, with whom he fell madly in love, and whom he married in 1808, almost in spite of her parents, and thanks to the kind offices of Madame Roguin, whom he knew in his society life. The marriage was not a happy one; the daughter of the Guillaumes adored Sommervieux without understanding him. The painter often neglected his rooms on the rue des Trois-Freres (now a part of the rue Taitbout) and transferred his homage to the Marechale de Carigliano. He had an income of twelve thousand francs; before the Revolution his father was called the Chevalier de Sommervieux. [At the Sign of the Cat and Racket.] Theodore de Sommervieux designed a monstrance for Gohier, the king's goldsmith; this monstrance was bought by Madame Baudoyer and given to the church of Saint-Paul, at the time of the death of F. de la Billardiere, head clerk of the administration, whose position she desired for her husband. [The Government Clerks.] Sommervieux also drew vignettes for the works of Canalis. [Modeste Mignon.]

SOMMERVIEUX (Madame Theodore de), wife of the preceding, born Augustine Guillaume, about 1792, second daughter of the Guillaumes of the Cat and Racket (a drapery establishment on the rue Saint-Denis, Paris), had a sad life that was soon wrecked; for, with the exception of Madame Roguin, her family never understood her aspirations to a higher ideal, or the feeling that prompted her to choose Theodore de Sommervieux. Mademoiselle Guillaume was married about the middle of the Empire, at her parish church, Saint-Leu, on the same day that her sister was married to Lebas, the clerk, and immediately after the ceremony referred to. A little less coarse in her feelings than her parents and their associates, but insignificant enough at best, without being aware of it she displeased the painter, and chilled the enthusiasm of her husband's studio friends, Schinner, Bridau, Bixiou, and Lora. Grassou, who was very much of a countryman, was the only one that refrained from laughing at her. Worn out at last, she tried to win back the heart that had become the possession of Madame de Carigliano; she even went to consult her rival, but could not use the weapons supplied her by the coquettish wife of the marshal, and died of a broken heart shortly after the famous ball given by Cesar Birotteau, to which she was invited. She was buried in Montmartre cemetery. [At the Sign of the Cat and Racket. Cesar Birotteau.]

SONET, marble-worker and contractor for tombstones, at Paris, during the Restoraton and Louis Philippe's reign. When Pons died, the marble-worker sent his agent to Schmucke to solicit an order for statues of Art and Friendship grouped together. Sonet had the draughtsman Vitelot as partner. The firm name was Sonet & Co. [Cousin Pons.]

SONET (Madame), wife of the preceding, knew how to lavish attentions no less zealous than selfish on W. Schmucke, when he returned, broken-hearted, from Pere-Lachaise, in April, 1845, and suggested to him, with some modifications however, to take certain allegorical monuments which the families of Marsay and Keller had formerly refused, preferring to apply to a genuine artist, the sculptor Stidmann. [Cousin Pons.]

SOPHIE, rival, namesake and contemporary of the famous Sophie, Doctor Veron's "blue ribbon," about 1844, was cook to the Comte Popinot on the rue Basse-du-Rempart, Paris. She must have been a remarkable culinary artist, for Sylvain Pons, reduced, in consequence of breaking with the Camusots, to dining at home, on the rue de Normandie, every day, often exclaimed in fits of melancholy, "O Sophie!" [Cousin Pons.]

SORBIER, a Parisian notary, to whom Chesnel (Choisnel) wrote, in 1822, from Normandie, to commend to his care the rattle-brained Victurnien d'Esgrignon. Unfortunately Sorbier was dead, and the letter was sent to his widow. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]

SORBIER (Madame), wife of the preceding, mentioned in Chesnel's (or Choisnel's) letter of 1822, concerning Victurnien d'Esgrignon. She scarcely read the note, and simply sent it to her deceased husband's successor, Maitre Cardot. Thus the widow unwittingly served M. du Bousquier (du Croisier), the enemy of the D'Esgrignons. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]

SORIA (Don Ferdinand, Duc de), younger brother of Don Felipe de Macumer, overwhelmed with kindness by his elder brother, owing him the duchy of Soria as well as the hand of Marie Heredia, both being voluntarily renounced by the elder brother. Soria was not ungrateful; he hastened to his dying brother's bedside in 1829. The latter's death made Don Ferdinand Baron de Macumer. [Letters of Two Brides.]

SORIA (Duchesse de), wife of the preceding, born Marie Heredia, daughter of the wealthy Comte Heredia, was loved by two brothers, Don Ferdinand, Duc de Soria, and Don Felipe de Macumer. Though betrothed to the latter, she married the former, in accordance with her wishes, the Baron de Macumer having generously renounced her hand in favor of Don Ferdinand. The duchess retained a feeling of deep gratitude to him for his unselfishness, and at a later time bestowed every care on him in his last illness (1829). [Letters of Two Brides.]

SORMANO, the "shy" servant of the Argaiolos, at the time of their exile in Switzerland, figures, as a woman, under the name of Gina, in the autobiographical novel of Albert Savarus, entitled "L'Ambitieux par l'Amour." [Albert Savarus.]

SOUCHET, a broker at Paris, whose failure ruined Guillaume Grandet, brother of the well-known cooper of Saumur. [Eugenie Grandet.]

SOUCHET (Francois), winner of the prix de Rome for his sculpture, about the beginning of Louis XVIII.'s reign; an intimate friend of Hippolyte Schinner, who confided to him his love for Adelaide Leseigneur de Rouville, and was rallied on it by him. [The Purse.] About 1835, with Steinbock's assistance, Souchet carved the panels over the doors and mantels of Laginski's magnificent house on the rue de la Pepiniere, Paris. [The Imaginary Mistress.] He had given to Florine (afterwards Madame Raoul Nathan) a plaster cast of a group representing an angel holding an aspersorium, which adorned the actress's sumptuous apartments in 1834. [A Daughter of Eve.]

SOUDRY, born in 1773, a quartermaster, secured a valuable friend in M. de Soulanges, then adjutant-general, by saving him at the peril of his own life. Having become brigadier of gendarmes at Soulanges (Bourgogne), Soudry, in 1815, married Mademoiselle Cochet, Sophie Laguerre's former lady's-maid. Six years later, he was put on the retired list, at the request of Montcornet, and replaced in his brigade by Viallet; but, supported by the influence of Francois Gaubertin, he was elected mayor of Soulanges, and became the formidable enemy of the Montcornets. Like Gregoire Rigou, his son's father-in-law, the old gendarme kept as his mistress, under the same roof with his wife, his servant Jeannette, who was younger than Madame Soudry. [The Peasantry.]

SOUDRY (Madame), wife of the preceding, born Cochet in 1763. Lady's-maid to Sophie Laguerre, Montcornet's predecessor at Aigues, she had an understanding with Francois Gaubertin, the steward of the estate, to make a victim of the former opera singer. Twenty days after the burial of her mistress, La Cochet married the brigadier, Soudry, a superb specimen of manhood, though pitted with small-pox. During the reign of Louis XVIII., Madame Soudry, who tried awkwardly enough to imitate her late mistress, Sophie Laguerre, reigned supreme in the society of Soulanges, in her parlor which was the meeting ground of Montcornet's enemies. [The Peasantry.]

SOUDRY, natural son of Soudry, the brigadier of gendarmes; legitimized at the time of his father's marriage to Mademoiselle Cochet, in 1815. On the day on which Soudry became legally possessed of a mother, he had just finished his course at Paris. There he knew Gaubertin's son, during a stay which he had at first intended to make long enough to entitle him to be registered as an advocate, and eventually to enter the legal profession; but he returned to Bourgogne to take charge of an attorney's practice for which his father paid thirty thousand francs. However, abandoning pettifoggery, Soudry soon found himself deputy king's attorney in a department of Bourgogne, and, in 1817, king's attorney under Attorney-General Bourlac, whom he replaced in 1821, thanks to the influence of Francois Gaubertin. He then married Mademoiselle Rigou. [The Peasantry.]

SOUDRY (Madame), wife of the preceding, born Arsene Rigou, the only daughter of wealthy parents, Gregoire Rigou and Arsene Pichard; resembled her father in cunningness of character, and her mother in beauty. [The Peasantry.]

SOULANGES (Comte Leon de), born in 1777, was colonel of the artillery guard in 1809. In the month of November of that year, he found himself the guest of the Malin de Gondrevilles, in their mansion in Paris, on the evening of a great party; he met there Montcornet, a friend of his in the regiment; Madame de Vaudremont, who had once been his mistress, accompanied by the Martial de la Roche-Hugon, her new lover; and finally his deserted wife, Madame de Soulanges, who had abandoned society, but who had come to the senator's house at the instigation of Madame de Lansac, with a view to a reconciliation, which was successfully carried out. [Domestic Peace.] Leon de Soulanges had several children as a result of his marriage; a son and some daughters; having refused one of his daughters in marriage to Montcornet, on the ground that she was too young, he made an enemy of that general. The count, remaining faithful to the Bourbons during the Hundred Days, was made a peer of France and a general in the artillery corps. Enjoying the favor of the Duc d'Angouleme, he was allowed a command during the Spanish war (1823), gained prominence at the seige of Cadiz and attained the highest degrees in the military hierarchy. Monsieur de Soulanges, who was very rich, owned, in the territory of the commune of Blangy (Bourgogne), a forest and a chateau adjoining the Aigues estate, which had itself once belonged to the house of Soulanges. At the time of the Crusades, an ancestor of the count had created this domain. Soulanges's motto was: "Je soule agir." Like M. de Ronquerolles he got on badly enough with his neighbor Montcornet and seemed to favor Francois Gaubertin, Gregoire Rigou and Soudry, in their opposition to the future marshal. [The Peasantry.]

SOULANGES (Comtesse Hortense de), wife of the preceding, and niece of the Duchesses de Lansac and de Marigny. In November, 1809, at a ball given by Malin de Gondreville, acting on the advice of Madame de Lansac, the countess, then on bad terms with her husband, conquered her proud timidity, and demanded of Martial de la Roche-Hugon a ring that she had received originally from her husband; M. de Soulanges had afterwards passed it on to his mistress, Madame de Vaudremont, who had given it to her lover, M. de la Roche-Hugon; this restitution effected the reconciliation of the couple. [Domestic Peace.] Hortense de Soulanges inherited from Madame de Marigny (who died about 1820) the Guebriant estate, with its encumbrance of an annuity. [The Thirteen.] Madame de Soulanges followed her husband to Spain at the time of the war of 1823. [The Peasantry.]

SOULANGES (Amelie de), youngest daughter of the preceding couple, would have married the Comte Philippe de Brambourg, in 1828, but for the condemning revelations made by Bixiou concerning Joseph Bridau's brother. [A Bachelor's Establishment.]

SOULANGES (Vicomte de), probably a brother of the preceding, was, in 1836, commander of a squad of hussars at Fountainebleau; then, in company with Maxime de Trailles, he was going to be second to Savinien de Portenduere in a duel with Desire Minoret, but the duel was prevented by the unforeseen death of the latter; the underlying cause was the disgraceful conduct of the Minoret-Levraults towards Ursule Mirouet, future Vicomtesse de Portenduere. [Ursule Mirouet.]

SOULAS (Amedee-Sylvain-Jacques de), born in 1809, a gentleman of Besancon, of Spanish origin (the name was written Souleyas, when Franche-Comte belonged to Spain), succeeded in shining brightly in the capital of Doubs on an income of four thousand francs, which allowed him to employ the services of "Babylas, the tiger." Such discrepancy between his means and his manner of living may well convey an idea of this fellow's character, seeing that he sought in vain the hand of Rosalie de Watteville, but married, in the month of August, 1837, Madame de Watteville, her widowed mother. [Albert Savarus.]

SOULAS (Madame Amedee de), born Clotilde-Louise de Rupt in 1798, stern in features and in character, a blonde of the extreme type, was married, in 1815, to the Baron de Watteville, whom she managed with little difficulty. She did not find it so easy, however, to govern her daughter, Rosalie, whom she vainly tried to force to marry M. de Soulas. The pressure, at Besancon, of Albert Savarus, who was secretly loved by Mademoiselle de Watteville, gave a political significance to the salon of Rosalie's parents during the reign of Louis Philippe. Tired of her daughter's obstinacy, Madame de Watteville, now a widow, herself married M. de Soulas; she lived in Paris, in the winter at least, and knew how to be mistress of her house there, as she always had been elsewhere. [Albert Savarus.]

SPARCHMANN, hospital surgeon at Heilsberg, attended Colonel Chabert after the battle of Eylau. [Colonel Chabert.]

SPENCER (Lord), about 1830, at Balthazar Claes's sale, bought some magnificent wainscoting that had been carved by Van Huysum, as well as the portrait of President Van Claes, a Fleming of the sixteenth century,--family treasures which the father of Mesdames de Solis and Pierquin was obliged to give up. [The Quest of the Absolute.]

SPIEGHALTER, a German mechanician, who lived in Paris on the rue de la Sante, in the early part of Louis Philippe's reign, made unsuccessful efforts, with the aid of pressure, hammering and rolling, to stretch the anomalous piece of shagreen submitted to him by Raphael de Valentin, at the suggestion of Planchette, professor of mechanics. [The Magic Skin.]

SPONDE (Abbe de), born about 1746, was grand vicar of the bishopric of Seez. Maternal uncle, guardian, guest, and boarder of Madame du Bousquier--_nee_ Cormon--of Alencon; he died in 1819, almost blind, and strangely depressed by his niece's recent marriage. Entirely removed from worldly interests, he led an ascetic life, and an uneventful one, entirely consumed in thoughts of salvation, mortifications of the flesh, and secret works of charity. [Jealousies of a Country Town.]

STAEL-HOLSTEIN (Anne-Louise-Germaine Necker, Baronne de), daughter of the famous Necker of Geneva, born in Paris in 1766; became the wife of the Swiss minister to France; author of "l'Allemagne," of "Corinne," and of "Delphine"; noted for her struggle against Napoleon Bonaparte; mother-in-law of the Duc Victor de Broglie and grandmother of the generation of the Broglies of the present day; died in the year 1817. At various times she lived in the Vendomois in temporary exile. During one of her first stays in the Loire, she was greeted with the singular formula of admiration, "Fameuse garce!" [The Chouans.] At a later period, Madame de Stael came upon Louis Lambert, then a ragged urchin, absorbed in reading a translation of Swedenborg's "Heaven and Hell." She was struck with him, and had him educated at the college of Vendome, where he had the future minister, Jules Dufaure, as his boon companion; but she forgot her protege, who was ruined rather than benefited by this passing interest. [Louis Lambert.] About 1823 Louise de Chaulieu (Madame Marie Gaston) believed that Madame de Stael was still alive, though she died in 1817. [Letters of Two Brides.]

STANHOPE (Lady Esther), niece of Pitt, met Lamartine in Syria, who described her in his "Voyage en Orient"; had sent Lady Dudley an Arabian horse, that the latter gave to Felix de Vandenesse in exchange for a Rembrandt. [The Lily of the Valley.] Madame de Bargeton, growing weary of Angouleme in the first years of the Restoration, was envious of this "blue-stocking of the desert." Lady Esther's father, Earl Charles Stanhope, Viscount Mahon, a peer of England, and a distinguished scholar, invented a printing press, known to fame as the Stanhope press, of which the miserly and mechanical Jerome-Nicholas Sechard expressed a contemptuous opinion to his son. [Lost Illusions.]

STAUB, a German, and a Parisian tailor of reputation; in 1821, made for Lucien de Rubempre, presumably on credit, some garments that he went in person to try on the poet at the Hotel du Gaillard-Bois, on the rue de l'Echelle. Shortly afterwards, he again favored Lucien, who was brought to his establishment by Coralie. [A Distinguished Provincial at Paris.]

STEIBELT, a famous musician, during the Empire was the instructor of Felicite des Touches at Nantes. [Beatrix.]

STEINBOCK (Count Wenceslas), born at Prelie (Livonia) in 1809; great-nephew of one of Charles XII.'s generals. An exile from his youth, he went to Paris to live, and, from inclination as much as on account of his poverty, he became a carver and sculptor. As assistant to Francois Souchet, a fellow-countryman of Laginski's, Wenceslas Steinbock worked on the decorations of the Pole's mansion, on the rue de la Pepiniere. [The Imaginary Mistress.] Living amid squalor on the rue du Doyenne, he was saved from suicide by his spinster neighbor, Lisbeth Fischer, who restored his courage and determination, and aided him with her resources. Wenceslas Steinbock then worked and succeeded. A chance that brought one of his works to the notice of the Hulot d'Ervys brought him into connection with these people; he fell in love with their daughter, and, the love being returned, he married her. Orders then came in quick succession to Wenceslas, living, as he did, on the rue Saint-Dominique-Saint-Germain, near the Esplanade des Invalides, not far from the marble stores, where the government had allowed him a studio. His services were secured for the work of a monument to be erected to the Marechal de Montcornet. But Lisbeth Fischer's vindictive hatred, as well as his own weakness of character, caused him to fall beneath the fatal dominion of Valerie Marneffe, whose lover he became; with Stidmann, Vignon, and Massol, he witnessed that woman's second marriage. Steinbock returned to the conjugal domicile on the rue Louis-le-Grand, towards the latter part of Louis Philippe's reign. An exhausted artist, he confined himself to the barren role of critic; idle reverie replaced power of conception. [Cousin Betty.]

STEINBOCK (Countess Wenceslas), wife of the preceding; born Hortense Hulot d'Ervy in 1817; daughter of Hector Hulot d'Ervy and Adeline Fischer; younger sister of Victorin Hulot. Beautiful, and occupying a brilliant position in society through her parents, but lacking dowry, she made choice of husband for herself. Endowed with enduring pride of spirit, Madame Steinbock could with difficulty excuse Wenceslas for being unfaithful, and pardoned his disloyalty only after a long while. Her trials ended with the last years of Louis Philippe's reign. The wisdom and foresight of her brother Victorin, coupled with the results of the wills of the Marechal Hulot, Lisbeth Fischer, and Valerie Crevel, at last brought wealth to the countess's household, who lived successively on the rue Saint-Dominique-Saint-Germain, the rue Plumet, and the rue Louis-le-Grand. [Cousin Betty.]

STEINBOCK (Wenceslas), only son of the preceding couple, born when his parents were living together, stayed with his mother after their separation. [Cousin Betty.]

STEINGEL, an Alsatian, natural son of General Steingel, who fell at the beginning of the Italian campaigns during the Republic; was, in Bourgogne, about 1823, under head-keeper Michaud, one of the three keepers of Montcornet's estates. [The Gondreville Mystery. The Peasantry.]

STEVENS (Miss Dinah), born in 1791, daughter of an English brewer, ugly enough, saving, and puritanical, had an income of two hundred and forty thousand francs and expectations of as much more at her father's death; the Marquise de Vordac, who met her at some watering-place in 1827, spoke of her to her son Marsay, as a very fine match, and Marsay pretended that he was to marry the heiress; which he probably did, for he left a widow that erected to him, at Pere-Lachaise, a superb monument, the work of Stidmann. [A Marriage Settlement. Cousin Pons.]

STIDMANN, a celebrated carver and sculptor of Paris at the times of the Restoration and Louis Philippe; Wenceslas Steinbock's teacher; he carved, for the consideration of seven thousand francs, a representation of a fox-chase on the ruby-set gold handle of a riding whip that Ernest de la Briere gave to Modeste Mignon. [Modeste Mignon.] At the request of Fabien de Ronceret, Stidmann undertook to decorate an apartment for him on the rue Blanche [Beatrix.], he made the originals of a chimney-piece for the Hulot d'Ervys; was among the guests invited by Mademoiselle Brisetout at her little house-warming on the rue Chauchat (1838); the same year he was present at the celebration of Wenceslas Steinbock's marriage with Hortense Hulot; knew Dorlange-Sallenauve; with Vignon, Steinbock and Massol, he was a witness of Valerie Marneffe's second marriage to Celestin Crevel; entertained a secret love for Madame Steinbock when she was neglected by her husband [The Member for Arcis. Cousin Betty.]; executed the work of Charles Keller's and Marsay's monuments. [Cousin Pons.] In 1845 Stidmann entered the Institute. [The Unconscious Humorists.]

STOPFER (Monsieur and Madame), formerly coopers at Neuchatel, in 1823; were proprietors of an inn at Gersau (canton of Lucerne), near the lake, to which Rodolphe came. The same village sheltered the Gandolphinis, disguised under the name of Lovelace. [Albert Savarus.]

SUCY (General Baron Philippe de), born in 1789, served under the Empire; on one occasion, at the crossing of the Beresina, he tried to assure the safety of his mistress, Stephanie de Vandieres, a general's wife, of whom he afterwards lost all trace. Seven years later, however, being a colonel and an officer in the Legion of Honor, while hunting with his friend, the Marquis d'Albon, near the Isle-Adam, Sucy found Madame de Vandieres insane, under the charge of the alienist Fanjat, and he undertook to restore her reason. With this end in view, he arranged an exact reproduction of the parting scenes of 1812, on an estate of his at Saint-Germain. The mad-woman recognized him indeed, but she died immediately. Having gained the promotion of general, Sucy committed suicide, the prey of incurable despair. [Farewell.]

SUZANNE, real given name of Madame Theodore Gaillard.

SUZANNET was, with the Abbe Vernal, the Comte de Fontaine, and M. de Chatillon, one of the four Vendean chiefs at the time of the uprising in the West in 1799. [The Chouans.]

SUZETTE, during the first years of Louis XVIII.'s reign, was lady's-maid to Antoinette de Langeais, in Paris, about the time that the duchess was receiving attentions from Montriveau. [The Thirteen.]

SUZON was for a long time valet de chambre for Maxime de Trailles. [A Man of Business. The Member for Arcis.]

SYLVIE, cook for Madame Vauquer, the widow, on the rue Neuve-Saint-Genevieve, during the years 1819 and 1820, at the time when Jean-Joachim Goriot, Eugene de Rastignac, Jacques Collin, Horace Bianchon, the Poirets, Madame Couture, and Victorine Taillefer boarded there. [Father Goriot.]

T

TABAREAU, bailiff of the justice of the peace in the eighth ward of Paris in 1844-1845. He was on good terms with Fraisier, the business agent. Madame Cibot, door-keeper, on the rue de Normandie, retained Tabareau to make a demand for her upon Schmucke for the payment of three thousand one hundred and ninety-two francs, due her from the German musician and Pons, for board, lodging, taxes, etc. [Cousin Pons.]

TABAREAU (Mademoiselle), only child of Tabareau, the bailiff; a large, red-haired consumptive; was heir, through her mother, of a house on the Place Royale; a fact which made her hand sought by Fraisier, the business agent. [Cousin Pons.]