Quitting Laval the day after my arrival, I ascended a long and steep
hill, travelled by the side of the forest of Petre, and came to Vitre,
where I remained all night for the purpose of visiting the chateau of
the celebrated Madame de Sevigne,[4] whose estate has descended to a
distant branch of her family, who had the good fortune to save it from
destruction during the revolution. The grounds are kept in excellent
order. Her picture hangs in the apartment in which she composed her
interesting and elegant letters, and every article of furniture
carefully preserved is shown to strangers. The distance from Vitre to
Rennes is seven leagues, over a road which becomes gradually less and
less Interesting.
[Footnote 4: Marie de Rabutin, Marchioness de Sevigne, was the
daughter of the Baron de Chantal, and born in 1626: she espoused at
the age of eighteen the Marquis de Sevigne, who fell in a duel in
1651, leaving her with one son and a daughter, to whose education
she paid strict attention: the daughter married in 1669 the Count de
Grignan, Commandant in Provence, and it was on a visit to her that the
Marchioness caught a fever and died in 1696. Her son Charles, Marquis
de Sevigne, was one of the admirers of Ninon de L'Enclos, and had
a dispute with Madame Dacier respecting the sense of a passage in
Horace. He died in 1713. (Moreri.)]
Rennes is the chief city of the Isle-et-Vilaine, and in former times
was the capital of Bretagne. It is a large ancient built town,
standing on a vast plain, between the rivers Isle and Vilaine.
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