SILHOUETTES OF STRANGE WOMEN.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 106, 5 May 1923, Page 19

SILHOUETTES OF STRANGE WOMEN.

" THE CHEVALIERE D'EON." THE MYSTEKY MAN-WOMAN OF THE FKEN'CH COUKT. (V. METHLET.) Here Is a problem In wblch the small '■'•ft>-i ■■' mull* n world's difference Chevalier or Cbevallere, that is the question and a ijuestion which troubled Europe considerably rather more than a century ago. solved; even now, some Bay one thins, some another. But we will take it here that the I'lievallere D'J-.'on was n woman, since the probabilities seem to point that way.

I/Kou u-n» liorn iit Tonnerre In Burgundy in the year 1725. and whilst still very young, as the practicn was In those days, received a cornetcy of dragoons from tLe Prince de Conii. and inter served as A.!).('. vrlth Marshal de Erogllo on the Kliine. lie—or she, but It will perhapß be best to stick to one pronoun at a time— was a slim, unusual-looking youngster, very brave and very reckless. It was rumoured that he liad been concerned In at least elt affairs of honour before h« was twenty years old. Upsides possessing undoubted soldierly cj.ialiti.-s. D'Eon was also extremely quick-witted, and wns sent ns Secretary of Location on several important diploma tie mUslons to foreign Courts, where his gift of languages served him well. For these Rervlces, especially at London and St. Petersburg, the Trench King. Louis XV., bestowed upon him the Order of St. Louis, thus creating him a "Chevalier. ,,

Ij) to this point—somewhere about the year 1760—we do not find that any doubts regarding the "Chevalier's" sex had become public, but on a certain mission to Russia, the Petersburg gossips begain to whisper strange things—and the rumours spread like Bre In tinder.

In 1771, rcEon was sent on a political mission to London, more or less secretly, for at that moment most Important French diplomacy was inclined to camouflage. The Chevalier was a useful agent, since he spoke English extremely well, but it was now chat it began-to be said in London, quite openly, that "he" was a woman. By this time, the mysterious personage was about forty years old, and certainly, to judge from his portraits, he showed no conceivable traces of womanly beauty. These prints show him as gaunt, with deep-set eyes, an ugly nose and a queer, inscrutable mouth.

But the rumours grew and Increased and the England of that day. The sex of the Chevallor was made the subject of bets, and gambling policies of insurance, to an extremely large amount, were effected with regard to the "Mystery Man." These most exlraordinary proceedings become public in 3777, when an action was brought, before Lord Justice Mansfielrl, to recover X7OO. The plaintlfT was n Burgeon, called Hayes, and the defendant .Taques, a broker, wbo received premiums of fifteen guineas, for every one of which he engaged to return one hundred guineas, when it could be

proved that the Chevalier was a woman. On his slile, Hayes brought forward two that this was the fact, unci that D'Kon was not a man. Although the judge expressed great disapproval of the whole transaction, verdict for Hayes was accordingly given.

Naturally, as a sequel to this suit, the

was lu-rused of having al>rtt<-<l these pnmblinsr transactions, anil of sharing In the 111-gotten profits. Public opinion ran lllpll in Ihe matter, one] DT..,n was obliged to leave Knj,'land, after publishing a protest in the newspapers. In this curious effusion "he" protests vehemently nsalnst the idea fif l:a vms obt n in<*<] any monetary pain, mid declares that the bad faith of the French witnesses can Ijc proved. But no definite statement is made recording the sex of the writer, only such equivocal phrases are used as that which follows: "I had rather perish of the sex imputed to mc. My sex was never inquired into when I was sent to Dght !ind nepotiatc with the enemies of my country. I leave with pain my dear England, to be near to an august master."

Thnt mißust innstt-r -the newly-made Kl'iß, I Louis XVl.—seems to liave taken rather a curious line of action with regard to the I returned Chevalier. All the rumours rejrardlns "his" sex were confirmed and made Concrete, when, by the direct command of the Kins of France, she was ordered from | henceforth to wear the dress of a female— which dress she did not relinquish for the rest of her life. In 1783, the Chevalier returned to England, and lived there, on I her Royal pension, until deprived of it by I the French Revolution. It is at this point that her nij-sterious personality asrain reappears In a most extraordinary correspondence with Anarcharsis Clootz, tire Republican and self-styled "Orator of the Human dressed to "Genevleve D'Eon," and in it he says: "I BUbmlt to the heroine of our age that now Is the time to put the seal to her glory by arming herself cap-a-pie, like Joan of Arc, to aid us in delivering the world from the race of tyrants. You sleep, D'Eon, you sleep—march, for shame!" Clootz ran on in this style for pages, and in the Chevallere"* answer, she assume* womanhood without a question. "When 1 ro elve a friendly summons to the field of battle. I a:n not the woman to hang back,' she says. ... "I detest the female gacD ns much as those who have compelled mc in wear It. Dressed always in n r ; aln Mack sown. I won.- perpetual mourning as t'.:e widow dv secrete nf Louis XV. Klnce 1777. when I loft London to repair to Versailles. I have always worn the dress or my rt'j. to prove to His Majesty my submission to his order*. But now my warlike spirit revolts asalnst my rap and my petticoats: my heart fiercely demands my cn.sq':<\ my sabre and my horse, and above nil, my rank In the Army, to sn and fight against the enemies of my Kin:; and my conntry. . . . Join therefore in supplicating the President and members of the

National Assembly to request for mc tie King's permission to lay aside the dres» of a woman and to go and fight against bis enemies. At si*ty-flve years of age I *o not run after glory like a silly girl."

An extraordinary letter, this, ivltb Its strange reference to Cbevaliere's supposed >r Yen! relations with Louie XV. Was thW the secret of her life? Or was It Just a delusion—the workings of a disordered brain? That can never be known, in any Notional Assembly on tbe 11th of June, 1792, In much tho came words as those of her letter to Ciootz. In It she makes the curious assertion that: "I hare passed successively from the state of a girl to that of a boy; from the state of a man to that of a woman; I have experienced all tn» odd vicissitudes of human life." But the petition got no further than a presentation Interrupted by repeated burets of applause. It was referred to the Military Committee, and there, apparently, the matter ended".

As (he Revolution crashed onwards t> wards the Terror, D'Eoii apparently found lliese events too fiery and mad and dlsTiWlnz. nlid returned to her "dear [England." In the year 17O.j—when she was sixty-seven years of age—v.-c find ber again, in an advertisement, inserted la fiomc of the leading: English papers. "The Cherallere D'Eon embraces the resource of her skill and lons experience in the science of arms, to rut her bread with ber sword. Instead of Idly looking for support from professed friends she relies on the liberunr.>rtunate woman of quality from the

'slings .1 n<l arrows of outrageous fortune' in n foreixn land and In a vale of teare."

This appeal proclaimed picturesquely that the Cbevallere, who was an extremely skilled fencer, had opened an academy to teach the science of arms, and to train the .voting In the use of the rapier, broadsword anil all other weapons. It "Was a curious avocation at the end of a most extraordinary life, and a curious figure the hen" of the Academy inuet have appeared— this gaunt woman, In short black, rusty gown and a fencer's mask and breastplate, who handled her weapons so adroitly and skilfully, and whose deep-set eyes glowed with life still, as she spoke of war, and quoted her fnvourlto Shakespeare, as she told of "disastrous chances," and "moving accidents by flood and field." She "cut her bread with her sword" until the year 1810. when she died, and died, as Blie had lived, an enigma. And an enigma she remains.