A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Souza, Maria Flahault de
SOUZA, MARIA FLAHAULT DE,
Was born at Paris. She married the Chevalier de Souza, ambassador from Portugal to the court of France, and editor of a fine edition of Camoens. Madame de Souza, at that time a widow, was among the noble emigrants who sought shelter in England, from the revolutionary storms of 1789. She had been admired as a brilliant woman of fashion; and it has been said of her, that it was only "necessity, the mother of invention" that had converted her into a successful author.
Her earliest work, "Charles and Marie," was published by subscription in London, and was, in point of time, one of the very first fictions noticed by the Edinburgh Review. Madame de Souza, being on terms of intimacy with Talleyrand, obtained permission to return to France. On being presented to Napoleon, he graciously asked which among her works was her favourite. "Mon meilleur ouvrage, sire, le voice," she replied, introducing her son, the handsome and animated Charles de Flahault, who was soon afterwards appointed aid-de-camp to the emperor, and accompanied him through all his campaigns. The most esteemed of Madame de Souza's novels are, "Eugène de Rothelin," and "Adèle de Senange," both distinguished for moral purity, and a particular delicacy of thought; these books were much admired by the celebrated Charles James Fox. Madame de Souza was educated at that period preceding the revolution, when ladies of rank were taught, at their convents, very little more than to shine in a drawing-room. Madame de Genlis relates, in her entertaining memoirs, the pains she took to induce the Duchess de Chartres, and some other court dames, to learn a little orthography. Their expressions were choice, and their style in speaking faultless; but alas I they could not spell! Madame de Souza used, ingenuously, to avow that this defect of her early education she bad never been able to remedy. At the same time, the critics allow that her French is a model of ease and purity. She died in 1836, at her hotel, Fauboug St. Honoré, surrounded by many attached friends and relatives, having lived to see her grand-children grown up, and her son reinstated in his rank, at the court of the Tuilleries.