DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.70301#0033
MEMOIRS OF THE CHEVALIER D’EON. 21
Mansfield, when the defendant pleaded a recent act of par-
liament for non-payment, which was admitted to be binding;
so that by this decision all the insurers were deprived of their
expected harvest.
After this trial D’Eon relinquished the habit of a man, and
assumed female attire, which he continued to wear during the
rest of his life. From this procedure, evidently adopted to
countenance the gross perjury of the witnesses, it is impossi-
ble to doubt that he was deeply implicated in this most dis-
graceful transaction; although, at his departure from Eng-
land, in 1777, he declared in the most solemn manner, that
he had no interest whatever in the policies respecting his
sex. It is easy to believe that the person who could lend
himself to so infamous a fraud, would not feel much scruple
io assert a falsehood.
On leaving this country D’Eon returned once more to
France, where he avowed himself a woman, and was treated
as such. Some curious particulars accounting for the origi-
nal adoption of the masculine character of this supposed fe-
male, and describing the awkwardness occasioned by her
resumption of the habit of her sex, were soon afterwards cir-
culated at Paris, if not by the Chevalier himself, yet most
probably with his approbation. It was stated that “ the dis-
guise of Mademoiselle D’Eon,” as he was now styled, “ and
the singular education which she had received, were owing to
the caprice of her father, who was ardently desirous of having
a boy; and though his wife lay in afterwards of a girl, the
father, still attached to his object, cried “ no matter for that,
I will bring her up as a boy.” Her desire of returning to
France, induced her, it is said, to own her sex. She has now
appeared, it is well known, at Paris, in all companies, dressed
like a woman, for the first time in her life, and at the age of
forty-nine years.
“ D’Eon owns that this garb seems very strange to her, and
that it will be long before she is used to it; she would gladly
Mansfield, when the defendant pleaded a recent act of par-
liament for non-payment, which was admitted to be binding;
so that by this decision all the insurers were deprived of their
expected harvest.
After this trial D’Eon relinquished the habit of a man, and
assumed female attire, which he continued to wear during the
rest of his life. From this procedure, evidently adopted to
countenance the gross perjury of the witnesses, it is impossi-
ble to doubt that he was deeply implicated in this most dis-
graceful transaction; although, at his departure from Eng-
land, in 1777, he declared in the most solemn manner, that
he had no interest whatever in the policies respecting his
sex. It is easy to believe that the person who could lend
himself to so infamous a fraud, would not feel much scruple
io assert a falsehood.
On leaving this country D’Eon returned once more to
France, where he avowed himself a woman, and was treated
as such. Some curious particulars accounting for the origi-
nal adoption of the masculine character of this supposed fe-
male, and describing the awkwardness occasioned by her
resumption of the habit of her sex, were soon afterwards cir-
culated at Paris, if not by the Chevalier himself, yet most
probably with his approbation. It was stated that “ the dis-
guise of Mademoiselle D’Eon,” as he was now styled, “ and
the singular education which she had received, were owing to
the caprice of her father, who was ardently desirous of having
a boy; and though his wife lay in afterwards of a girl, the
father, still attached to his object, cried “ no matter for that,
I will bring her up as a boy.” Her desire of returning to
France, induced her, it is said, to own her sex. She has now
appeared, it is well known, at Paris, in all companies, dressed
like a woman, for the first time in her life, and at the age of
forty-nine years.
“ D’Eon owns that this garb seems very strange to her, and
that it will be long before she is used to it; she would gladly