Thiers provided at the earliest possible moment for his mother and grandmother, buying for the latter a pretty little property which she had always coveted, near Aix, and taking his mother to preside over his own home.  But Madame Thiers felt out of place in her son’s life, and preferred to return to the property given to Madame Arnic, where she spent the rest of her days with the old lady.  Lamartine tells a pretty anecdote of Thiers’ relations with his mother.  The poet and the statesman had been dining together at a friend’s house, in 1830, when Thiers was already a cabinet officer.  On leaving together after dinner, they found in the ante-room an elderly woman plainly and roughly dressed.  She was asking for M. Thiers, who, as soon as he saw her, ran to her, clasped her in his arms, kissed her, and then, leading her by both hands up to the poet, cried joyously:  “Lamartine, this is my mother!”

In 1834 Thiers married a beautiful young girl fresh from her pension, Mademoiselle Dosne, who was co-heiress with her mother and her father to a great fortune.  Unhappily Thiers had fallen first in love with the mother; but he accepted the daughter instead.  The early married life of Madame Thiers was saddened by her knowledge of this state of things.  She was devoted to the interests of her husband, and watched over him as a mother might have watched over a child.  She was an accomplished woman and most careful housekeeper, and had received an excellent education.  She knew many languages, and turned all English or German documents required by her husband into French.  She was also a charming hostess, but she lived under the shadow of a great sorrow.

When Thiers was to be married, he paid his father twelve thousand francs (about $2,500) for the legal parental consent which is necessary in a French marriage; but he was by no means anxious to have his irrepressible parent at his wedding.  For three weeks before the event he hired all the places in all the stage-coaches running through Carpentras to Lyons.

In 1840 M. Thiers went out of office, in consequence of a dispute with England about the Eastern Question.  The only charge that his enemies ever brought against him affecting his honor as a politician was that of employing the Jew Deutz to act the part of Judas towards the Duchesse de Berri; but for that he could plead that it solved a difficulty, and probably saved many lives.

During the Second Empire he kept much in retirement.  At first he had thought that Prince Louis Napoleon, seeing in him the historian and panegyrist of the Great Emperor, would call him to his councils.  But he was quite mistaken.  He could not—­nor would he—­have served Louis Napoleon’s turn as did such men as Persigny, Saint-Arnaud, De Maupas, and De Morny.  When the coup d’etat came, Thiers was imprisoned with the other deputies, the only favor allowed him being a bed, while the other deputies had no couch but the floor.