A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Aunoy, Marie Catharine Jumelle de Berneville, Comtesse d'
AUNOY, MARIE CATHARINE JUMELLE DE BERNEVILLE, COMTESSE D',
Widow of the Count D'Aunoy, and niece of the celebrated Madame Desloges, died in 1705. She wrote with ease, though negligently, in the department of romance. People of a frivolous taste still read with pleasure her "Tales of the Fairies," four volumes in duodecimo, and especially her "Adventures of Hippolytus, Earl of Douglas," a story natural and interesting in the stvle, with abundance of the marvellous in the adventures. Her "Mémoires Historiques de ce qui c'est passé de plus Remarquable en Europe depuis 1672 jus qu'en 1679," are a medley of truth and falsehood. She wrote also "Memoirs of the Court of Spain," where she had lived with her mother, a work which presents us with no favourable idea of the Spanish nation. Her Memoirs of the Court of England," was rather better arranged; and a "History of John De Bourbon, Prince de Karency," in three volumes duodecimo, which is one of those historical romances that are the offspring of slender abilities joined to a warm imagination. Her husband, the Count d'Aunoy, being accused of high treason, by three Normans, very narrowly escaped with his head. One of his accusers, struck with remorse of conscience, declared the whole charge to be groundless. The countess died at Paris in January 1705, and left four daughters, one of whom, Madame de Hère, kept alive the family reputation, and was celebrated in verse for wit and talent. "The White Cat," "Cherry and Fair-star," "The Yellow Dwarf," "The Fair one with the Golden Locks," are among the Fairy tales written by le Comptesse d'Aunoy, and on these her principal claim to remembrance now rests; they have been much turned to account by writers of pantomimes and stage spectacles.