Marseilles, she had written to her father, as we have seen, complaining of the aching pain between the shoulders, that never left her, sure precursor and sign of consumption. Both were already doomed: the career of the one was cut off in the full plenitude of her power and genius; the other only appeared before the public a pale and graceful phantom, pathetic and touching in her youth and tenderness, beside the grandeur and strength of her sister, and then vanished, taking with her all the joy and gladness and the best and purest affection Rachel ever knew.
We have already alluded to her brother Raphaël. She seems to have been attached to him and to have depended on his good sense for the management of her affairs; but she knew his faults, and often had a sly hit at him.
In the letter addressed to M. Jules Lecomte, she makes fun of the company Raphaël had got together to accompany her in 1849, during her tour in the south of France:—
I remember having read in an article of yours this observation, full of rare and deep wisdom, "Les voyages qui forment la jeunesse déforment les cartons à chapeaux." Never has the truth of this maxim been more brought home to me than since I left Paris. I lost a trunk at Mouliers. I saw the box in which my old Rose had packed the "peplum" of the Moineau de Lesbie fly from the top of an imperial to the ground, with a rapidity which ought to excite the emulation of the company got together by Raphaël!
From Liège, however, in June 1847, she wrote to Sarah in enthusiastic terms:—
