What
is evident is, that Goethe saw in her the type of a high-bred woman
such as had not yet crossed his path. In his reminiscence of her, his
words have a warmth which is in notable contrast to the coldness of
his portrait of Lotte Buff. "She was a most wonderful woman," he
writes; "I knew no other to compare with her. Slight and delicately
formed, rather tall than short, she had contrived even in advanced
years to retain a certain elegance both of form and bearing which
pleasingly combined the manner of a Court lady with that of a
dignified burgess's wife."[129] In addition to these graces, Frau von
la Roche had precisely the temperament and the mental qualities that
appealed to Goethe in the emotional phase through which he was now
passing. She lived in the same world of sentiment as the ladies of the
Darmstadt circle, and she had the gift of effusive utterance, as she
had shown in a novel in the manner of Richardson which had brought her
some celebrity.
[Footnote 128: In point of fact, Goethe announced himself. Merck
arrived after him.]
[Footnote 129: In a letter to Schiller (July 24th, 1799) Goethe gives
a much less favourable estimate of Frau von la Roche, whom he had just
met: "Sie gehoert zu den nivellierenden Naturen, sie hebt das Gemeine
herauf und zieht das Vorzuegliche herunter.
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