od, too, they were so delighted to have
you in that fortified lodge (BOUGE FORTIFIE) that you must be taking
pleasure there, for he that gives pleasure gets it.

"You have already seen the jolly Ambassador of the amiablest Monarch in
the world,"--Camas, a fattish man, on his road to Versailles (who called
at Brussels here, with fine compliments, and a keg of Hungary Wine, as
YOU may have heard whispered). "No doubt M. de Camas is with you. For my
own share, I think it is after you that he is running at present. But
in truth, at the hour while I say this, you are with the King;"--a lucky
guess; King did return to Wesel this very day. "The Philosopher and the
Prince perceive already that they are made for each other. You and M.
Algarotti will say, FACIAMUS HIC TRIA TABERNACULA: as to me, I can only
make DUO TABERNACULA,"--profane Voltaire!

"Without doubt I would be with you if I were not at Brussels; but my
heart is with you all the same; and is the subject, all the same, of a
King who is, formed to reign over every thinking and feeling being. I do
not despair that Madame du Chatelet will find herself somewhere on
your route: it will be a scene in a fairy tale;--she will arrive with a
SUFFICIENT REASON [as your Leibnitz says] and with MONADS. She does not
love you the less though she now believes the universe a PLENUM, and has
renounced the notion of VOID. Over her you have an ascendant which you
will never lose. In fine, my dear Monsieur, I wish as ardently as she to
embrace you the soonest possible. I recommend myself to your friendship
in the Court, worthy of you, where you now are."--TOUT A VOUS, somewhat
rheumatic! [Voltaire, lxxii. p. 243.]

Always an anxious almost tremulous desire to conciliate this big glaring
geometrical bully in red wig. Through the sensitive transparent being of
M. de Voltaire, you may see that feeling almost painfully busy in every
Letter he writes to the Flattener of the Earth.

Chapter IV. -- VOLTAIRE'S FIRST INTERVIEW WITH FRIEDRICH.

At Wesel, in the rear of all this travelling and excitement, Friedrich
falls unwell; breaks down there into an aguish feverish distemper,
which, for several months after, impeded his movements, would he have
yielded to it. He has much business on hand, too,--some of it of prickly
nature just now;--but is intent as ever on seeing Voltaire, among
the first things. Diligently reading in the Voltaire-Friedrich
Correspondence (which is a sad jumble of m