als, the other
tutors; when the Grand Conde died, La Bruyere got rid of his dreadful
pupil as well. We find him no longer "precepteur," but "gentilhomme de
M. le Duc,"--no longer, that is, a mere scholastic drudge, but a sort
of lord-in-waiting. He had probably a large increase of salary, since
in 1687 he seems to have resigned his "charge" at Caen. Instead of
being pinned to the dark apartment in the recesses of the Cite, he now
revolved in ceaseless movement between Chantilly and Fontainebleau,
Paris and Versailles. He became a sort of confidential reader to the
Duke and Duchess, an essential part of the suite. After the first
years, he had a great deal of leisure. He could retire to the security
of a handsomely furnished apartment--upholstered in green--on the
second floor of the Hotel de Conde, opposite the Luxembourg, and he
had another set of rooms at Versailles. The bondage became, I expect,
no real bondage at all.

But why had he, so long completely his own master, consented to become
the servant even of famous Royal princes? I think that as mothers
accept irksome situations for the support of their children, so La
Bruyere became the serf of the Condes for the sake of his book. For it
is now time to reveal the fact that in this apparently listless, empty
life there was one absorbing secret interest. This was the collection
of the maxims, reflections, pictures, and what not which he had been
quietly absorbing and turning into the honey of more and more
exquisite prose ever since his early youth. I think that La Bruyere
deliberately accepted all that might prove irksome in the captivity to
the House of Conde for the sole sake of his book. He needed to see
more types, and types of a more brilliant and effective kind than he
could become familiar with in his mediocre condition. He knew all that
was to be known about the artizans and the shopkeepers of the Cite; he
wanted to examine the rulers of society, and while he watched them
like a naturalist, they might make what contortions they pleased. How
did one of his contemporaries describe him? "When Menippe leaves his
home, it is for the purpose of studying the attitudes of the whole
human race and of painting them from the life. But he is not merely a
portrait-painter, he is an anatomist as well. Do you see that vain and
arrogant fellow in the midst of his good fortune? He is enchanted to
think Menippe is admiring him. What a mistake! At this very moment
Menippe is