hu, whose ninety-eighth birthday we
celebrated yesterday evening by a dinner at Voisin's? Lavaux suggested
it, and if it cost me 40L., it gave me the opportunity of counting my
men. We were twenty-five at table, all Academicians, except Picheral,
Lavaux, and myself. I have the votes of seventeen or eighteen; the rest
are uncertain, but well disposed. Dinner very well served, and very
chatty.

By the way, I have asked Lavaux to come to Clos Jallanges for his
holiday. He is librarian of the Bibliotheque Mazarine. He shall have
the large room in the wing, looking out on the pheasants. I don't
think highly of his character, but I must have him; he is the Duchess's
'zebra'! Did I tell you that a zebra in ladies' language is a bachelor
friend, unoccupied, discreet, and quick, kept always at hand for errands
and missions too delicate to be trusted to a servant? In the
intervals of his diplomacy a young zebra may sometimes get particular
gratifications, but as a rule the animal is tame and wants little,
content with small promotion, a place at the bottom of the table, and
the honour of showing his paces before the lady and her friends. Lavaux,
I fancy, has made his place profitable in other ways. He is so clever
and, in spite of his easy manner, so much dreaded. He knows, as he says,
'the servants' hall' of two establishments, literature and politics, and
he shows me the holes and traps of which the road to the Institute is
full. Astier, my master, does not know them to this day. In his grand
simplicity he has climbed straight up, unaware of danger, with his eyes
upon the dome, confident in his strength and his labour. A hundred times
he would have broken his neck, if his wife, the cleverest of clever
women, had not guided him unperceived.

It was Lavaux who dissuaded me from publishing between this and the next
vacancy my 'Thoughts of a Rustic.' 'No, no,' said he to me, 'you have
done enough. You might well even let it be understood that you will
not write any more. Your work is over, and you are a mere gentleman at
large. The Academie loves that.' I put that with the valuable hint from
Picheral: 'Do not take them your books.'

The fewer your works, I see, the better your claim. Picheral has much
influence; he too must come to us this summer. Put him on the second
floor, in what was the box-room, or somewhere. Poor Germaine, it is a
great bother for you, and ill as you are! But where's the help? It is
bad enough not to have