erformed, rendered him an
irresistible attraction, especially to the ladies, who appear to have
almost idolized him. Endowed with an enchanting voice, he could also
play every instrument then in vogue, but especially excelled upon the
violin, which he could handle in such a manner as to give it the effect
of a small orchestra. Cotemporary writers declare that, in his more
ordinary performances, a connoisseur could distinctly hear the separate
tones of a full quartet when the count was extemporizing on his favorite
Cremona. His little work, entitled "La Musique Raisonnee," published in
England, for private circulation only, bears testimony to his musical
genius, and to the wondrous eccentricity, as well as beauty, of his
conceptions. But it was in alectromancy, or divination by signs and
circles; hydromancy, or divination by water; cleidomancy, or divination
by the key, and dactylomancy, or divination by the fingers, that the
count chiefly excelled, although he, at the same time, professed
alchemy, astrology, and prophecy in the higher branches.

The fortunes of the Count St. Germain rose so rapidly in France, that in
1760 he was sent by Louis XV, to the Court of England, to assist in
negotiations for a peace. M. de Choiseul, then Prime Minister of France,
however, greatly feared and detested the Count; and secretly wrote to
Pitt, begging the latter to have that personage arrested, as he was
certainly a Russian spy. But St. Germain, through his attendant sprites,
of course, received timely warning, and escaped to the Continent. In
England, he was the inseparable friend of Prince Lobkowitz--a
circumstance that gave some color to his alleged connection with the
Russians. His sojourn there was equally distinguished by his devotion to
the ladies, and his unwavering success at the gaming-table, where he won
fabulous sums, which were afterward dispensed with imperial munificence.
It was there, too, that he put forward his claims to the highest rank in
Masonry; and, of course, added, thereby, immensely to the _eclat_ of his
position. He spoke English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian,
German, Russian, Polish, the Scandinavian, and many of the Oriental
tongues, with equal fluency; and pretended to have traveled over the
whole earth, and even to have visited the most distant starry orbs
frequently, in the course of a lifetime which, with continual
transmigrations, he declared to have lasted for thousands of years. His
birth,