Monsieur le Count de B-, merely because he had done me one kindness
in the affair of my passport, would go on and do me another, the
few days he was at Paris, in making me known to a few people of
rank; and they were to present me to others, and so on.
I had got master of my SECRET just in time to turn these honours to
some little account; otherwise, as is commonly the case, I should
have dined or supp'd a single time or two round, and then, by
TRANSLATING French looks and attitudes into plain English, I should
presently have seen, that I had hold of the couvert {3} of some
more entertaining guest; and in course should have resigned all my
places one after another, merely upon the principle that I could
not keep them. - As it was, things did not go much amiss.
I had the honour of being introduced to the old Marquis de B-: in
days of yore he had signalized himself by some small feats of
chivalry in the Cour d'Amour, and had dress'd himself out to the
idea of tilts and tournaments ever since. - The Marquis de B- wish'd
to have it thought the affair was somewhere else than in his brain.
"He could like to take a trip to England," and asked much of the
English ladies. - Stay where you are, I beseech you, Monsieur le
Marquis, said I. - Les Messieurs Anglois can scarce get a kind look
from them as it is. - The Marquis invited me to supper.
Monsieur P-, the farmer-general, was just as inquisitive about our
taxes. They were very considerable, he heard. - If we knew but how
to collect them, said I, making him a low bow.
I could never have been invited to Mons. P-'s concerts upon any
other terms.
I had been misrepresented to Madame de Q- as an esprit. - Madame de
Q- was an esprit herself: she burnt with impatience to see me, and
hear me talk. I had not taken my seat, before I saw she did not
care a sous whether I had any wit or no; - I was let in, to be
convinced she had. I call heaven to witness I never once opened
the door of my lips.
Madame de V- vow'd to every creature she met - "She had never had a
more improving conversation with a man in her life."
There are three epochas in the empire of a French woman. - She is
coquette, - then deist, - then devote:
