He seemed buried in thought for a few moments. ‘No,’ he said at last, ‘men’s idiocy and ill-nature respect nothing. In Catherine’s case these two have endeavoured to sully the grandeur one admires; in Marie-Antoinette the grace and beauty one worships. France has a few pages in her annals which one day she will wish to tear up. After having most grossly slandered the most beautiful and the most sympathetic of queens, whose goodness of heart, which was that of an angel, no one could appreciate better than I, and whose soul without reproach was as pure and as white as her face, the cannibals immolated her as an offering to their bloodthirsty liberty.’ At these words his voice grew low, and his eyes filled with tears. The tears of such a friend, of an old man and a wise one, were the most eloquent tribute to Marie-Antoinette’s memory. ‘This is my study,’ he said, opening another door, ‘and here I am free from the intrusion of all those parrots who besiege me in my little house on the wall. Here I let my pen wander as my imagination and whim prompt me.’ He showed me a great many works completed, and a number of unfinished manuscripts. ‘All this has been written for myself, to satisfy the cravings of my own heart. They are what actors would call “my asides.”’ I asked him if the world at large was not to benefit by his lessons of experience. ‘No, no,’ he replied, ‘I have too often had proof that here below a man’s reputation depends upon those who have none. And what, when all is said and done, is this glory before which one bows down, and which one pursues with all one’s might? The same day witnesses its birth and its death, so short, after all, is life. Ypsilanti, about whom we have chatted so often, has gloriously lost his arm. When at present he makes his appearance in a drawing-room, he is surrounded, he is pointed out to public curiosity, and people tell of the battle in which he distinguished himself. To-day he is a young hero; before many springs pass over our heads, and they pass very quickly, people will call him the old cripple. ‘Never had a woman a more glorious welcome than that accorded to Mme. de Staël in Vienna six years ago. Her arrival and her stay constituted, as it were, a date, for people still say--“When Mme. de Staël was here.” Well, the enthusiasm was soon succeeded by a spirit of criticism the reverse of good-natured. Nevertheless, if there be anything in this world which is _not_ all vanity, assuredly it is the admiration one inspires; but how long does that admiration last? At the outset Mme. de Staël carried all hearts, and conquered all minds.’ ‘Not in virtue of her personal attractions, for even in her portraits she did not seem to me sufficiently good-looking to please.’