“_La calomnie, Monsieur! vous ne savez guère ce que vous dédaignez; j’ai vu des plus honnêtes gens prêts d’en être accablés. Croyez qu’il n’y a pas de plâte méchanceté, pas d’horreurs, pas de conte absurde, qu’on ne fasse adopter aux oisifs d’une grande ville en s’y prenant bien.... D’abord un bruit léger rasant le sol comme hirondelle avant l’orage, +pianissimo+ murmure et file, et sème en courant le trait empoisonné. Telle bouche le recueille, et +piano+, +piano+, vous le glisse en l’oreille adroitement. Le mal est fait; il germe, il rampe, il chemine et +rinforzando+ de bouche en bouche il va le diable; puis tout à coup on ne sait comment, vous voyez la calomnie se dresser, siffler, s’enfler, grandir à vue d’oeil. Elle s’élance, étend son vol, tourbillonne, enveloppe, arrache, entraine, éclate et tonne, et devient, grace au ciel, un cri général, un +crescendo+ public, un +chorus+ universel de haine et de proscription. Qui diable y résisterait?”_ _“Le Barbier de Séville,” Act II, Scene VII._ The Death of Paris Du Verney--The Lawsuit La Blache--Judgment Rendered in Favor of Beaumarchais--The Comte de La Blache-- Appeals to the New Parliament--Private Life of Beaumarchais at This Period. As will be remembered, it was in 1760 that Beaumarchais entered into relationship with Paris du Verney. During the ten years which followed there had been considerable movement of capital between the two, very many business transactions more or less sustained by the old financier, numerous loans of money, and finally the partnership in the forest of Chinon, without their ever having arrived at a definite settlement. Beaumarchais, always minutely careful in matters where money was concerned, realizing the advanced age of du Verney often had urged upon his friend the necessity of such a settlement. Finally in April, 1770, after several years of correspondence, an act was drawn up in duplicate by Beaumarchais, dated, signed, and sealed by du Verney. By this act, after a long and detailed enumeration of the rights on both sides, Beaumarchais gave back to his old friend 160,000 francs of the latter’s notes and consented to the dissolution of the partnership in the Forest of Chinon. Du Verney, on his side, declared Beaumarchais absolved from all debts against him, recognized that he owed the latter 15,000 francs and obliged himself to loan 75,000 francs without interest, for eight years. Du Verney died before the last two clauses had been executed, so that it was to his heir, the Comte de la Blache, that Beaumarchais presented the act demanding its execution. This was the moment for which the count had been so long waiting. Already for years he had been saying of Beaumarchais, “I hate that man as a lover loves his mistress.”