Still, in spite of age and sickness, d’Eon never quite resigned himself to his sad lot, and remained to the end as indomitable in his energy as he was tenacious in his hope of better days to come, renewing his appeals for permission to return to France and preparing for his departure. He succeeded in interesting in his cause the Citoyen Otto, the Commissioner of the Republic in London, through whom he sent, on June 18, 1800, to Talleyrand, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, a lengthy petition in which he recapitulated his services and enumerated his misfortunes. I have fought the good fight; I am seventy-three years of age; I have a sabre-cut on my head, a broken leg and two bayonet-thrusts. In 1756 I contributed largely to the reunion of France and Russia. In 1762 and 1763 I laboured night and day to establish peace between France and England. I was in direct and secret correspondence with Louis XV. from 1756 to the year of his death. My head belongs to the war department, my heart to France, and my gratitude to Citizen Charles Max Talleyrand, the worthy minister for foreign affairs, who will do me justice, and will not leave me to die of despair and starvation. Despair was not a salient feature in d’Eon’s character, for at the moment he sent this doleful letter he was engaged in preparing an edition of Horace, and an Englishman offered him, with a view to this work, a collection of all the old editions of the Latin poet from 1476 to 1789. His poverty was such, however, that he was reduced to pawning his Cross of Saint Louis and his jewels; but at the same time he obtained from Citizen Otto a passport to Paris and Tonnerre. His friends in France did not fail to encourage him in his projects, and promised him their support. Barthélemy, formerly chargé d’affaires in London during the Revolution and now a senator highly esteemed by Bonaparte, offered to present to the all-powerful First Consul the Chevalière, famous of yore, who had assisted him more than once to do the honours of the French embassy. This is what his friend Falconnet wrote to him, on September 13, 1802: But you, my illustrious friend, what will you do? I still advise you to set out. The longer you wait the harder you will find it. Remember the man in Horace: Rusticus expectat dum defluat amnis; at ille Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis ævum.