The Count made me a remittance of 12,000 crowns, which I carried to my aunt De Maignelai, telling her that it was a restitution made by one of my dying friends, who made me trustee of it upon condition that I should distribute it among decayed families who were ashamed to make their necessities known, and that I had taken an oath to distribute it myself, persuant to the desire of the testator, but that I was at a loss to find out fit objects for my charity; and therefore I desired her to take the care of it upon her. The good woman was perfectly transported, and said she would do it with all her heart; but because I had sworn to make the distribution myself, she insisted upon it that I must be present, not only for the sake of my promise, but to accustom myself to do acts of charity. This was the very thing I aimed at,--an opportunity of knowing all the poor of Paris. Therefore I suffered myself to be carried every day by my aunt into the outskirts, to visit the poor in their garrets, and I met very often in her house people who were very well clad, and many whom I once knew, that came for private charity. My good aunt charged them always to pray to God for her nephew, who was the hand that God had been pleased to make use of for this good work. Judge you of the influence this gave me over the populace, who are without comparison the most considerable in all public disturbances. For the rich never come into such measures unless they are forced, and beggars do more harm than good, because it is known that they aim at plunder; those, therefore, who are capable of doing most service are such as are not reduced to common beggary, yet so straitened in their circumstances as to wish for nothing more than a general change of affairs in order to repair their broken fortunes. I made myself acquainted with people of this rank for the course of four months with uncommon application, so that there was hardly a child in the chimney-corner but I gratified with some small token. I called them by their familiar names. My aunt, who always made it her business to go from house to house to relieve the poor, was a cloak for all. I also played the hypocrite, and frequented the conferences of Saint Lazarus.