"What time is it?" Talma continued, not seeing her. "Six o'clock, uncle." "It is always six o'clock with you." He tried to set going the repeater of his watch. "I cannot any longer hear my watch," he said. "Would you like a timepiece?" "Yes; go and fetch me the one out of my bedroom." His nephew went, and Madame Talma was exposed to view. "Ah! there you are, Caroline," he said; "we must now put matters right for you." His nephew brought the clock and put it on the night table. "I am very unsightly, am I not, my good Amédée?" Talma remarked. "My beard is so long...." "You shall have it trimmed to-day." "Give me a looking-glass." He took it and looked at himself. "I tell you, Amédée, I am losing my sight; for pity's sake, have something done for my eyes. Oh! I shall lose them--I cannot see at all to-day." The lawyers arrived and, with them, M. Davilliers. But Talma tried in vain to discuss business matters--he was past all that; he could only speak in whispers, although he believed he was speaking very loudly, and his speech grew more and more indistinct. MM. Arnault and de Jouy were announced. Talma signed for them to be brought to him. M. Arnault embraced Talma, to whom he was tenderly attached, and, as he did so, the word "Adieu" escaped from his lips. "Are you going away, then?" asked Talma. "Yes," Amédée answered hastily, "these gentlemen are going to Brussels." Both men embraced him and, to hide their sobs, rushed quickly from the room; as Talma saw them go out he said-- "Quite right, be quick and go, then I shall hope to see you again soon; the sooner you go, the sooner you will come back." When MM. de Jouy and Arnault had gone away, his two children were brought him, and Talma held out his hands to them, to be kissed. A few minutes later, he uttered three words-- "Voltaire!... like Voltaire!..." Then, immediately afterwards, he murmured-- "The cruellest thing of all is to lose one's sight." The next moment, some piece of furniture cracked very loudly, and Talma turned his head in the direction of the sound. A lady who had just arrived took advantage of this movement to say-- "Talma, it is I, Mademoiselle Menocq." The dying man made a slight token of acknowledgment and pressed her hand. It struck half-past eleven. Talma took his handkerchief in both hands, lifted it up slowly to his mouth, wiped his lips and then put it behind his head, still holding it in both hands. After the lapse of a few seconds, his hands released their hold and fell down by his sides. His nephew took hold of the hand nearest him, and felt that his pressure was returned feebly. At eleven thirty-five, without any convulsion or muscular contraction of the face, one sigh escaped his lips--it was his last breath. When Garrick died, four peers of England claimed it as an honour to bear the four corners of his pall, and to follow their English Roscius to his resting-place among the tombs of kings.