Vignet was a nephew of the Counts de Maistre, two of whom were distinguished in the political arena and world of letters. Lamartine was received by the elders as a son, and the younger members of the family as a brother. He remained with them during the summer. The wholesome influence took his mind away from the philosophy of the guardhouse and the effeminate literature then current in France. It was indeed an important epoch in his history. Time, death, difference of country and opinion afterward separated them, but he always vividly remembered that summer at the house of Colonel de Maistre and Louis de Vignet. A diversion of the household consisted of recitations of verse. Vignet had collected a large number of effusions which were current among the Savoyards. Lamartine also ventured to recite his own verses before Colonel de Maistre and his daughters. The old man admired his pure French diction and predicted to his nephew that Lamartine would become distinguished. Another summer found Lamartine at home in Milly. The family had gone away; the father and uncles to a hunting party in Burgundy, the mother on a journey, and the sisters on visits to friends, or to the convent. He was left alone with no companionship but an old servant-woman, his horse and his dog. The silence, the loneliness of the garden, and the empty rooms reminded him of the tomb. It was in keeping with his state of mind. He felt himself, or rather he desired to feel himself dead. In this mood he again resumed familiar relations with the Abbé Dumont, his former schoolmaster at Bussières. The abbé had himself become the parish priest. There had been a tragedy in his life before he gave up his place in the world to take orders. He was the original of Jocelyn in Lamartine's little poem. Lamartine rode daily to the parsonage. The two discoursed on topics more or less abstruse, such as the state of man on the earth, the vanity of ambition, the religions, philosophies and literature of different peoples, the esteem bestowed on one great man over another, the superiority of certain authors to their rivals, the greatness of spirit in some and littleness in others. To set forth their views they quoted authors of every age, like Plato, Cicero, Seneca, Fénélon, Bossuet, Voltaire, Rousseau. Poetry was more severely handled. Dumont appreciated only the sense of language, and did not care for the musicalness of what was uttered. They both agreed that in the study of rhythm and the mechanic consonance of rhyme there was a puerile attempt to associate a sensual delight of sound to some grand thought or manly sentiment. Versifying pertains to the speech of a people's infancy, prose to that of its maturity.