There were some allusions to the Regent and Madame du Berri in “Œdipe,” very vociferously applauded, which must have made Maître Arouet groan in spirit and think that after all his Armand, his rigid “fool in prose” at home, was safer to deal with than this “fool in verse” on the boards, who would _not_ be warned and _must_ come to the gallows. But the Regent, like a wise man, hearing of that astounding first night and the allusions, presented the author with a gold medal and a thousand crowns; talked with him publicly at the next Opera ball, and made a point of coming to the performance to show that the arrows could not have been really intended for him after all. As for the Duchesse du Berri, _she_ came five nights in succession to the piece. And of course all the little, witty, disaffected Court of Maine were there too, enjoying those allusions and looking hard at their enemies, the Regent and his daughter. The curtain went down on perhaps the most successful _début_ that ever playwright had made. “Œdipe” ran for forty-five nights. Clever Philip commanded it to Court to be performed before the little Louis XV. The enterprising and energetic young author asked, and obtained, permission to dedicate it, in book form, to downright old Charlotte Elizabeth, the Regent’s mother. He sent a copy, with a flaming sonnet, to George I. of England; and yet another copy to the Regent’s sister, the Duchess of Lorraine, with a letter wherein is to be found his first signature of his new name, Arouet de Voltaire. When the Prince de Conti, his old Temple companion, complimented “Œdipe” and its author in a poem of his own, “Sir,” said Voltaire airily, “you will be a great poet; I must get the King to give you a pension.” The young playwright gained from “Œdipe”--not including the Regent’s present--about four thousand francs, besides a fine capital of fame. He was the old notary’s son to some purpose after all, and began to invest money. As to the fame, he took _that_ very modestly. When the women declared his “Œdipe” to be a thousand times better than his old hero Corneille’s play on the same subject, the young man made the happiest quotation from Corneille himself, disclaiming superiority. He attended every one of the forty-five performances--a learner of his own art and of the actors’. He must have gone back gay and well pleased enough on those evenings to his furnished room in the Rue de Calandre. In the spring of 1719 the faithless and charming Mademoiselle de Livri insisted on his using his influence to get her a good part in his play. Perhaps she, Voltaire, and “little de Génonville” enjoyed themselves about Paris together as before. “Que nous nous aimions tous trois!... que nous étions heureux!” the forsaken lover wrote ten years later in his graceful poem to the memory of de Génonville.