Chapter LXII: Letter LI: THE ROCKS, Sunday, December 1, 1675

Well, my dear, it seems now settled that I am to receive two of your packets together, and miss one post; you should see the faces I make, and how I receive it in comparison with those that come regularly. I am of your opinion, my child, and would give a great deal to be as easy about answering letters as the coadjutor is, and keep them in my pocket for a month or two without troubling my head about them. Well, it is a gift from heaven certainly, this happy indifference! Madame de Langeron used to say of visits, and I apply it to every thing: “What I do fatigues me, and what I omit to do vexes me.” I think this is very well said, and I feel it sensibly. I am always exact, however, in my answers. It is with pleasure I give you the top of the basket; that is, you have the very flower of my mind, my head, my eyes, my pen, my desk--the rest fare as they can. I have as much amusement in chatting to you, as labor and fatigue in writing to others. I am perfectly stunned with the great news that abounds in Europe.

I suppose the coadjutor has shown Madame de Fontevraud the letter he received from you. You are ignorant of its value. You write like an angel; I read your letters with admiration. You no sooner set out than you reach the goal. Do you remember the minuet which you danced so well, and closed in such excellent time, when the other creatures were not at the end of theirs till the next day? The late madame and yourself were famous for this; we used to call it _gaining ground_. Your letters are just the same.

As for your poor little _frater_, I know not where he has hid himself; it is three weeks now since I had a line from him. He made no mention of the pretty airing upon the Meuse, though every body believes it here; his fortune is really very hard, poor lad. I do not see how he can manage the affair of his promotion, unless Lauzun will take the guidonage in part of payment, with some other little additions we will endeavor to raise; but to buy the ensign’s place, and have the guidonage left upon our hands, will never do. Your reasoning upon the matter is very just; we all acquiesce in it, and shall be very well contented to mount after the other two,[131] provided the guidon serves as the first step.

[131] The Marquis de la Trousse, and the Marquis de la Fare; the
one captain-lieutenant, and the other sub-lieutenant, in the
dauphin’s gens-d’armes.

I shall finish the year here very peaceably. There are times when all places are indifferent, and a solitude like this not unpleasant. Madame de la Fayette returns you all your civilities; she has very bad health, and poor M. de Limoges still worse; he has resigned all his benefices to the king; I fancy his son, the Abbé de la Fayette, will have one of his abbeys. Poor Gascony has been as roughly handled as we have been. We have six thousand troops sent down to pass the winter among us: if it were not for the misconduct of the provinces, I do not know how they would be able to dispose of their troops. I can not think peace is so near: do you remember all our reasoning upon the subject of war, and how many there must be killed? This is always a certain prophecy, and so is that, that your letters can never tire me, long as they may be: ah! you will find no chimera in this hope, they are my choicest reading. Ripert brings you a third volume of the Moral Essays, which are worth your perusal. I never met with greater energy than there is in the style of these writers: they make use of no words but what are in common use, and yet they appear perfectly new, by the elegant manner in which they dispose them. In the morning I read the history of France; in the afternoon, some serious subjects in my woods; such as the Essays, the Life of Saint Thomas of Canterbury, which I think delightful, or the Iconoclastes; and in the evening, things of a lighter nature: this is my constant rule. I hope you continue to read Josephus; take courage, my dear, and go on boldly to the end. If you read the history of the Crusades, you will meet with two illustrious men who were your ancestors, but not a word about the great family of V***, that holds its head so high at present: but I am persuaded there are some passages which will make you throw aside the book, and curse the Jesuit;[132] and yet upon the whole it is an admirable history.

[132] Father Maimbourg, author of the History of the Crusades.
The physician, in the Lettres Persanes, gives as a recipe for the
asthma, to read all the works of this father, stopping only at
each period.