I will just say, that after the lapse
of two or three days from the time of my last visit, the idea
occurred to me of sending him a thousand crowns in an Indian
casket. This I sent by a servant out of livery, whom I strictly
enjoined not to name me but to say simply that he came from a
lady. He brought back the casket to me unopened, and the following
billet from Rousseau:--
"MADAM,--I send back the present you would force
upon my acceptance in so concealed a manner; if it
be offered as a testimony of your esteem I may
possibly accept it, when you permit me to know
the hand from which it comes. Be assured, madam,
that there is much truth in the assertion of its being
more easy to give than to receive.
"I have the honour to remain, madam, yours, etc., etc.,
"J. J. ROUSSEAU."
This was rather an uncouth manner of refusing; nevertheless, when
at this distance of time I review the transaction, I cannot help
admitting that I well deserved it. Perhaps when it first occurred
I might have felt piqued, but since I have quitted the court I
have again read over the works of J. J. Rousseau, and I now
speak of him, as you see, without one particle of resentment.
I must now speak to you of a new acquaintance I made about this
Period--that of the two duchesses d'Aiguillon. From my first
entrance into the chateau until the close of 1770, madame
d'Aiguillon, the daughter-in-law, observed a sort of armed
neutrality towards me; true, she never visited me, but she always
met me with apparent satisfaction at the houses of others; thus she
managed to steer clear of one dangerous extreme or the other till
the downfall of the des Choiseuls; when the duc d'Aiguillon having
been nominated to the ministry, she perceived that she could not,
without great ingratitude, omit calling to offer me her acknowledgments,
and accordingly she came.
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