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husband by singing fagnana fagnana. It was deliciousto hear Voltaire say, seriously, that the piece was excel-lent. It is silly, is it not, to laugh at such follies ?Yet I laughed. Voltaire is as delightful a child as heis a wise philosopher .” — “ This morning we were tohear an epistle read ; hut the fair lady was still in thesarue merry humour of yesterday; and she began tojoke Voltaire , who, holding his epistle in his hand,parodied it against her in the most delightful manner:in short, there was no reading. He laughed at first, butwas a little annoyed at last. For myself, I was ashamedto laugh so much ; but there was so much wit; eachword came and shone like lightning, and all accom-panied by such vivacity and pleasantry that Heraclitus himself must have laughed.” — “We had the Marion-ettes again. Voltaire declared that he was jealous.Do you know that I think that Voltaire shows geniusin laughing at these follies. I sat next him to-day; itwas a delightful seat. Yesterday evening he read anepistle which the fair lady criticised most wittily.”
At other times, every hour was given to labour.Voltaire spent the entire day writing : “ Does he leavehis work for a quarter of an hour during the day,”writes his guest, “ to pay me a visit, he does not sitdown, saying that the time lost in talking is fright-ful — that no moment ought to be wasted, and loss oftime is the greatest expense of all. This has goneon for a month. When we come in to sup he is athis desk; we have half done before he joins us, and heis with difficulty prevented from returning immediatelyafter. He exerts himself to amuse us during themeal; but evidently from sheer politeness: his thoughtsare far away." Madame du Chatelet was even moreindustrious. “ She spends her whole nights till five orsix in the morning, writing; when she finds herselfovercome by sleep, she puts her hands in iced water,and walks about the room to rouse herself. After this,instead of sleeping till the middle of the day, she risesat nine or ten. In short, she only gives two hours to