em on one side
the globe, and me on the other, my affections shall pervade its whole
mass to reach them. Knowing then my determination, attempt not to
disturb it. If you can at any time furnish matter for their amusement,
it will be the office of a good neighbor to do it. I will, in like
manner, seize any occasion which may offer, to do the like good turn for
you with Condorcet, Rittenhouse, Madison, La Cretelle, or any other of
those worthy sons of science, whom you so justly prize.

I thought this a favorable proposition whereon to rest the issue of the
dialogue. So I put an end to it by calling for my nightcap. Methinks, I
hear you wish to Heaven I had called a little sooner, and so spared you
the _ennui_ of such a sermon. I did not interrupt them sooner, because
I was in a mood for hearing sermons. You, too, were the subject; and on
such a thesis, I never think the theme long; not even if I am to write
it, and that slowly and awkwardly, as now, with the left hand. But
that you may not be discouraged from a correspondence, which begins
so formidably, I will promise you, on my honor, that my future letters
shall be of a reasonable length. I will even agree to express but half
my esteem for you, for fear of cloying you with too full a dose. But on
your part, no curtailing. If your letters are as long as the Bible,
they will appear short to me. Only let them be brim full of affection. I
shall read them with the dispositions with which Arlequin, in _Les
Deux Billets_, spelt the words '_Je t'aime,_' and wished that the whole
alphabet had entered into their composition.

We have had incessant rains since your departure. These make me fear for
your health, as well as that you had an uncomfortable journey. The same
cause has prevented me from being able to give you any account of your
friends here. This voyage to Fontainebleau will probably send the Count
de Moutier and the Marquis de Brehan to America. Danquerville promised
to visit me, but has not done it as yet. De la Tude comes sometimes to
take family soup with me, and entertains me with anecdotes of his five
and thirty years' imprisonment. How fertile is the mind of man, which
can make the Bastille and dungeon of Vincennes yield interesting
anecdotes! You know this was for making four verses on Madame de
Pompadour. But I think you told me you did not know the verses. They
were these.

'Sans esprit, sans sentiment,
Sans etre belle, ni neuve,
En Fran