he had grown to be completely what in essence he
always was--a fighter, without tenderness, without scruples, and without
remorse. No, he went to Berlin for his own purposes--however dubious
those purposes may have been.

And it is curious to observe that in his correspondence with his niece,
Madame Denis, whom he had left behind him at the head of his Paris
establishment and in whom he confided--in so far as he can be said to
have confided in anyone--he repeatedly states that there is nothing
permanent about his visit to Berlin. At first he declares that he is
only making a stay of a few weeks with Frederick, that he is going on to
Italy to visit 'sa Saintete' and to inspect 'la ville souterraine,' that
he will be back in Paris in the autumn. The autumn comes, and the roads
are too muddy to travel by; he must wait till the winter, when they will
be frozen hard. Winter comes, and it is too cold to move; but he will
certainly return in the spring. Spring comes, and he is on the point of
finishing his _Siecle de Louis XIV_.; he really must wait just a few
weeks more. The book is published; but then how can he appear in Paris
until he is quite sure of its success? And so he lingers on, delaying
and prevaricating, until a whole year has passed, and still he lingers
on, still he is on the point of going, and still he does not go.
Meanwhile, to all appearances, he was definitely fixed, a salaried
official, at Frederick's court; and he was writing to all his other
friends, to assure them that he had never been so happy, that he could
see no reason why he should ever come away. What were his true
intentions? Could he himself have said? Had he perhaps, in some secret
corner of his brain, into which even he hardly dared to look, a
premonition of the future? At times, in this Berlin adventure, he seems
to resemble some great buzzing fly, shooting suddenly into a room
through an open window and dashing frantically from side to side; when
all at once, as suddenly, he swoops away and out through another window
which opens in quite a different direction, towards wide and flowery
fields; so that perhaps the reckless creature knew where he was going
after all.

In any case, it is evident to the impartial observer that Voltaire's
visit could only have ended as it did--in an explosion. The elements of
the situation were too combustible for any other conclusion. When two
confirmed egotists decide, for purely selfish reasons, to set up hou