of this letter,
compared with the almost crude ones which he has since written to me.
He thought I was in great favor with Madam Richelieu; and the courtly
suppleness, which everyone knows to be the character of this author,
obliged him to be extremely polite to a new comer, until he become better
acquainted with the measure of the favor and patronage he enjoyed.

Authorized by M. de Voltaire, and not under the necessity of giving
myself the least concern about M. Rameau, who endeavored to injure me,
I set to work, and in two months my undertaking was finished. With
respect to the poetry, it was confined to a mere trifle; I aimed at
nothing more than to prevent the difference of style from being
perceived, and had the vanity to think I had succeeded. The musical part
was longer and more laborious. Besides my having to compose several
preparatory pieces, and, amongst others, the overture, all the
recitative, with which I was charged, was extremely difficult on account
of the necessity there was of connecting, in a few verses, and by very
rapid modulations, symphonies and choruses, in keys very different from
each other; for I was determined neither to change nor transpose any of
the airs, that Rameau might not accuse me of having disfigured them.
I succeeded in the recitative; it was well accented, full of energy and
excellent modulation. The idea of two men of superior talents, with whom
I was associated, had elevated my genius, and I can assert, that in this
barren and inglorious task, of which the public could have no knowledge,
I was for the most part equal to my models.

The piece, in the state to which I had brought it, was rehearsed in the
great theatre of the opera. Of the three authors who had contributed to
the production, I was the only one present. Voltaire was not in Paris,
and Rameau either did not come, or concealed himself. The words of the
first monologue were very mournful; they began with:

O Mort! viens terminer les malheurs de ma vie.

[O Death! hasten to terminate the misfortunes of my life.]

To these, suitable music was necessary. It was, however, upon this that
Madam de la Popliniere founded her censure; accusing me, with much
bitterness, of having composed a funeral anthem. M. de Richelieu very
judiciously began by informing himself who was the author of the poetry
of this monologue; I presented him the manuscript he had sent me, which
proved it was by Voltaire. "In