uld look with some little indulgence on the faults
of a man who possesses a secret so useful to the state. As regards the two
safe-conducts sent him by the king, I think I can answer certainly that it
was through no fault of his that he paid so little attention to them. His
year, strictly speaking, consists only of the four summer months; and when
by any means he is prevented from making the proper use of them, he loses
a whole year. Thus the first safe-conduct became useless by the irruption
of the Duke of Savoy in 1707 and the second had hardly been obtained, at
the end of June 1708, when the said Delisle was insulted by a party of
armed men, pretending to act under the authority of the Count de Grignan,
to whom he wrote several letters of complaint, without receiving any
answer, or promise that his safety would be attended to. What I have now
told you, sir, removes the third objection, and is the reason why, at the
present time, he cannot go to Paris to the king, in fulfilment of his
promises made two years ago. Two, or even three, summers have been lost to
him, owing to the continual inquietude he has laboured under. He has, in
consequence, been unable to work, and has not collected a sufficient
quantity of his oil and powder, or brought what he has got to the
necessary degree of perfection. For this reason also he could not give the
Sieur de Bourget the portion he promised him for your inspection. If the
other day he changed some lead into gold with a few grains of his powder,
they were assuredly all he had; for he told me that such was the fact long
before he knew my nephew was coming. Even if he had preserved this small
quantity to operate before the king, I am sure that, on second thoughts,
he would never have adventured with so little; because the slightest
obstacles in the metals (their being too hard or too soft, which is only
discovered in operating,) would have caused him to be looked upon as an
impostor, if, in case his first powder had proved ineffectual, he had not
been possessed of more to renew the experiment and surmount the
difficulty.

"Permit me, sir, in conclusion, to repeat, that such an artist as this
should not be driven to the last extremity, nor forced to seek an asylum
offered to him in other countries, but which he has despised, as much from
his own inclinations as from the advice I have given him. You risk nothing
in giving him a little time, and in hurrying him you may lose a great
deal. T