place at this new meeting;--which, we find farther,
was at Chasot's Lodging (the CHAPEAU of Hanbury), who is now in Town,
like all the world, for Carnival. Hirsch does not directly venture on
naming Chasot: but by implication, by glimmers of evidence elsewhere,
one sufficiently discovers that it is he: Lieutenant-Colonel, King's
Friend, a man glorious, especially ever since Hohenfriedberg, and
that haul of the "sixty-seven standards" all at once. In the way of
Arbitration, Voltaire thinks Chasot might do something. In regard to
those 450 pounds worth of bought Jewels, there is not such a judge in
the world! Hirsch says: "Next morning [December 25th, morrow after that
jumbly Account, with probable slamming of the door, and still worse!],
Voltaire went to a Lieutenant-Colonel in the King's service; and ask
him to send for me." [Duvernet (Second), p. 172; Hirsch's Narrative
(in--Tantale,--p. 344).] This is Chasot; who knows these jewels well.
Duvernet,--who had talked a good deal with D'Arget, in latter years, and
alone of Frenchmen sometimes yields a true particle of feature in things
Prussian,--Duvernet tells us, these Jewels were once Chasot's own: given
him by a fond Duchess of Mecklenburg,--musical old Duchess, verging
towards sixty; HONI SOIT, my friend! What Hirsch gave Chasot for these
Jewels is not a doubtful quantity; and may throw conviction into Hirsch,
hopes Voltaire.

DECEMBER 25th, 1750. The interview at Chasot's was not lengthy, but it
was decisive. Hirsch never brings that Paris Bill; privately fixed,
on that point. Hirsch's claims, as we gradually unravel the intricate
mule-mind of him, rise very high indeed. "And as to the value of those
Jewels, and what I allowed YOU for them, Monsieur Chasot; that is no
rule: trade-profits, you know"--Nay, the mule intimates, as a last
shift, That perhaps they are not the same Jewels; that perhaps M. de
Voltaire has changed some of them! Whereupon the matter catches fire,
irretrievably explodes. M. de Voltaire's patience flies quite done; and,
fire-eyed fury now guiding, he springs upon the throat of Hirsch like a
cat-o'-mountain; clutches Hirsch by the windpipe; tumbles him about the
room: "Infamous canaille, do you know whom you have got to do with? That
it is in my power to stick you into a hole underground for the rest
of your life? Sirrah, I will ruin and annihilate you!"--and "tossed me
about the room with his fist on my throat," says Hirsch; "offering to
have pi