idle mind. Of which,
TANTALE EN PROCES may still, for the sake of that PREFACE to it, be
considered to have an obscure existence. And such, reduced to its
authenticities, was the Adventure of the Steuer-Notes. A very bad
Adventure indeed; unspeakably the worst that Voltaire ever tried, who
had such talent in the finance line. On which poor History is really
ashamed to have spent so much time; sorting it into clearness, in the
disgust and sorrow of her soul. But perhaps it needed to be done. Let
us hope, at least, it may not now need to be done again. [Besides the
KLEIN, the TANTALE EN PROCES and the Voltaire LETTERS cited above, there
is (in--OEuvres de Voltaire,--lxiv. pp. 61-106, as SUPPLEMENT there),
written off-hand, in the very thick of the Hirsch Affair, a considerable
set of NOTES TO D'ARGET, which might have been still more elucidative;
but are, in their present dateless topsy-turvied condition; a very
wonder of confusion to the studious reader!]

This is the FIRST ACT of Voltaire's Tragic-Farce at the Court of Berlin:
readers may conceive to what a bleared frost-bitten condition it
has reduced the first Favonian efflorescence there. He considerably
recovered in the SECOND ACT, such the indelible charm of the Voltaire
genius to Friedrich. But it is well known, the First Act rules all
the others; and here, accordingly, the Third Act failed not to prove
tragical. Out of First Act into Second the following EXTRACTS OF
CORRESPONDENCE will guide the reader, without commentary of ours.

Voltaire, left languishing at Berlin, has fallen sick, now that all is
over;--no doubt, in part really sick, the unfortunate Phoenix-Peafowl,
with such a tremor in his bones;--and would fain be near Friedrich and
warmth again; fain persuade the outside world that all is sunshine with
him. Voltaire's Letters to Friedrich, if he wrote any, in this Jew time,
are lost; here are Friedrich's Answers to Two,--one lost, which had
been written from Berlin AFTER the Jew affair was out of Court; and to
another (not lost) after the Jew affair was done.

1. KING FRIEDRICH TO VOLTAIRE AT BERLIN.

"POTSDAM, 24th February, 1751. "I was glad to receive you in my house; I
esteemed your genius, your talents and acquirements; and I had reason to
think that a man of your age, wearied with fencing against Authors, and
exposing himself to the storm, came hither to take refuge as in a safe
harbor.

"But, on arriving, you exacted of me, in a rather sing