very memorable to
us,--happened to be running towards Holland that way, one of his many
journeys thitherward; and actually saw this Congress, then in the first
year of its existence. Saw it, probably dined with it. A Letter of his
still extant, not yet fallen to the spiders, as so much else has done,
testifies to this fact. Let us read part of it, the less despicable
part,--as a Piece supremely insignificant, yet now in a manner the one
surviving Document of this extraordinary Congress; Congress's own works
and history having all otherwise fallen to the spiders forever. The
Letter is addressed to Cardinal Dubois;--for Dubois, "with the face like
a goat," [Herzogin von Orleans, BRIEFE.] yet lived (first year of this
Congress); and Regent d'Orleans lived, intensely interested here as
third party:--and a goat-faced Cardinal, once pimp and lackey, ugliest
of created souls, Archbishop of this same Cambrai "by Divine permission"
and favor of Beelzebub, was capable of promoting a young fellow if he
chose:--

"TO HIS EMINENCE CARDINAL DUBOIS (from Arouet Junior).

"CAMBRAI, July, 1722.

"... We are just arrived in your City, Monseigneur; where, I think,
all the Ambassadors and all the Cooks in Europe have given one another
rendezvous. It seems as if all the Ministers of Germany had assembled
here for the purpose of getting their Emperor's health drunk. As to
Messieurs the Ambassadors of Spain, one of them hears two masses a day,
and the other manages the troop of players. The English Ministers [a
LORD POLWARTH and a LORD WHITWORTH] send many couriers to Champagne, and
few to London. For the rest, nobody expects your Eminence here; it is
not thought you will quit the Palais-Royal to visit the sheep of your
flock in these parts [no!], it would be too bad for your Eminence and
for us all.... Think sometimes, Monseigneur, of a man who [regards your
goat-faced Eminence as a beautiful ingenious creature; and such a
hand in conversation as never was]. The one thing I will ask [of your
goat-faced Eminence] at Paris will be, to have the goodness to talk to
me." [_OEuvres de Voltaire,_ 97 vols. (Paris, 1825-1834), lxviii. 95,
96.]

Alas, alas!--The more despicable portions of this Letter we omit, as
they are not history of the Congress, but of Arouet Junior on the
shady side. So much will testify that this Congress did exist; that
its wiggeries and it were not always, what they now are, part of a
nightmare-vision in Human History.--