embarrassments. I went begging for customers for him on every side. If
he came at meal-times, I would not let him go; if he lacked shoes, I
gave him them; now and then I slipped a shilling into his hands as well.
he had the air of the worthiest man in the world, and he even bore his
neediness with a certain gaiety that used to amuse me. I was fond of
chatting with him; he seemed to set little store by fortune, fame, and
most of the other things that charm or dazzle us in life. Seven or eight
days ago Damilaville wrote to send this man to him, for one of his
friends who had a manuscript for him to copy. I send him; the manuscript
is entrusted to him--a work on religion and government. I do not know
how it came about, but that manuscript is now in the hands of the
lieutenant of police. Damilaville gives me word of this. I hasten to my
friend Glénat, to warn him to count no more upon me. 'And why am I not
to count upon you?' 'Because you are a marked man. The police have their
eyes upon you and 'tis impossible to send work to you.' 'But, my dear
sir, there's no risk, so long as you entrust nothing reprehensible to my
hands. The police only come here when they scent game. I cannot tell how
they do it, but they are never mistaken.' 'Ah well, I at any rate know
how it is, and you have let me see much more in the matter than I
ever expected to learn from you,' and with that I turn my back on my
rascal." Diderot having occasion to visit the lieutenant of police,
introduced the matter, and could not withhold an energetic remonstrance
against such an odious abuse of a man's kindness of heart, as the
introduction of spies to his fireside. M. de Sartine laughed and Diderot
took his leave, vowing that all the wretches who should come to him for
the future, with cuffs dirty and torn, with holes in their stockings and
holes in their shoes, with hair all unkempt, in shabby overcoats with
many rents, or scanty black suits with starting seams, with all the
tones and looks of distressed worth, would henceforth seem to him no
better than police emissaries and scoundrels set to spy on him. The vow,