Mairan watched his opportunity. Astruc did not deign to wait.
Fontenelle alone let it come to him without seeking it, and he
used so discreetly the attention given him, that his witty
sayings and his clever stories never occupied more than a moment.
Alert and reserved, Helvetius listened and gathered material for
the future."

Mme. de Tencin loved literature and philosophy for their own
sake, and received men of letters at their intrinsic value. She
encouraged, too, the freedom of thought and expression at that
time so rare and so dangerous. It was her influence that gave
its first impulse to the success of Montesquieu's esprit DES
LOIS, of which she personally bought and distributed many copies.
If she talked well, she knew also how to listen, to attract by
her sympathy, to aid by her generosity, to inspire by her
intelligence, to charm by her versatility.

Another figure flits in and out of this salon, whose fine
qualities of soul shine so brightly in this morally stifling
atmosphere that one forgets her errors in a mastering impulse of
love and pity. There is no more pathetic history in this arid
and heartless age than that of Mlle. Aisse, the beautiful
Circassian, with the lustrous, dark, Oriental eyes," who was
brought from Constantinople in infancy by the French envoy, and
left as a precious heritage to Mme. de Ferriol, the intriguing
sister of Mme. de Tencin, and her worthy counterpart, if not in
talent, in the faults that darkened their common womanhood. This
delicate young girl, surrounded by worldly and profligate
friends, and drawn in spite of herself into the errors of her
time, redeemed her character by her romantic heroism, her