"Your highness will fare but badly," said Rousseau: "however, I will tell
them to lay another knife and fork."

The philosopher gave his instructions, and came out and rejoined the
prince, with whom he walked up and down for two or three hours. When it
was dinner-time he took the prince into his dining-room, where the table
was laid for three.

"Who is going to dine with us?" said the prince. "I thought we were to be
alone."

"The third party," said Rousseau, "is my other self--a being who is
neither my wife, nor my mistress, nor my servant-maid, nor my mother, nor
my daughter, but yet personates all these characters at once."

"I daresay, my dear fellow, I daresay; but as I came to dine with you
alone, I will not dine with your--other self, but will leave you with all
the rest of you to keep your company."

So saying the prince bade him farewell and went out. Rousseau did not try
to keep him.

About this time I witnessed the failure of a play called 'Aristides'
Daughter', written by the ingenious Madame de Graffini, who died of
vexation five days after her play was damned. The Abbe de Voisenon was
horrified, as he had advised the lady to produce it, and was thought to
have had some hand in its composition, as well as in that of the 'Lettres
Peruviennes' and 'Cenie'. By a curious coincidence, just about the same
date, Rezzonico's mother died of joy because her son had become pope.
Grief and joy kill many more women than men, which proves that if women