"I have not read them, but I will get them."

He took a pen and noted the name down, and said,--

"But Tassoni has criticised Petrarch very ingeniously."

"Yes, but he has dishonoured taste and literature, like Muratori."

"Here he is. You must allow that his learning is immense."

"Est ubi peccat."

Voltaire opened a door, and I saw a hundred great files full of papers.

"That's my correspondence," said he. "You see before you nearly fifty
thousand letters, to which I have replied."

"Have you a copy of your answers?"

"Of a good many of them. That's the business of a servant of mine, who
has nothing else to do."

"I know plenty of booksellers who would give a good deal to get hold of
your answers.

"Yes; but look out for the booksellers when you publish anything, if you
have not yet begun; they are greater robbers than Barabbas."

"I shall not have anything to do with these gentlemen till I am an old
man."