"About me?"
"Yes, about you, and I learnt...."
"You learnt ...?"
"I learnt that you drank."
Rousseau left; but this time he did not return again. Poor Rousseau! Three months before his death, he related this story to my son and me, with tears in his eyes.
"Romieu will come to a bad end," he said in tones as tragic as those of Calchas; "he is an ungrateful being."
May Heaven preserve Romieu from Rousseau's prediction!
Romieu stayed in the provinces for three years without coming back to Paris, and during those three years his absence led to great changes in the capital, as the following distich by an unknown author appears to state:—
"Lorsque Romieu revint du Monomotapa
Paris ne soupait plus, et Paris ressoupa."
I said great changes had taken place in Paris, I should have said fatal changes. The cessation of supper parties has brought about more troublesome consequences in a civilised world than might be supposed. I attribute our present state of intellectual degeneration to the cessation of supper parties and the innovation of the cigar. God forbid I should state that our sons' mental abilities are not equal to our own; I, at least, have a son who would not forgive me if I made such a statement. But they are of a different type of mind. Time alone can settle which is the better of the two.