VOLTAIRE. "'Yes. His face was imposing, and so was his voice; in his WORKS there are many leaves and little fruit; distorted expressions, and periods intolerably long. [TAKING DOWN A BOOK.] There, you see the KORAN, which is well read, at least. [It was marked throughout with bits of paper.] There are HISTORIC DOUBTS, by Horace Walpole [which had also several marks]; here is the portrait of Richard III.; you see he was a handsome youth.'
SHERLOCK (making an abrupt transition). "'You have built a Church?'
VOLTAIRE. "'True; and it is the only one in the Universe in honor of God [DEO EREXIT VOLTAIRE, as we read above]: you have plenty of Churches built to St. Paul, to St. Genevieve, but not one to God.'" EXIT Sherlock (to his Inn; makes jotting as above;—is to dine at Ferney to-morrow).
SCENE III. DINNER-TABLE OF VOLTAIRE.
"The next day, as we sat down to Dinner," our Host in the above shining costume, "he said, in English tolerably pronounced:—
VOLTAIRE. "'We are here for liberty and property! [parody of some old Speech in Parliament, let us guess,—liberty and property, my Lords!] This Gentleman—whom let me present to Monsieur Sherlock—is a Jesuit [old Pere Adam, whom I keep for playing Chess, in his old, unsheltered days]; he wears his hat: I am a poor invalid,—I wear my nightcap.'...
"I do not now recollect why he quoted these verses, also in English, by Rochester, on CHARLES SECOND:—
'Here lies the mutton-eating King,
Who never said a foolish thing,
Nor ever did a wise one.'
But speaking of Racine, he quoted this Couplet (of Roscomman's ESSAY ON TRANSLATED VERSE):—
'The weighty bullion of one sterling line
Drawn to French wire would through whole pages shine.