So having appointed a Grand Master to represent him, and delegated his seal—a serpent pierced with an arrow—to two “venerables,” Cagliostro left Lyons for Paris. If he made enemies in Lyons they did not molest him. It was the only place in which he does not complain of being persecuted.
III
On arriving in Paris, Cagliostro declares that he “took the greatest precaution to avoid causing ill-will.” As the majority of contemporary documents concur in describing his life in Paris as “dignified and reserved,” there is no reason to doubt the truth of his statement. But one cannot escape one’s fate, and in spite of his efforts not to attract attention, he was condemned to an extraordinary notoriety.
His arrival was no sooner known than, as at Strasburg, Bordeaux, and Lyons, his house was beset with cripples and invalids of all walks of life. As usual he refused to accept payment for his services or even for his remedies.
“No one,” says Grimm, “ever succeeded in making him accept the least mark of gratitude.”
“What is singular about Cagliostro,” says the Baron de Besenval, “is that in spite of possessing the characteristics that one associates with a charlatan, he never behaved as such all the time he was at Strasburg or at Paris. On the contrary, he never took a sou from a person, lived honourably, always paid with the greatest exactitude what he owed, and was very charitable.”
Needless to say, it was not long before his name became the chief topic of conversation in the capital. In the enthusiasm his successes excited his failures were ignored. Rumour multiplied the number of his cures and magnified their importance. His fame was thus reflected on the invalids themselves. To be “healed” by the Grand Cophta became the rage. In 1785 Paris swarmed with men and women who professed to have been cured by Cagliostro.
Naturally this infatuation infuriated his inveterate enemies the doctors. It is said that they obtained an order from the King compelling him, if he wished to remain in Paris, to refrain from practising medicine. If so, they had not the courage to enforce it, for he counted among his partisans men of the very highest rank, such as the Prince de Luxembourg, who was Grand Master of the Lodge at Lyons, as well as those distinguished for their learning like the naturalist Ramon. All the same the doctors did not leave him entirely unmolested.
Urged by their masters, who from a sense of dignity or prudence dared not encounter him in person, two medical students resolved to play a practical joke upon the “healer.” It was a species of amusement very popular at the period; in this instance it was regarded also as a duty. The students accordingly called on Cagliostro, and on being admitted one of them complained of a mysterious malady of which the symptoms seemed to him extraordinary. In attempting, however, to describe them, he used certain scientific terms, which at once caused Cagliostro to suspect that his visitor was an emissary of the doctors. Restraining his indignation he turned to the other and said with the greatest gravity—
“Your friend must remain here under my care for sixteen days. The treatment to which I shall subject him is very simple, but to effect his cure it will be absolutely necessary for him to eat but once a day, and then only an ounce of nourishment.”