“The part of Schnaps,” said I, “seems to me no less felicitous.  Indeed, I should not think there were many better or more thankful parts in the repertoire.  There is in this personage, as in the whole piece, a clearness, an actual presence, to the utmost extent that can be desired for a theatre.  The scene where he comes in with the knapsack, and produces the things one after another, where he puts the moustache on Maerten, and decks himself with the cap of liberty, uniform, and sword, is among the best.”  “This scene,” said Goethe, “used always to be very successful on our stage.  Then the knapsack, with the articles in it, had really an historical existence.  I found it in the time of the Revolution, on my travels along the French border, when the emigrants, on their flight, had passed through, and one of them might have lost it or thrown it away.  The articles it contained were just the same as in the piece.  I wrote the scene upon it, and the knapsack, with all its appurtenances, was always introduced, to the no small delight of our actors.”

The question whether the Buergergeneral could still be played with any interest or profit, was for a while the subject of our conversation.

Goethe then asked about my progress in French literature, and I told him that I still took up Voltaire from time to time, and that the great talent of this man gave me the purest delight.

“I still know but little of him,” said I; “I keep to his short poems addressed to persons, which I read over and over again, and which I cannot lay aside.”

“Indeed,” said Goethe, “all is good which is written by so great a genius as Voltaire, though I cannot excuse all his profanity.  But you are right to give so much time to those little poems addressed to persons; they are unquestionably among the most charming of his works.  There is not a line which is not full of thought, clear, bright, and graceful.”

“And we see,” said I, “his relations to all the great and mighty of the world, and remark with pleasure the distinguished position taken by himself, inasmuch as he seems to feel himself equal to the highest, and we never find that any majesty can embarrass his free mind even for a moment.”

“Yes,” said Goethe, “he bore himself like a man of rank.  And with all his freedom and audacity, he ever kept within the limits of strict propriety, which is, perhaps, saying still more.  I may cite the Empress of Austria as an authority in such matters; she has repeatedly assured me, that in those poems of Voltaire’s, there is no trace of crossing the line of convenance.”

“Does your excellency,” said I, “remember the short poem in which he makes to the Princess of Prussia, afterwards Queen of Sweden, a pretty declaration of love, by saying that he dreamed of being elevated to the royal dignity?”

“It is one of his best,” said Goethe, and he recited the lines—­

    “Je vous aimais, princesse, et j’osais vous le dire;
  Les Dieux et mon reveil ne m’ont pas tout ote,
    Je n’ai perdu que mon empire.”