What tears of tenderness have I shed when on the road to it, while thinking of the paternal goodness, amiable virtues, and charming philosophy of this respectable old man!  I called him father, and he called me son.  These affectionate names give, in some measure, an idea of the attachment by which we were united, but by no means that of the want we felt of each other, nor of our continual desire to be together.  He would absolutely give me an apartment at the castle of Columbier, and for a long time pressed me to take up my residence in that in which I lodged during my visits.  I at length told him I was more free and at my ease in my own house, and that I had rather continue until the end of my life to come and see him.  He approved of my candor, and never afterwards spoke to me on the subject.  Oh, my good lord!  Oh, my worthy father!  How is my heart still moved when I think of your goodness?  Ah, barbarous wretches! how deeply did they wound me when they deprived me of your friendship?  But no, great man, you are and ever will be the same for me, who am still the same.  You have been deceived, but you are not changed.  My lord marechal is not without faults; he is a man of wisdom, but he is still a man.  With the greatest penetration, the nicest discrimination, and the most profound knowledge of men, he sometimes suffers himself to be deceived, and never recovers his error.  His temper is very singular and foreign to his general turn of mind.  He seems to forget the people he sees every day, and thinks of them in a moment when they least expect it; his attention seems ill-timed; his presents are dictated by caprice and not by propriety.  He gives or sends in an instant whatever comes into his head, be the value of it ever so small.  A young Genevese, desirous of entering into the service of Prussia, made a personal application to him; his lordship, instead of giving him a letter, gave him a little bag of peas, which he desired him to carry to the king.  On receiving this singular recommendation his majesty gave a commission to the bearer of it.  These elevated geniuses have between themselves a language which the vulgar will never understand.  The whimsical manner of my lord marechal, something like the caprice of a fine woman, rendered him still more interesting to me.  I was certain, and afterwards had proofs, that it had not the least influence over his sentiments, nor did it affect the cares prescribed by friendship on serious occasions, yet in his manner of obliging there is the same singularity as in his manners in general.  Of this I will give one instance relative to a matter of no great importance.  The journey from Motiers to Colombier being too long for me to perform in one day, I commonly divided it by setting off after dinner and sleeping at Brot, which is half way.  The landlord of the house where I stopped, named Sandoz, having to solicit at Berlin a favor of importance to him, begged I would request his excellency to ask