“What were the words that your father spoke when he sent you forth as a man into the world?  I think you once repeated them to me,” said Frederick.

    “Quand vos yeux, en naissant, s’ouvraient a la lumiere,
     Chacun vous souriait, mon fils, et vous pleuriez. 
     Vivez si bien, qu’un jour, a votre derniere heure,
     Chacun verse des pleurs, et qu’on vous voie sourire.”

“You have fulfilled your father’s wish,” said the king.  “You have so lived, that you can smile when all others are weeping for you, and no man who has loved can forget you.  I am sure your Victoire will never forget you.  Have you not seen her since that first parting?”

“Yes, sire, I have seen her once again, as I came to Prussia, after being banished forever from England.  Ah, sire, that was a happy meeting after twenty years of separation.  The pain and grief of love were over, but the love remained.  We confessed this to each other.  In the beginning there was suffering and sorrow, then a sweet, soft remembrance of our love, for we had never ceased to think upon each other.  It seems that to love faithfully and eternally it is only necessary to love truly and honorably, and then to separate.  Custom and daily meeting cannot then brush the bloom from love’s light wings; its source is in heaven, and it returns to the skies and shines forever and inextinguishable a star over our heads.  When I looked again. upon Victoire she had been a long time married, and to the world she had, perhaps, ceased to be beautiful.  To me she will be ever lovely; and as she looked upon me it seemed to me that the clouds and shadows had been lifted from my life, and my sun was shining clear.  But, sire, all this has no interest for you.  How tenderly I loved Victoire you will know, when I tell you that the only poem my unpoetical brain has ever produced was written for her.”

“Let us hear it, my lord,” said the king.

“If your majesty commands it, and Voltaire will forgive it,” said Lord Marshal.

“I forgive it, my lord,” cried Voltaire.  “Since I listened to you I live in a land of wonders and soft enchantments, whose existence I have never even guessed, and upon whose blooming, perfumed beauty I scarcely dare open my unholy eyes.  The fairy tales of my dreamy youth seem now to be true, and I hear a language which we, poor sons of France, living under the regency of the Duke of Orleans, have no knowledge of.  I entreat you, my lord, let us hear your poem.”

Lord Marshal bowed, and, leaning back in his chair, in a full rich voice, he recited the following verses: 

    “’Un trait lance par caprice
     M’atteignit dans mon printemps;
     J’en porte la cicatrice
     Encore, sous mes cheveux blancs. 
     Craignez les maux qu’amour cause,
     Et plaignez un insense
     Qui n’a point cueilli la rose,
     Et qui l’epine a blesse.’
 [Footnote:  Memoires de la Marquise de Crequi.]