but retired in great emotion, and with a settled determination never to visit him again.

'I had not seen him for two months and a half, when we met one afternoon at the corner of a street. He came up to me and inquired why I had ceased to visit him. "You know the reason, "said I. "There are some days," said he, "in which I wish to be alone. I return from my solitary walk so quiet and happy-I have there offended nobody-nobody has offended me. I should regret," said he, with an air of tenderness, "to see you too often; but I should be still more grieved not to see you at all. I am afraid of intimate friendships, but nevertheless I have a project, when the proper time comes."-"Why," said I, "do you not hang out a signal at your window, when you wish to receive my visit? or if you choose to be alone, why not tell me so when I come ?" you not perceive," said he, "that my ill humour gets the better of me? I struggle with it awhile, but it finally prevails, and breaks out in spite of me. I have my faults, but if we value a person's friendship, we must take him as we find him." He then invited me to dine with him, the next day.'

"Do

The following anecdotes, related by Corancez, indicate very clearly an occasional aberration of intellect.

I had perceived for some time, says this narrator, a striking change in the habits of Rousseau, and I often found him in a state of convulsion, which altered his physiognomy entirely, and gave it an expression really frightful. His looks were vacant and wild: he would turn half round on his seat, and passing his arm over the frame of his chair, move it rapidly, backward and forward, in the manner of a pendulum. Whenever

at my entrance, I saw him take this posture, I expected the most extravagant conduct, and I was never deceived. On one of these distressing occasions he said to me, "do you know why I feel so remarkable a partiality for Tasso ?" "No," said I," but I think I can guess. Tasso, united with the utmost richness of imagination, and the highest poetical talent, the advantage of being posterior to Virgil and Homer, and was able of course to profit by their beauties, and their faults." "Yes," said he, "there is something in that: but I value him because he predicted my misfortunes." I made a motion, as if intending to speak, but he checked me. "I understand you," said he," you mean to say that Tasso lived a long time ago, and could have no knowledge of the events of my life. Of this I

know nothing, and perhaps he knew as little; the fact is, he predicted them. Observe that there is this remarkable property in the poem of Tasso, that if you take a single stanza from the work, a single verse from any one of the stanzas, or a single word from any one verse, the whole poem falls to pieces; so precise was he in his language, and so careful not to insert any thing superfluous. Now with the 77th stanza, of the 12th canto, to which I allude, the case is different. Take it away, and the poem remains as perfect as before. It has no connexion with any thing that precedes, or that follows; it is wholly superfluous. The probability is, that Tasso composed it involuntarily and without understanding it himself: but the application to me is clear enough." He then repeated this miraculous stanza, which is the following.

Vivrò fra i miei tormenti, e le mie cure,
Mie giuste furie, forsennato errante.
Paventerò l'ombre solinghe, e scure,
Che'l primo error mi recheranno innante:
E del sol, che scoprì le mie sventure,
A schivo, ed in orrore avrò il sembiante.
Temerò me medesmo; e da me stesso
Sempre fuggendo, avrò me sempre appresso.

Still, still 'tis mine with grief and shame to rove,
A dire example of disastrous love!
While keen remorse for ever breaks my rest,
And raging furies haunt my conscious breast,
The lonely shades with terror must I view,
The shades shall every dreadful thought renew:
The rising sun shall equal horrors yield,
The sun that first the dire event revealed!
Still must I view myself with hateful eye,
And seek, tho' vainly, from myself to fly!-

I had presented to him the musician Gluck, after first obtaining his permission; and this distinguished artist, whose genius he valued and admired, was for some time received by him with great distinction. One day, however, without any previous misunderstanding, he said to Gluck, that he was sorry to give a gentleman of his age the trouble of going up three pair of stairs so often, and begged him in future to abstain from it. Poor Gluck was quite distressed about this for several days. As I had presented him to Rousseau, I thought

myself at liberty to inquire the reason why he had treated him so rudely. "Pray," said he, "do you think that Gluck, who has habitually composed music, for poems in the Italian language, so favorable for this purpose, now employs the French, although so very difficult, merely to shew his powers? Do you not perceive that it is because I have asserted that it was impossible to compose good music upon French poetry, and that he wishes to convict me of an error? This is the reason why I have broken with him."

At another time, I called upon him, after assisting the evening before, at a representation of the Devin du Village, and thinking to flatter him, I gave him an account of the applause and enthusiasm, with which it had been received. I was surprised to see him redden with anger. "What," said he, “will they never be weary of persecuting me?" I was quite unable to understand how applause could be construed into persecution. "Oh yes," said he, "it is quite natural that you, with your simplicity, should consider applause as applause: you do not know the adroitness and malignity of my enemies. They first spoke ill of the piece; but finding that the public persisted in applauding it, they have changed their mode of attack, and now assert that I stole it: and to make the crime as great as possible, they are constantly exalting the value of the work." He sometimes admitted himself that the occasional singularity of his conduct was the effect of madness.

One day at table,' says the writer last quoted, whose narrative of his acquaintance with Rousseau is incorporated in the biography before us-' one day at table he described to us the precipitate manner of his return from England. He had taken it into his head that M. de Choiseul, then prime minister in France, was endeavoring to get possession of his person; and in order to make his escape, he quitted his residence at a moment's warning, without money, and leaving most of his effects behind him. At this time he burnt the manuscript of a new edition of Emile, which he afterwards regretted. He was obliged to pay his tavern bills, by breaking off pieces from the silver forks and spoons, which he had with him. He finally arrived at Dover. The wind was contrary, and this natural occurrence was immediately construed into a device of his enemies, to prevent his departure. Without knowing the language, he got upon an elevation, and harangued the people, who, of course, did not understand a word that he said. The wind

finally changed and permitted him to sail. These details were all given by himself, and he added, that he could not disguise from himself or us that he was laboring at the time under a temporary fit of insanity. "Such indeed was the severity of it," said he, "that I even suspected this excellent woman," pointing to his wife, "of being in league with my enemies."

The following passage is from the narrative of St Pierre.

We met one morning at a coffee house in the Elysian fields, in the intention of walking together to Mount Valerian.. Before setting out, we took chocolate together. It was a fine morning, the wind westerly, the air fresh, and the sky thinly fleeced with large white clouds, interspersed in fields of blue. We entered the Bois de Boulogne at 8 o'clock, and Jean Jacques began to botanize as we continued our walk. In a solitary part of the wood we saw two young girls, one of whom was dressing the hair of the other. This pastoral scene struck us both very agreeably. "My wife tells me," said Rousseau, "that in the province where she was born, the shepherdesses constantly assist each other in this way in dressing in the open field." We came to the river, and passed in the boat with a great number of persons who were going, from devotional motives, to Mount Valerian. We climbed a very steep ascent, and on reaching the top found ourselves hungry, and began to think of dinner. Rousseau conducted me to a hermitage, where he knew that we should be hospitably received. The monk who admitted us conducted us to the chapel, where they were chanting the litanies of Providence, which are very beautiful. We entered just at the moment when they were pronouncing these words,-Providence that carest for empires! Providence that carest for travellers! These simple and affecting expressions filled us with emotion; and when we had prayed, Rousseau said to me with much feeling, "I now experience the truth of the saying in scripture,-Where two or three are met together in my name, I will be with you. There is a sentiment of quiet and happiness here which goes to the heart." I said to him, "If Fenelon were living, you would become a catholic." "Oh," said he, in a transport of feeling, and with tears in his eyes, "if Fenelon were living, I would try to be his footman in the hope of becoming his valet de chambre." We were introduced to the refectory,

:

and sat down to hear the sermon, which Rousseau listened to very attentively. It turned upon the injustice of the complaints of man. God created us from nothing, and we have no claim whatever upon his justice. When the sermon was over, Rousseau said to me in a tone of the deepest emotion,"Ah! what a happy thing it is to believe." We returned by a very pleasant road, talking of Plutarch. Rousseau called him the great painter of misfortune and quoted his account of the deaths of Agis, Antony, and Monimia, the wife of Mithridates, of the triumph of Paulus Emilius, and the sorrows of the sons of Perseus. 66 Tacitus," he observed, "alienates our feelings from men, but Plutarch reconciles us to them." We were walking at the time under some large chestnut trees in full bloom. Rousseau cut off one of the blossoms with his little botanical sickle, and shewed me the beauty of the flower. We then agreed to take a walk the next week to the hills of Sèvres. "There are fine fir trees there," said he, " and heaths all covered with violets." The mention of fir trees reminded me of the north of Europe, and I took this occasion to relate to him my adventures in Russia, and my unfortunate loves in Poland. They interested him very much, and at parting he pressed my hand, and expressed to me how much pleasure he had received from our

excursion.'

Not long after the time to which this narrative relates, the health of Rousseau declined and he became incapable of the daily labor, to which he had so long resorted for subsistence. Various proposals of aid and comfort were made to him from different quarters, which his jealous and misanthropic temper led him to decline. He was induced at length to comply with the offer of Mr de Girardin and to take up his abode in an apartment at the castle of Ermenonville, where this nobleman resided. During the little time that he passed at this place, he gave lessons to the children of the proprietor and one of them, who is now a member of the house of deputies, frequently takes occasion to felicitate himself in his speeches upon having been the pupil of Rousseau. It was hardly a week however after his removal to Ermenonville that he died very suddenly; and although this event happened within a few miles of Paris, and at a time when the reputation of Rousseau was at its height, it has always been and still is in a degree uncertain whether his death was natural or volun