Paris, rue des Audriettes, across the street from Madame Foucault. By Jove, what a splendid sight to be across the street from! We saw her yesterday. She is marvelously plump and has just acquired new curves. Very round curves, very white, they seem to have a quality most essential in the eyes of amateurs such as you, for instance: it would be possible, I bet, to kill a flea on them. So much so, in fact, that there is no honest man, not only in the new world and in the old but in every possible world, who would not enjoy them to the utmost.

As it does not suffice to have performed the greatest deeds, to be lavished with the greatest honors, in fact to live on when one is dead, especially if you are dead or if you suffer while alive: allow me, my dear good Papa to ask you first of all for news of your health, since that is what concerns me the most. Indeed, nothing would be bleaker than if we had to say of His Honor,

True, one could not add:

You have none, I believe, of these gentlemen.

Even less so could one finish the declamation, which goes

This would be horrible blasphemy. First of all, dear Papa, you will not die; ergo I need not subject you to the universal regret you would elicit. As for your birth, although not from a virgin, it will always be blessed, and you will always have in common with our Lord that you will be called for all eternity Salvator mundi. One might even be able to argue that you are as great as He particularly today as the light is clearer now, and the witnesses, if not more in number, are at least more reliable.

In conclusion, dear Papa, I dispense you from all the glory, as long as you have that of good health. It is better (says our friend La Fontaine) to be a boor on his feet then an emperor in his tomb. In this sense, Papa, be a boor for another 100 years, finish your great work, leave laws for the country for which you gave peace, nay, even more, birth. That is what I wish for you and even more for your 13 states who owe their very being to you.

So that is my little greeting for the end of one year and the renewal of the next; it will reach you when it can. If I haven't written you earlier, it is because I couldn't.

I will not tell you what you doubtlessly already know: a cardinal who was the King's first chaplain accused of having used the Queen's name to get hold of a diamond necklace worth 1,500,000 l.t., the cardinal, put in the Bastille at His Majesty's behest and ordered under arrest by the Parliament, who in a few days will begin to be subjected to legal interrogations. Then a so-called Comte de Cagliostro and his wife, a Madame Delamotte and her husband descending, they say, through the maternal line from one of our kings, Henri II, I believe, and a harlot called La Dolivat who pretended to be the Queen one beautiful evening while speaking to the cardinal on the terrace of the Versailles Park. The Delamotte above, bodyguard of Monsieur, the King's brother, has fled to London and the others have been taken to the Bastille.

You scarcely remember the golden and the silver age; you have lived through the iron age in your country; here we are now living through the age of madness. Charlatanism is rampant; you will say that it has always existed; I grant you that but it is worse than ever and all the stranger since we brag about our superior education.

Despite your best efforts, Mesmer or rather his disciple Deslon still has his partisans; people are still magnetised by him. Ask your dear Franklinet about the Enchanter Cagliostro, I am sending him a little brochure on the subject.

Everyone wants to be important; there have never been so many lords, counts, and marquis.

Everyone wants to take up a lot of space, nowadays. The men wear hats that are just tremendous in height and width. The women's hairdos are like thick bushes; and they provide themselves with enormous bosoms, monstrous derrières. If you think you saw some samples when you were here, I can tell you that you saw nothing at all.

Madame de Monconseil, the most agreeable of women, has replaced the most agreeable of men in Passy.

The Chaumont family is all together except the son who, like you, is in the other [i.e. new] world.

The Le Veillard family is doing magnificently as are the priest, the Daillis, the tall abbot Laroque, the fat abbot Rochon, the little abbots, and Madame Helvétius, who every time the talk turns to you exclaims: “Ah, that great man, that poor man, we shall not see him any more!” “Certainly through your fault, Madame,” says I.

It is thanks to you, dear Papa, that we are not so sad about not staying in Passy anymore. We make up three pairs of friends who gather together in Paris. You are often amongst us as the subject of our conversations. Your portrait has followed us. While I am speaking to you right now, I am taking pleasure in seeing you in my study, and I don't feel sorry, if you are in good health as I have been assured, and if you are happy as I have every reason to believe, back with all that is dear to you, your house, your family, your friends, your country.

It pained me to see you leaving with those two shrews, Gravel and Gout; you cannot imagine how much this idea tormented me.

Madame Paris is to be delivered next month. Her little girl is already thirteen months old, full of fun and strength. Madame de Malachelle, my second daughter, is taking the necessary steps to catch up with her sister. Thanks to God, we have been given, my wife and I, sons-in-law endowed with huge appetites. And as you know, my dear Papa, he who eats well labors heartily.

I wish you could borrow money the way Mr. de Calonne does. Two years ago, sixty million, last year 125, today 80. All done in a moment and winning on the spot.

New gold louis are being reminted in stupendous quantities. People who don't seem to have a cent are rolling in money. The Mint is exchanging old louis for 24 15 to 16 s. It has been calculated that there are approximately six hundred million livres worth in the Kingdom.

I learned of the following yesterday. An old beggar who had an ugly brown jacket with green and black patches all over was finally permitted to have his money taken at the royal treasury, where he took, to the great surprise of the spectators, twenty sacks of a thousand louis each. That's not all, for the next day he brought in the same amount. Oh, if only you had a quarter of our money, what a boon that would be to all your presidencies.

People had said that the Queen is pregnant, but that is no longer true. Now it is time for compliments. I shan't make you any. I embrace you and you will be between my arms with all my heart. My feelings, as tender as they are sincere, will last as long as your servant and friend Brillon will.