ChÂteau de Fontainebleau, Thursday, June 13, 1861.

Dear Friend: For two days I have been here, recuperating, with great enjoyment, among the trees, after my tribulations of the last week.[28] I suppose you read of the affair in the Moniteur. I have never in my life seen people so wild, so senseless as magistrates. For my consolation, I say to myself that twenty years from now, when some antiquarian shall poke his nose into the Moniteur of this week, he will say that he has discovered in 1861, in an assembly of young fools, a philosopher full of moderation and calmness. This philosopher is myself, and I say it without vanity.

In this country, where magistrates are recruited from the ranks of men too stupid to earn their living as lawyers, they are ill-paid, and to get on with them they are privileged to be insolent and quarrelsome. Happily, it is all ended at last. I have done what I ought to do, and if it were possible, I should reopen the case for the petition of Madame Libri.

I was cordially received here, and have not been laughed at on account of my defeat. I expressed my opinion of the affair very plainly, and have had no intimation of any disapproval of my judgment. After all the excitement of these last days, I feel as if an enormous weight had rolled off my back. The weather is superb, and the air of the woods delicious. There are few people here. My hosts are, as usual, extremely kind and friendly.

We have with us the Princess Metternich, who is very vivacious, after the German fashion—that is to say, she has created for herself a kind of originality composed of two parts of rapid woman and one of great lady. I fancy she has not wit enough to sustain the rÔle she has adopted. To-day we are going hunting. The evenings are a little tedious, but they do not last forever. I expect to be here a week longer; my official duties hold me here, however, only until Sunday. If I remain beyond that time I shall let you know.

Good-bye, dear friend. Some one has come for me.