seems to incline to believe that gold can be
made: there is a fascination in the idea when
pecuniary affairs are embarrassing, certainly.
The last day of February in sixteen
hundred he set off to Paris—using relays of
very bad horses. On the tenth of March
he was presented to Henry the Fourth, who
received him with singular humanity. "Thou
knowest, Lord," he enters in his Diary,
"that I did not seek—did not court— this
royal position. Thou hast done it, Lord."

His books, of course, had to follow him, or
accompany him, in these peregrinations; and
his first employment in a new place was to
set them all up and prepare his private
museum in the house. Soon, he falls-to at
them again; and now his labours on
Athenæus are drawing to a close. He is
fixed in Paris, and the king is kind to him;
conducts him one day over the palace with
much serious conversation. Thuanus has
lost his wife, and Casaubon consoles him; in
addition to which, he is studying Arabic,
besides his usual classical labours; and now
he opens a correspondence with that
conceited monarch, James the Sixth of
Scotland. This monarch writes him a letter
from his Scotch palace, being ambitious of
the praise of learned men. Casaubon does
not yet foresee that he is destined to become
associated with this monarch; and, in fact,
is a little suspicious of him. Meanwhile,
Henry the Fourth is kind, as usual, though
there are orthodox people always at his
ear, hinting that Casaubon is a dangerous
heretic. Gentlemen of wooden—faggoty
aspect, indeed—scowl at Monsieur Casaubon,
and would roast him, on a good pretext, if
possible. Underlings of the royal library
are not polite; nor are treasurers punctual
with instalments of the pension.

On his forty-fourth birthday, Casaubon—
as is his wont on his birthday— was
meditating solemnly on his life and prospects,
when who should come in but the philtat? She
brought with her a birthday present of money,
which she had saved out of the household
expenses for this auspicious occasion.
Casaubon was delighted, and returned thanks
to God for the frugality and management
(oikonomia) of the charissima uxor.

In sixteen hundred and three, he visited
his mother at Bordeaux, and soon afterwards
paid a visit to Geneva, where old friends and
relatives received him with open arms. On
a fine June night he supped with Theodore
Beza, exclaiming, "What a man! What
piety! What learning! O truly great man!"
Beza, he remarks, though his memory was
failing as to ordinary matters, still retained
it in all matters of religion and theology.
He told him that on the night of the
Admiral's murder, he (Beza) had seen him
in a dream, at Geneva, all bloody; and
had heard from him the events of that
night almost as they actually occurred.
Casaubon stayed a little while at Geneva,
on the money affairs of some relations (about
which the Genevese authorities did not
behave well), and then returned to Paris.

About the end of sixteen hundred and
three, we find him busy on his Persius,
examining ancient manuscripts, preparatory to
beginning his admirable edition of that poet.
He prays that the mind of King Henry may
not be swayed by evil counsellors. The
king did not conceal from him that the pope
complained of the favour he showed to
heretics; and all the people about the king
were brimming over with hatred of the
poor scholar. Large promises—every artifice
employed—but neither Casaubon nor his
wife would open their ears to the tempters.

What with Cardinal Perron trying to
convert him; what with black sons of Loyola
tempting and hating (your conscience or
your life, being the favourite alternative of
these pious dragoons); what with occasional
poverty and domestic troubles—what is a
scholar to do? What but go on with his
work? Isaac Casaubon had various labours
on the anvil: a Treatise on the Ancient
Satire (one of those rare treatises which
settle the question)—the incomparable
Commentary on Persius, and so forth.
Occasionally he had visitors. Casaubon loved not
visitors. Why will people come and talk,
dragging a quiet man from his books? There
comes one man who loves to hear Casaubon
talk—an Englishman, handsome, high-
spirited, grave, courtly, learned—nobilissimum
virum. His name is Edward Herbert,
known to all the word in after ages as Lord
Herbert of Cherbury. That most
distinguished gentleman—the best swordsman and
rider and duellist of his age; accomplished
in all that could grace rank or give dignity
to birth—left courts and palaces to come and
talk to the quiet and laborious scholar; and
reported in his Autobiography that he had
much benefited himself thereby. Such a
man, one could spare an hour or two from
Persius to chat with. In such talk one could
forget the " arrogant biped" whose foolish
remarks on the Roman poet much annoyed
Casaubon in those days.

This is the way, then, in which life was
jogging on. The king held firm, and would
not persecute this heretic. Money was
scanty, but still things were kept going,
through the household wisdom of that model
wife, the philtat. Early morning found
Casaubon commencing operations with prayer.
Then, to work he went, still in the early part
of the century, at Persius. In sixteen
hundred and five the Persius appeared.
Joseph Scaliger observed that the sauce was
worth more than the fish. Indeed, Persius
sails like a cock-boat in a huge sea of
commentary. He is hung up like a picture with
a hundred lights on it—illuminated like a
palace on a festal night. He had been everywhere
spoken of as obscure and unintelligible.
Casaubon, who heartily admired him,