Princess Dashkova, May 1771

The Russia princess's autobiography was published posthumously as Memoirs of the princess Daschkaw (London 1840). Theodore Besterman reproduces the following passage in his critical edition of Voltaire's correspondence (D.app.343).

Also read the Letters pertaining to this visit, below.

I . . . shall therefore only speak of the different persons, of any celebrity, with whom I happened to be acquainted. The principal one was Voltaire.

The day after our arrival at Geneva, I sent to beg permission to call on him, accompanied by my friends. Although very unwell, he assured me of the pleasure he should have in seeing me, and that I was at liberty to bring whom I pleased.

On the appointed evening, Mrs. Hamilton, Lady Ryder, Mlle. Kamensky, my cousin Worontzov, and Mr. Campbell of Shawfield, went along with me to his house. The night before, he had lost some ounces of blood, and, though very ill, desired it should be kept a secret, that we might not be deterred from the projected visit.

On entering his room, we found him Iying back in a great chair, weak, and apparently in pain. I went up to him, and half-upbraidingly insisted that in his present situation our visit must be considered an intrusion, and that the most flattering proof I could receive of his esteem was to be thought capable of appreciating the value of his health so far as to have suspended for some days the pleasure of his society.

He disconcerted me excessively by raising up his arm in a theatrical manner, and with a tone of astonishment, exclaiming, "What is this I hear? even her very voice is the voice of an angel!"

As I came only to admire him, to be flattered so extravagantly was certainly the last thing in my thoughts,--which I believe I told him. A few compliments followed, and then we talked about the Empress of Russia.

After making a pretty long visit, when I proposed returning home he earnestly requested us to go to his niece Madame Denists apartment, where he hoped we would indulge him with our company at supper. We agreed, and were not long with Madame Denis before we were joined by her uncle.

In a parenthesis it may be added, that, considering her as the niece of Voltaire, I was surprised to find her so very common-place a sort of woman as she appeared.

Voltaire was supported into the room by his valet-de-chambre, and placed on his knees in a great chair, over the back of which he leant, and continued opposite to me in this uneasy posture during the whole of supper time. This sort of constraint, perhaps, and the addition to our party of two rich farmers general from Paris, whose portraits hung in the saloon below, and to whom both uncle and niece paid the greatest court, disappointed a good deal the expectations I had formed from such a visit.

As we took our leave, Voltaire begged to see me often during our stay at Geneva. I requested permission sometimes to call on him in the mornings, and to enjoy his society tête-à-tête in his cabinet or in his garden--a permission which he willingly granted, and of which I frequently availed myself. At those times he was a very different creature, and appeared in reality everything which his works and my imagination had represented.

In the first few days that we spent at Geneva we made acquaintance also with M. Hubert, "L'Oiselieur," as he was usually called, from his love of hawking. He was a person of considerable genius, possessing a thousand agreeable talents: he was a poet, musician, and painter; and to infinite sensibility and gaiety of manners added all the charms of perfect good breeding. Voltaire was very much afraid of him, as Hubert well knew his peculiarities, and represented circumstances on canvas in which Voltaire recognised several of his own weaknesses of character. They used to be frequent combatants at chess. Voltaire was almost always the loser, and on those occasions he never
failed to be put out of humour.

Hubert had a little favourite dog, with which he used to divert himself at the other's expense by making him snap at a piece of cheese, which, after two or three twists in his mouth, was turned out so exact a likeness of Voltaire, that one would have said it was a miniature copy of the famous bust of Pigal....