academician was in the right, published, anonymously, a letter to prove that the treatment he had received was unjust. Frederick, both as king and disciplinarian, was disposed to stand by his President; and was so indignant at the side taken by Voltaire, whose style at once betrayed him, that he, in his turn, wrote (anonymously) a letter "from an Academician of Berlin to an Academician of Paris," in which some very rude things were said of his chamberlain. However, with full consciousness of this anonymous warfare, they went on supping together, till a good understanding was so far restored that Voltaire read to the king a satire which he had prepared against Maupertuis, called the "Diatribe of Doctor Akakia," wherein some of the President's favourite theories were laid hold of and run to their extreme conclusions, which lay far in the regions of absurdity. Though he greatly enjoyed the joke, Frederick laid on its author the strictest injunctions to let it go no further. Nevertheless, like so many of his productions, it was issued from a foreign press, and set everybody, in Berlin as elsewhere, laughing at the unfortunate President. The king was, naturally, very indignant. Voltaire, as usual, was ready to disclaim all knowledge of the publication, but was not believed, and endured the mortification of seeing his Diatribe burnt by the hangman. Thereupon he packed up the symbols of his favour, and returned them to the king with a verse in which he compared himself to a lover returning the portrait of his mistress. Much negotiation ensued; the king in some degree relented; and finally, Voltaire, after another brief period of apparent favour, left Berlin in May 1753, as if on a short leave of absence on account of bad health, to drink the
