Paul Desforges Maillard was born nearly a century later, and wrote society verses till the age of thirty, when the desire for wider fame took possession of him.  He competed for a prize which the Academy had offered to the poet who should best commemorate the progress made by the art of navigation during the last reign.  His poem was returned.  It was offered, through the agency of a friend, to a paper called “The Mercury.”  The editor, La Roque, praised the work in florid terms, but said he dared not offend the Academy; he, too, returned the MS. Paul, mistaking the polite fiction for truth, wrote back an angry tirade against the editor’s cowardice; and the latter, retorting in as frank a fashion, told the writer that his poem was execrable, and that it was only consideration for his feelings which had hitherto prevented his hearing so.

At this juncture Paul’s sister interposed.  He was wrong, she declared, to proceed in such a point-blank manner.  In cases like these, it was only wile which conquered.  He must resume his incognito, and try, this time, the effect of a feminine disguise.  She picked out and copied the feeblest of his songs or sonnets, and sent it to La Roque, as from a girl-novice who humbly sued for his literary protection.  She was known by another name than her brother’s (Mr. Browning explains why); the travesty was therefore complete.  The poem was accepted; then another and another.  The lady’s fame grew.  La Roque made her, by letter, a declaration of love.  Voltaire also placed himself at her feet.

Paul now refused to efface himself any longer.  The clever sister urged in vain that it was her petticoats which had conquered, and not his verse.  He went to Paris to claim his honours, and introduce himself as the admired poetess to La Roque and Voltaire.  Voltaire bitterly resented the joke; La Roque affected to enjoy it; but nevertheless advised its perpetrator to get out of Paris as fast as possible.  The trick had answered for once.  It would not be wise to repeat it.  Again Paul disregarded his sister’s advice, and reprinted the poems in his own name.  “They had been praised and more than praised.  The world could not eat its own printed words!”

He discovered, however, that the world could eat its words; or, at least, forget them.  The only fame—­the speaker adds—­which a great man cannot destroy, is that which he has had no hand in making.  Paul’s light, with his sister’s, went out as did that of his predecessor.

Mr. Browning gives, in conclusion, a test by which the relative merit of any two real poets may be gauged. The greater is he who leads the happier life.  To be a poet is to see and feel.  To see and feel is to suffer.  His is the truest poetic existence who enslaves his sufferings, and makes their strength his own.  He who yokes them to his chariot shall win the race.[83]