No one dared to say that this passionate adoration offered to the princess was unbecoming and offensive to etiquette.  Voltaire was the man of his age, and therefore justified in offering his worship even to a princess.  He was also the favorite of the king, who allowed him privileges granted to no other man.  There was one present, however, who found these words of passion and of rapture too bold, and that one was King Frederick.  He had entered noiselessly and unannounced, as was his custom, and he saw, with a derisive smile, how every one surrounded Voltaire, and all were zealous in expressing their rapture over his improvised poem, and entreating him to repeat it.

“How can I repeat what I no longer know?” said he.  “An angel floated by me in the air, and, by a glance alone, she whispered words which my enraptured lips uttered as in a wild hallucination.”

“The centuries to come are to be pitied if they are to be deprived of this enchanting poem,” said the Princess Amelia.  She had remarked the entrance of the king, knew that his eye was fixed upon her, and wished to please him by flattering his beloved favorite.

“If your royal highness thinks thus, I will now write out a poem which I had designed only to recite,” said Voltaire, seating himself at the card-table; and, taking a card and pencil, he wrote with a swift hand and handed the card, bowing profoundly.

The king, who was a silent spectator of this scene, looked at the Princess Amelia, and saw that she blushed as she read, and her brow was clouded.

“Allow me, also, to read the poem of the great Voltaire, my sister,” said the king, drawing near.

The princess handed him the card, and while Frederick read, all stood around him in respectful silence.

“This poem is sublime,” said the king, smiling.  He saw that the princess was no longer grave, and that Voltaire breathed freely, as if relieved from a great apprehension.  “This little poem is so enchanting, that you must allow me to copy it, my sister.  Go on with your conversation, messieurs, it does not disturb me.”

A request from the lips of a king is a command; all exerted themselves therefore to keep up a gay and animated conversation, and to seem thoughtless and unoccupied.  Frederick seated himself at the table, and read once more the poem of Voltaire, which was as follows: 

     “Souvent un pen de verite
      Se mele au plus grossier mensonge. 
      Cette nuit dans l’erreur d’un songe,
      Au rang des rois j’etais monte,
      Je vous aimais alors, et j’osais vous le dire,
      Les dieux a mon reveil ne m’ont pas tout ote,
      Je n’ai perdu que mon empire.”

“Insolent!” cried the king, and his scornful glance wandered away to Voltaire, who was seated near the queen engaged in lively conversation.  “We will damp his ardor,” said he, smiling; and, taking a card, he commenced writing hastily.