Beaumarchais avenged himself on _le grand_ Bertrand by indicting upon him the celebrity of ridicule. Here, as elsewhere, the shade of the physiognomies is perfectly grasped. It is in vain that Bertrand attempted to deal terrible blows, in vain that he committed to writing such phrases as, "cynic orator; buffoon; brazen-faced sophist; unfaithful painter who draws from his own soul the filth with which he tarnishes the robe of innocence; evil, from necessity and from taste; his heart hard, implacable, vindictive; light-headed from his passing triumph; and smothering without remorse human sensibility ..." instead of paying back anger for anger, Beaumarchais contented himself with painting his enemy. He painted him talkative, shrewd for gain, undecided, timid, hot-headed, but more stupid than bad, in a word exactly as he showed himself in the four grotesque memoirs with which he has enriched this famous suit.
The fourth champion who precipitated himself upon Beaumarchais, the head lowered to pierce him through by the first blow, was a novelist of the time, amusing enough in a melancholy way, who prided himself as he said, upon having _l'embonpoint du sentiment_. It is d'Arnaud-Baculard, who, to be agreeable to the judge Goëzman, wrote a letter containing a false statement and who, after being very politely set right in the first memoir of Beaumarchais, replied in this style:
"Yes, I was on foot and I encountered in the rue de Condé, the sieur Caron _en carrosse_--_dans son carrosse_," and as Beaumarchais had said that d'Arnaud had a somber air, he grew indignant and cried, "I had an air, not somber but penetrating. The somber air goes only with those who ruminate crime, who work to stifle remorse and to do evil--There are hearts in which I tremble to read, where I measure all the somber depths of hell. It is then that I cry out, 'thou sleepest, Jupiter! for what purpose then hast thou thy thunderbolts?'"
"One sees," said Loménie, "that if d'Arnaud on his side was not _méchant_, it was not from lack of will. The reply of Beaumarchais perhaps will be found interesting; there it will be seen with what justice he gave to each one his deserts, and what attractive serenity he brought into the combat. He began by reproducing the phrase of d'Arnaud about the _carrosse_.
