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 gestions in a humorous, semi-serious, altogether indulgent vein, and even took pains to write such replies to him as from their tone, flattering to Voltaire, conciliatory to France, might serve the diplomatist without in the least committing the royal writer to any policy. But the mission was quite unsuccessful, because Frederick was convinced that he had nothing either to hope or to fear from France; because, too, he despised its government and its policy, and the diplomatist did not exist, whether Voltaire or any one else, who could have made him change his opinion; while any prospect of benefit which the aspiring negotiator might have derived from the king's compliments, vanished upon the sudden dismissal from office, through disfavour with the French sultana of the period, Madame de Chateauroux, of the favourably disposed functionary to whom his despatches were addressed.