Line 1. _Mon fils._ The only survivor of his many children, a young man,
just called to the bar at Aix and passionately loved by his father, he
bore the curious name of Marc-Anthony. A M. de Piles killed him in a
duel, having for second his brother-in-law. The whole was an honourable
bit of business, and the death such as men of honour must be prepared to
risk: but Malherbe would see no reason and defamed the adversary.
Line 9. _La Raison._ The idea runs all through Malherbe's work. It is
his distinguishing note, and is the spirit which differentiates him so
powerfully from the sixteenth century, that this stoical balance or
regulator which he calls "La Raison," and which governed France for two
hundred years, is his rule and text for verse and prose as well as for
practical life. Even the grandeur to which it gave rise seemed to him
accidental. He demanded "la raison" only, and felt the necessity of it
in art as acutely as though its absence were something immoral.