Rica to the same in Smyrna

The inhabitants of Paris are endowed with a curiosity that verges on extravagance. When I got here, I was regarded as if I had been sent from heaven : the aged, men, women, and children all wanted to see me. If I went out, everyone was at the windows ; if I was in the Tuileries, [1] a circle immediately formed about me, even the women made a rainbow of a thousand shades surrounding me ; if I was at the theatre, a hundred binoculars were immediately focused on my face. In a word, never has any man been as much seen as I. I would sometimes smile hearing people who had almost never left their own room saying to each other : You have to admit he really looks Persian. What a wonder ! I found portraits of me everywhere ; I saw myself reproduced in all the shops and on all the mantelpieces, so did they fear they had not seen me enough. [2]

So many honors do not fail to be tiresome. I did not think myself a man so curious and so rare ; and though I have a very good opinion of myself, I would never have imagined that I could trouble the calm of a great city where I was not known. For this reason I decided I would quit my Persian costume and don a European one, to see whether there would still remain something remarkable about my physiognomy. This test let me see what I was really worth. Free of all the foreign ornaments, I was evaluated very closely. I had cause for complaining to my tailor, who had caused me to lose the public’s attention and esteem in a moment, for I suddenly entered a frightening void. I would sometimes remain an hour in a company without been looked at or pressed to open my mouth ; but if by chance someone told the company that I was Persian, immediately I heard a buzzing around me : Ah, ah, Monsieur is a Persian ? How extraordinary ! How can a person be Persian ? [3]

Paris this 6^th day of the moon of Chalval 1712