[M.B. notes, “my previous letter being unanswered, I thought I should address the following letter to Father Cazin, a priest serving at Quinze-Vingts, on October 18, 1818.]

To Father Cazin, Priest [1]

October 18, 1818

Sir,

I am taking the liberty of writing you to inquire after three letters from a Mr. Etienne Prieur, one dated October 12, 1817, the next the 24th of that month, and the third, January 2, 1818. All these letters were written to you for reasons that are not foreign to you, and are not foreign to Etienne Prieur. 

I beg of you to reply to me, and oblige one who has the honor of being, 

Your very humble servant,

M.B.

 

[1] I understand that Cazin may have been fabricated by Etienne. I’m not sure about this, I believe it was mentioned in Mauron’s biography, I’ll cite source when I re-read that. But it would help explain the tone of these notes. The next letter is written from Marigny, quite some distance from Paris. Perhaps this was selected by Etienne because it was inconveniently remote. 

The “Quinze-Vingts” is a hospital historically for the blind, and still a hospital for eye disease and ophthalmology research.
Quinze-Vingts” means 15 of 20, or a 300-bed hospital.