You know what, now I'm wondering if Algarotti is the one who talked to Fritz about Valori, although the negativity doesn't really seem like him (he visited Rheinsberg about two weeks before the October letter to Voltaire).
Voltaire himself didn't know Valori before November/December 1740, when he seems to have spent some time at his place, because he promptly sets his Algarotti poem at Valori's:
Mais quand, chez le gros Valori, Je vois le tendre Algarotti Presser d'une vive embrassade Le beau Lugeac, son jeune ami, Je crois voir Socrate affermi Sur la croupe d'Alcibiade;
And thank you for reposting the whole portrait - I had read it before but it was definitely good to reread and refresh my memory.
Re: Camas Letters I - Colonel Camas (1734-1740)
Voltaire himself didn't know Valori before November/December 1740, when he seems to have spent some time at his place, because he promptly sets his Algarotti poem at Valori's:
Mais quand, chez le gros Valori,
Je vois le tendre Algarotti
Presser d'une vive embrassade
Le beau Lugeac, son jeune ami,
Je crois voir Socrate affermi
Sur la croupe d'Alcibiade;
And thank you for reposting the whole portrait - I had read it before but it was definitely good to reread and refresh my memory.