Laudator Temporis Acti

Essays by the Late Mark Pattison, Vol. I (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1889), p. 71:

Addressing his own son Paul in 1585, Henri [Estienne] says:

    And as I am on the topic of speaking Latin, I will add another notable reminiscence of my father's family, by the which thou mayst understand the facilities I enjoyed as a boy for acquiring that tongue. There was a time when thy grandfather Robert entertained in his own household ten men employed by him as correctors on his press, or in other parts of his business. These ten persons were all of them men of education; some of them of considerable learning; as they were of different nations, so they were of different languages. This necessitated them to employ Latin as the common medium of communication, not at table only, but about the house, so that the very maidservants came to understand what was said, and even to speak it a little. As for your grandmother [Perrette,] except one made use of some very unusual word, she understood what was said in Latin with the same ease as if it had been French. As to myself and my brother Robert, we were allowed at home to use no other language whenever we had to address my father, or one of his ten journeymen.—
Dedication to Aulus Gellius, 1585.

One is reminded of Montaigne.

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