Transcriber's Note: Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note. Variant spellings have been retained. Although not present in the original, the following table of contents has been included for readers' convenience.

THE LETTERS
OF HER MOTHER
TO ELIZABETH

JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD
LONDON & NEW YORK · MDCCCCI

Copyright, 1901
By John Lane

FIFTH EDITION

UNIVERSITY PRESS · JOHN WILSON
AND SON · CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.

NOTE

Every one who has read "The Visits of Elizabeth," in which a girl of seventeen describes her adventures to her mother in a series of entertaining and clever letters, has instinctively asked the question: "What sort of woman was Elizabeth's Mother?"

Perhaps an answer that will satisfy all will be found in the following "Letters of her Mother to Elizabeth."

The Letters of Her
Mother to Elizabeth

LETTER I

Monk's Folly, 27th July

Dearest Elizabeth:

I am glad you reached Nazeby without any mishap. Your letter was quite refreshing, but, darling, do be more careful of your grammar. Remember, one never talks grammar now-a-days in Society, it isn't done; it is considered very Newnham and Girton and patronising, but one should always know how to write one's language. Because the fashion might change some day, and it would be so parvenu to have to pick it up.

As I told you before you started on your round of visits, you will have a capital opportunity of making a good match. You are young, very pretty, of the bluest blood in the three kingdoms, and have a fortune—to be sure this latter advantage, while it would be more than a sufficient dot to catch a twelfth-century French duke, would be considered by an impecunious British peer quite beneath contempt. Your trump card, Elizabeth, is your manner, and I count upon that to do more for you than all the other attributes put together. Nature and my training have made you a perfect specimen of an ingénue, and I beseech you, darling, do me credit. Please forgive the coarseness of what I have said, it is only a little plain speaking between us; I shan't refer to it again; I know I can trust you.

These Horrid Smiths

From what you write I gather that the Marquis of Valmond is épris with Mrs. Smith. Horrid woman! the Chevingtons have met her. Mrs. Chevington was here this morning to enquire after my neuralgia. She said that Mr. Smith met his wife in Johannesburg five years ago before he "arrived." He used to wear overalls, and carry a pick on his shoulder, and spent his days digging in the earth, but he stopped at sunset, as I should think he well might, and invariably went to the same inn to refresh himself, where Mrs. Smith's mother cooked his dinner and Mrs. Smith herself gave him what she called a "corpse-reviver" from behind the bar. At night, a great many men who dug in the earth with Mr. Smith would come for "corpse-revivers," and they called Mrs. Smith "Polly," and the mother "old girl." And one day Mr. Smith found a nugget as big as a roc's egg when he was digging in the earth, and after that he stopped. The funny part was that "Polly" always said he would never find anything, and he had a wager with her that if he did she should marry him. So that is the story of their courtship and marriage, and they have millions. Mrs. Chevington vouches for the truth of it all, for Algy Chevington was out in Johannesburg at the time, and he dug in the same hole with Mr. Smith and knows all about him and "Polly," only Algy never found anything, for the flowers in Mrs. Chevington's hat were in the bonnet she wore all last spring. But let us leave these horrid Smiths; I am sure they are horrid. I can't understand how Lady Cecilia puts up with them. Mrs. Chevington says she hears Sir Trevor is one of the directors in the Yerburg Mine. Algy called him a guinea-pig, and said he wished he was one.

An Eligible Parti

Lord Valmond has fifty thousand a year and six places besides the house in Grosvenor Square. You will hardly meet a more eligible parti; I hear he is very fast; they say he gave Betty Milbanke, the snake-dancer at the Palace, all the diamonds she wears. If he is anything like his father was, he must be both good-looking and fascinating. The late Marquis was the handsomest man save one that I have ever seen, and could have married any of the Duchess of Rougemont's daughters if he had been a valet instead of a marquis, and the Duchess was the proudest woman in England. The girl who gets this Valmond will not only be lucky but clever; the way to attract him is to snub him; the fools that have hitherto angled for him have always put cake on their hooks; but, if I were fishing in the water in which My Lord Valmond disported himself, I should bait my hook with a common worm. It is something he has never yet seen.

The African Millionaire

Tell me more about Mr. Wertz, the African millionaire; is he the man who is building the Venetian palazzo in Belgrave Square? If so, it was rumoured last season that he was to be made a baron. They blackballed him at the Jockey Club in Paris, and even the Empire nobility who live in appartements in the Champs Élysées refused to know him; that is why he came to England. He is a gentleman, if he is a Jew; the family belong to the tribe of Levi. Algy Chevington, who knows everything about everybody, says his Holbeins are priceless, and that the Pope offered to make him a Papal Count if he would part with a "Flight into Egypt" known as the Wertz Raphael. But of course even a knighthood is better than a Papal Count, and if Mr. Wertz gives his Holbeins to the National Gallery he is sure to be created something.

You cannot be too careful of the unmarried girls you know; Miss La Touche is certainly not the sort of person for you to be intimate with. The Rooses, of course, are quite correct, they will make capital foils for you; beside Jane Roose is amiable, and has been out so many seasons that her advice will be useful. Be sure, however, to do the very opposite to what she tells you.

Lady Beatrice Carterville

If the weather is fine to-morrow, I am going to drive over in the afternoon to call on Lady Beatrice Carterville. She has a house-party, and the people who come to her are sure to be odd and amusing. My neuralgia has been better these last few days. The things I ordered from Paquin have come at last; the mauve crêpe de chine with the valenciennes lace flounces is lovely; the hat and parasol are creations, as the Society papers say. Love to Lady Cecilia and the tips of my fingers to Sir Trevor.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER II

Monk's Folly, 29th July

Darling Elizabeth:

Lady Beatrice's Tea

I felt so well yesterday that I drove over in the afternoon to Lady Beatrice's to tea. I felt I must show myself as Paquin made me to someone. It was so warm that tea was served on the terrace; the view of the Quantocks steaming in the distance over the tops of the oaks in the park was charming. There were a great many people present, and when I arrived, Lady Beatrice exclaimed at the courage I showed in coming when the sun was so hot and the road so dusty. She presided at the tea-table in white piqué and a sailor hat which rested on the bridge of her nose. She is as fat as Lady Theodosia Doran and plays tennis; the rouge on her neck had stained her collar, quite a four-inch collar too, and there were finger marks of rouge on her bodice. She introduces everybody, which, while it is not the thing, certainly makes one more comfortable than the fashion at present in vogue. I always like to know the names of the people I am talking to. Everybody talked about the weather and the dust, and it was deadly dull till Lady Beatrice said she wanted to play tennis. She went off to play singles with Mr. Frame, the Low Church curate, and looked so funny, bounding about the lawn like a big rubber ball, that I nearly screamed. Most of the people strolled up and down the terrace, or leaned over the balustrade above the lake. I sat under my parasol in a Madeira chair, and was talked to by such a curious woman, a Mrs. Beverley Fruit. A Live AuthoressIt was interesting to meet a real live authoress after having read her works. I remember when Mrs. Fruit's first novel came out ten years ago it created a great sensation, but I must confess the sensation was confined to middle-class people and the Universities. Of course, everybody in Society bought it. It was all about Radicals and a silly Low Church curate who threw up his living because he didn't believe in God, and went to London and lived in the slums. Mr. Gladstone wrote a review of it, and they dramatised it in America. Mrs. Fruit has since written several other books, and each one is more bitter against Society than the last, so you may fancy how nervous I felt at being left with such a woman. But, darling, she isn't at all like her books. I was quite charmed with her; she was dressed so well, and looked quite like a lady; she lives in Berkeley Square and has a place in Essex. In the last election she canvassed the county for the Conservatives, and the Duchess of Rougemont is very, very fond of her. Lady Beatrice tells me that Mrs. Beverley Fruit's son, who is private secretary to a Cabinet Minister, is actually going to marry one of the Duchess's daughters, Lady Mabel, the one with the projecting teeth and the squint. And I am sure I think it is very brave of Mr. Fruit Junior, for Lady Mabel is both ugly and stupid. However, the connection is a good one for the Fruits, who have made their fortune out of books, which I think is decidedly less vulgar than pale ale or furniture. Mrs. Fruit is staying with Lady Beatrice.

Lady Ann Fairfax

Lady Ann Fairfax, the Daily Sensation's War correspondent, is also stopping at Braxome Towers. She told me that she had been through three sieges, and never felt happier than when "sniping," whatever that may be. She lived three months in a bomb-proof shelter on quarter rations, was once taken prisoner, and when exchanged was sent through the lines barefoot and with only a blanket round her. She is bringing out a book to be called "What I have been through," and I shall certainly buy it. She is rather pretty and dresses beautifully, and is very amusing; you could listen to her for hours; her stories are like shilling shockers, with a bit of Henty thrown in to give them style. She was quite breezy, and I was sorry when Lady Beatrice shouted triumphantly, "Six love, Mr. Frame!" and came up puffing like a porpoise, her hair soppy on the temples and gutters on her cheeks.

Lady Beatrice was in an awfully good humour, for Mr. Frame beat the Somerset champion last week, but, poor man! he would not dare to even dream of beating Lady Beatrice. She only suffers him to eat her cucumber sandwiches and drink her Mazawattee for the pleasure of beating him.

The drive home in the twilight was very pleasant. I brought Captain Bennett of the Coldstreams and the Earl of Mortimer as far as the Club in Taunton. They are playing for Gloucester, but, as I dislike cricket as much as you do, I shan't go to see the match. I know my frock was admired at Braxome to-day; poor Mr. Frame, who sat and ate ices near me after his thrashing, would never meet my glance directly, and I overheard Lady Beatrice tell Mrs. Beverley Fruit that I spent altogether too much on dress, while Lady Beatrice always looks as if she considered the expenditure of a five-pound note on her person an extravagance. Dear, dear Paquin!

The Missing Handkerchief

I am awfully provoked with myself, the lace handkerchief I wore to-day is missing. I am sure it was in my hand when we left Braxome, for I remember sniffing "parfum d'Arabie" in the carriage. It is really quite provoking.—Your dearest Mamma.

The Handkerchief Found

P. S.—I have just received a note from Captain Bennett saying he found my handkerchief sticking to his coat when he got into the Club, and asking if he may restore it to me in person to-morrow.

LETTER III

Monk's Folly, 1st August

Dearest Elizabeth:

A Mature Young Man

L'ingénue va bien. I am so glad you managed to put that odious Mrs. Smith in her place. It is really too revolutionary to be forced to accept such people, but what you tell me about her and Lord Valmond surprises me. I can quite understand a woman of her stamp liking the admiration of Valmond, for he is young and good-looking, and a marquis, but what can he see in her? He is one of those young men who mature quickly; at fifteen he could tell whether a woman put on her chemise or her petticoat first, and at one and twenty he knew the Rake's Catechism by heart. But I have always heard that he was intelligent, and his people were never afraid of his doing something foolish. He takes his menus plaisirs like a gentleman, but why he should be so devoted to this Mrs. Smith I cannot conceive. She is not pretty, she is not witty; Lord Valmond is rich, surely he does not want to borrow money from her. I shall be glad when you leave Nazeby Hall; it is one thing to catch a marquis, and another thing to get scratched in the effort. You must leave at once, otherwise you will be forced to play your trump card—the art of being an ingénue. Leave at once, Valmond will be sure to follow. The slap on the cheek was excellent; no man ever forgets a woman who has left the print of her fingers on his face, he will either hate her or love her. If the man is a man and was in the wrong, he will be forced to admire the woman who could protect herself against him. Leave Nazeby, Elizabeth; Valmond is a man and a gentleman, let him know that you are a lady and virtuous.

The Handkerchief Returned

This morning, just before lunch, Fifine and I were dozing on the lawn under the big Japanese umbrella, when James came to tell me that Captain Bennett was in the drawing-room. Of course he came to return my handkerchief—it was very polite of him to bring it himself, especially as he rode all the way from Taunton in a blazing sun, along a road lying under nearly a foot of dust. Naturally, I could not let him go back without lunch, and afterwards, when I thought he would go, he asked me to let him look over my songs, as he wanted something to sing at a smoker to-night, which the Yeomanry are giving for him and the Earl of Mortimer. He tried nearly all, and tea was brought in before he got one to suit his voice, which is really Captain Bennetta very good one. He is a very gentlemanly man, and has a shy way of looking at one, that is quite naïve in a soldier. He wouldn't believe me when I told him I had a daughter seventeen, until I showed him your photograph. He seemed so astonished that I was obliged to tax him with being extremely ungallant. I asked him if he expected a woman to be old at thirty-five because she happened to marry at seventeen, and he gave me such a look that I felt quite uncomfortable. His eyes were not at all shy, but looked like sparks of blue fire. Just then there was the sound of a carriage driving up, and Mrs. Chevington and the Blaine girls rushed into the room. Fell in would be more correct, for so few Englishwomen know how to enter a room quickly and gracefully. They didn't know Captain Bennett, and as I thought I had had enough of him for one day, I wouldn't introduce him.

He has a horrid way of shaking hands, and left the print of my opal ring on my middle finger. I told him to keep the songs as long as he wished, but he is so awfully polite he said he would return them to-morrow. When he had gone, Daisy Blaine asked me if I had heard that he said in the Taunton Club he intended to marry money, which I thought very spiteful of her.

Mrs. Chevington was greatly agitated by the report that an American family have taken Astley Court. She said that everybody is asking Lady Beatrice Carterville if she is going to call on them. I believe, if Lady Beatrice should marry Mr. Frame, Mrs. Chevington would find an excuse for her. Whenever she passes the lions at Braxome Lodge, Mrs. Chevington is pervaded with the most sacred emotions—she has admitted as much to me. There are some people to whom blue blood is more intoxicating than champagne, and who look on a pedigree as a reservoir which you can never exhaust. The odd part of it is, that Mrs. Chevington is not a snob, she is merely common or garden respectable.

The Ghost

The Blaine girls asked a great many questions about you, and if it was true that the ghost walked every night at Nazeby (Mrs. Chevington had told them about your letter which I read to her). Blanche Blaine said she wouldn't visit such a house as Nazeby for all the possible husbands it might contain, which I think was rude of her, but admitted, when I seemed cross, that once she had a similar experience at Great Ruin Castle. Her adventure was more sensational than yours, for Mrs. Maltravers, who had the room next to her, told her their corridor was haunted and that several people who on hearing noises had come out of their rooms to see what it was, had gone mad. But the ghost has yet to walk who can frighten Blanche Blaine. Immediately after Mrs. Maltravers, who had seen Blanche into her bed-room to reassure her, she said, had kissed her good-night and left, Blanche opened her door softly and peeped cautiously into the corridor, and while she looked she distinctly saw the ghost advancing towards her; and the ghost carried a candle in one hand, and wore crimson plush knee-breeches and white stockings and its hair was powdered. And while Blanche was uncertain whether to scream or faint the ghost vanished into Mrs. Maltravers' room. Blanche said she waited to hear Mrs. Maltravers scream, but as not a sound came from her room, Blanche believed her imagination had got the better of her, so she bolted her door and went to bed.

The weather has been so fine that my neuralgia has entirely gone, and I am accepting all invitations. Write me when you reach Eaton Place.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER IV

Monk's Folly, 3rd August

Darling Elizabeth:

The Parkers Arrive

Mrs. Chevington walked over yesterday before tea expressly to tell me, she said, that Mr. Phineas T. Parker and family, of New York, had arrived at Astley Court, having travelled down from London in a special Pullman attached to the Bristol express. I saw two of them this morning in Taunton going into St. Mary's with Baedekers, and Lady Beatrice called on them this afternoon, and by the end of the month the Parkers will be a county family. They are fabulously rich; I forget how many hundred million dollars Mr. Parker is worth, and of course nobody asks how he made his money. Algy says they are all kings in America and it doesn't matter, but as for that it doesn't matter in England either, where at the most the millionaires are only barons.

Nobody can talk of anything but their arrival, and everybody is singing Lady Beatrice's praises for having called on them so soon. Captain Bennett, who came this afternoon to bring back the songs and stupidly left two behind, says she should be canonised. Mr. Parker and his son have already been proposed and seconded at the Taunton Club; they have been asked to dine at the mess on guest-night; and both Father Ribbit and Mr. Frame, the High Church rector and Low Church curate, have offered them pews under the pulpit, and asked them to subscribe respectively to the Convent School of the Passionate Nuns and the Daily Soup Dispensary. But rumour has it that the Parkers are Baptists, and are going to the chapel in Holmes' the grocer's back-yard. I shall drive Mrs. Chevington over to Astley to-morrow and leave your card with mine.

On coming home from Taunton this morning, Perkins drove by Braxome. You know part of the road runs through the park, and I saw Lady Beatrice's equestrian cook out for an airing on a brown cob, with a couple of Gordon setters sniffing its hoofs. She really looked quite lady-like. Mrs. Chevington says her habit was made at Redfern's. Lady Beatrice found her in the Want column of the Standard.

"Young woman desires situation in County Family, as cook, housemaid, or companion; cook preferred. Must have use of horse daily. Highest references."

Lady Beatrice is delighted with her, and she will hunt with the West Somerset Harriers this coming season.

Captain Bennett Dislocates his Thumb

Captain Bennett dislocated his thumb at cricket to-day, and is hors de combat for the rest of the match. When he came back with the songs this afternoon he was suffering such pain that he asked me if I would mind putting on a fresh bandage for him. I told him that the sight of blood always made me faint, but he assured me the skin was not broken, so I took off the old bandage and put on a new one. It seemed to give him great relief, and he said I would make a splendid nurse, and looked at me with that queer blue fire look his eyes always have, when their expression is not as timid as a bashful boy's. He is awfully stupid at conversation, and one has to do all the talking. I asked him if they fed him properly at the Club, for he always looked so hungry whenever I met him. He replied that he was literally starving, but that nothing so material as food would satisfy his hunger, and that blue fire look came back into his eyes.

Captain Bennett in Delirium

I thought he was becoming delirious from the pain of his thumb, and I begged him to go home and send for the doctor. Then he did so strange a thing that I am sure it was done in delirium; he asked me to feel how fast his pulse was beating—it went tick-tock like a Waterbury watch—and he put his arm with the bad thumb round my waist, and called me an angel in the back of his throat and was hot all over. So I knew he had fever. I wasn't a bit afraid, for I have wonderful presence of mind, as you know. I have been told it is best to humour people in delirium, so I said I was sure I was an angel, for everybody told me so, and that if he would kindly stop crushing the jet spangles on my cream-coloured crepon bodice I would act like an angel to him. He instantly obeyed, and I rose and rang for James and told him that Captain Bennett was too ill to ride back to Taunton. Whereupon, before I could finish speaking, James asked if he should tell Perkins to get ready the brougham or dog-cart, and if I thought a glass of barley-water would do Captain Bennett good.

An Ideal Servant

Such a treasure, James. Really an ideal servant; knows exactly what one wants without one's having the trouble to order it. I can't understand how Lord Froom parted with him.

Monsieur Malorme

Just then Monsieur Malorme, whom the Blaines have engaged to talk French with Bertie before he joins the Embassy in Paris, came over with a note from Blanche asking me to a garden party on Saturday. I made Captain Bennett drink the barley-water, which I think must have done him good, because he sat very quiet till James came to say Perkins was ready. Monsieur Malorme is a very good-looking young man for a Frenchman, almost as good-looking as Captain Bennett; he has beautiful teeth and hands, but a horrid way of looking out of his eyes, as if he had just winked at you. He is a Provençal and quite a gentleman; Blanche said they felt obliged to have him eat with them, for he was very superior and accustomed to the best society. When he was coaching the Duke of FitzArthur he always followed the Melton Mowbray pack, and took the Dowager Duchess in to dinner when the family were alone.

I found him quite entertaining and he made Captain Bennett laugh quite naturally, so I knew the barley-water had acted, and I said so. I told Captain Bennett that I would send a groom into Taunton with his horse, and he could take that opportunity to return the rest of my songs, if he had done with them. When he went away, he gave me such a blue fire look and squeezed my hand so horridly that I thought he was going to be delirious again.

Remembering what Blanche had said of Monsieur Malorme's superiority, I took an interest in his pursuits, asked him how long he had been in England, what he thought of our customs, and if he found Bertie an apt pupil. He replied that he had been a year in England, that he found life in Grosvenor Square plus ravissante qu'à Paris, and that the English women were comme les volcanes ayant leurs cimes dans la neige, and that Bairtee was précoce, which I knew was a horrid French lie, for you know it is only because Mrs. Blaine's uncle is in the Cabinet that Bertie, whose chin and forehead seem to be racing to see which can get away from the other the fastest, ever got that secretaryship in the Rue St. Honoré.

The Phonograph

James brought in whiskey and soda and cigarettes, and Monsieur Malorme, who is really quite amusing, became communicative. He assured me that Daisy Blaine was something for which there seems to be no word in French, for he substituted as an equivalent a gesture made by putting the thumb and forefinger to the lips and wafting a kiss into the air. I also gathered that he was at work on a French-English grammar, which was to revolutionise all methods of teaching at present in vogue. It seems that Monsieur Malorme speaks the grammar into phonographs, and one buys the phonograph instead of the book. Lord St. Noodle is quite delighted with the idea, and has promised to speak into the phonograph before the grammar begins; and Monsieur Malorme hopes to persuade the French Ambassador and the Chancellor of the Exchequer to recommend it in the same way. To overcome the difficulty of speaking into each phonograph separately, Monsieur Malorme proposes to hire a room and fill it with phonographs, so that all will catch the voice at the same time. He grew quite farouche over it, and let one of my Bohemian goblets, which contained his whiskey and soda, fall and break. And he looked at me like Captain Bennett when the delirium was coming on, so I excused myself as having to dress for dinner, and left James to show him out. I expect to hear from you at Heaviland Manor to-morrow. I feel sure Lord Valmond will follow you, for he has a place near, which makes the excuse very plausible.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER V

Monk's Folly, 5th August

Darling Elizabeth:

The Dinner-party

Last night Lady Beatrice gave a dinner for the Parkers. I wore the blue brocade with the Peter Lely bodice, and that odious Mr. Rumple took me in. I am sure Lady Beatrice decided on it at the last moment to spite me, because she overheard me ask Mr. Frame how such a champion as he liked being beaten by her ladyship every day. Captain Bennett sat on the other side of me and Mr. Frame was opposite, so I devoted myself entirely to them, and left Mr. Rumple to lap up his soup like a horse in a water-trough. Society is falling off terribly now-a-days; we are no longer county but provincial families. I really don't see why because Mr. Rumple is Lady Beatrice's lawyer that she should invite him to dine when she has a party, but of course we have no really smart set down here, and one sends into Taunton for a lawyer or a doctor to fill up a vacant place at a dinner-table, just as one sends in for meat or candles. Mr. Rumple is fat and pasty, and has a beard; his only topics of conversation were the assizes and the war. I asked him why he didn't volunteer, and he looked at me with a Dover to Calais smile, and said what did I think would become of his practice. And I replied, "I believe you are a Pro-Boer, Mr. Rumple." He turned green like a gooseberry, and then purple, and Lady Beatrice cried sharply, "What is that you are, Mr. Rumple?" "Pro-Boer," he faltered, echoing my words, and everybody was upon him at once like a pack of wolves. He isn't really anything of the sort, but a Tory who believes that because Lady Beatrice was a duke's daughter she is part of the Constitution. Algy Chevington says he is a rising man, but I prefer to know such people when the process is complete, for this rising is only another term for moulting, which is decidedly unpleasant to witness in the male species of the respectable middle-class.

In the drawing-room, before the men joined us, Mrs. Parker sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "Marching through Georgia," and Lady Beatrice actually joined in the chorus. Mrs. Parker's dress was not made at Paquin's, and she only wore one decent ring. Miss Parker, however, kept up the family's reputation for wealth, and wore ropes of diamonds round her neck, which made poor Lady Beatrice in her black and yellow satin and amethysts look positively dowdy. Mr. Parker père is, I think, inclined to be jovial if he got the chance. He has small bright eyes, and has lost two fingers on his left hand in the course of his "rising" process. He called me madam continually, and asked me if I thought Lady Beatrice would ever marry, which struck me as so absurd that I laughed outright. "Do you want her for your son?" I said. "God forbid!" he replied, and I thought he was going to poke me in the waist with one of the stumps of his right hand.

Lady Beatrice, as you know, would have fifty fits of the most violent epileptic form if a woman attempted to smoke in her presence, and as I saw Blanche Blaine walking up and down on the terrace with a cigar in her cheek I was on the point of joining her when I remembered my neuralgia, but I sent Mr. Parker out to her as he said he found it "darned poky" to have to listen to his wife's voice.

Captain Bennett Apologises

Captain Bennett at once took the vacant place, and began to apologise most profusely for his behaviour two days ago. He looked really miserable, and there wasn't any more blue fire in his eyes. He has to go back to Windsor to-morrow, and I shan't see him again. He wanted to know if I was sorry and if I would let him come back, and then to my amazement he declared he loved me. It was a most unfair advantage, and I told him so; we were sitting in the middle of Lady Beatrice's drawing-room. Mr. Frame and Lady Beatrice were looking at us as hard as they could, and I am sure Daisy Blaine heard every word he said. I begged him to stop, but he said recklessly he didn't care if the whole room heard; that I had encouraged Captain Bennett's Threathim and broken his heart. He had never loved a woman before, and if I wouldn't have him he was going to hell, and it would all be at my door. I think it was villainously low down of him, and at that moment I would have preferred Mr. Rumple to be sitting next me. I got up to go away, but he had hold of my skirt and said I should hear him out, and as I didn't care to leave yards of Paquin in his hands I submitted. Captain Bennett is a perfect brute, and I am sure he had drunk too much of Lady Beatrice's champagne. And to think how deceived I had been in him! I thought him such a nice, manly young fellow, with such good manners, and such a straight back and long legs, so smart and handsome; and he was so insulting and threatening, and had hold of my skirt so that I couldn't budge. How I hate him. As if I would ever dream of marrying a parvenu, even if his fortune would build a line of battle ships. When he finally let me move, he said he was going back to Windsor to blow out his brains. I told him with my sweetest smile, for Lady Beatrice scented something and was glaring at me, that if I were he I would do something original, and that I was sure he hadn't a bit of originality about him, for he talked "Family Herald"just like the Family Herald. He laughed and said he would like to choke me, and that I had not seen the last of him, and he would have me on my knees at his feet yet. A really horrid young man. I wish he would go to South Africa; I am sure nobody would miss him.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER VI

Monk's Folly, 10th August

Darling Elizabeth:

The Graftons

I felt particularly virtuous this morning, and drove over to Romford to see old Admiral and Mrs. Grafton. Such a dear Darby and Joan pair, so different from the foot-in-the-grave old couples one meets now-a-days. The Admiral was pruning roses in the dearest little garden when I drove up; he hobbled up with a wheeze and muddy fingers and opened the carriage door before Alfred had time to dismount from the box. He welcomed me to Romford with an old-school bow, and gave me an elbow to shake because his hands were full of lumps of Somersetshire clay. He asked me to sit down in the dining-room (they always shut up the drawing-room in the summer, and it is as damp as a church), while he called his wife. Mrs. Grafton, who is a dear, kissed me on both cheeks, and asked after my neuralgia and you. Although it was awfully hot, she was wearing the Queen's Indian shawl; they keep the rooms so dark that I nearly sat down on the Angora cat, which was sleeping in the most comfortable chair in the room. While the Admiral was washing his hands and choking with asthma in the next room, Mrs. Grafton told me about the rheumatism in her left shoulder, and that she had thought at first that I was the chiropodist they were expecting from Taunton.

They insisted on my seeing the kitchen garden, and were very proud that their Brussels sprouts took the first prize at the Bath Vegetable Show in the Spring. I saw the pigs being fed, and the Admiral told me that one of his sows had been given him by the Dowager Marchioness of Ealing, who had brought it to him in her arms wrapped in cotton-wool when it was a week old. The Admiral amuses himself with carpentering, and has had one of the conservatories fitted up as a tool-house, but since he mistook one of his thumbs for a shaving and nearly planed it off, he hasn't been able to finish the table for the butler's pantry. Mrs. Grafton made him show me his artificial ice-machine, and he frappéed a Veuve Clicquot for me, but the vacuum or something didn't work and the neck of the bottle broke. Then we went back to the dining-room, where the Angora cat was sharpening its claws in the lace curtains. The Admiral said, "Damn that beast, Maria!" but Mrs. Grafton gave him such a look, and said, "Oh, Arthur! how can you when he has been so ill lately. Puss, puss, purr-r, purr-r."

A servant brought in some port wine and biscuits, and the Admiral asked me if I cared to see his views of places on the Pacific station. We came to a photograph of a woman in a mantilla, whom the Admiral said was the belle of Lima, and he sighed and chuckled. "Those were days to remember; we were the fastest ship in the Navy, and when we went out of commission there wasn't a pair of black eyes from Valparaiso to Vancouver that didn't shed tears." Then Mrs. Grafton told me of the voyage she made out to the station, when she was the only woman on the steamer, and how two men quarrelled over her in Colon harbour, and another threatened to throw himself in among the man-eaters at Barbados, because she hadn't spoken to him for a whole day. The Admiral looked very savage, and wheezed terribly and called her Mrs. Grafton. They were too delightfully Jo Anderson, my jo, John. I could have spent the whole morning with them, for it is so refreshing to find people natural and sincerely attached to each other. They never spoke a word of scandal during the whole visit; and when I left, Mrs. Grafton gave me a beautiful bouquet of Maréchal Niels and said if she were a man she knew she would break her heart over me, and the dear old Admiral insisted on helping me into the carriage and gave me such a charming Early Victorian salute.

I know they only said nice things of me when I was out of sight, and I wish there were more people like them in the county.

The Parkers' Dinner-party

Blanche Blaine came to tea in the afternoon; two of her fingers are iodined and she had a leather strap round her wrist; she says she sprained her hand at tennis yesterday and can't grip her racquet. Daisy biked over to Exeter this morning with Mr. Frame to represent Taunton in the mixed doubles and ladies' singles. The Duchess of Windermere is to give the prizes. Lady Beatrice is furious because the Committee decided at the last moment to scratch her name in the ladies' doubles. I think it is quite time she gave up tennis, for she can't hit a ball and disputes every point and looks such a fright. She was so mad when she heard she had been scratched, that she refused to go over to Exeter, or to let any of her house-party go. The Parkers took a party in a special Pullman; Blanche thinks they own it, for they always have it wherever they go. The Duchess of Windermere has invited them to sit under the marquee with her.

I was sorry I could not go to their dinner-party last night. Blanche says it was awfully well done. The chef from Prince's and an army of waiters came down from London. The plate was superb, china was only used with soup and fruit—Dresden and Sèvres; the handles of the knives and forks were gold, studded with rubies, those of the spoons were silver and ebony. The favours must have cost a small fortune. Lady Beatrice, who went in with Mr. Parker, got a diamond aigrette; Blanche got two volumes of Tennyson's poems in calf; there must have been some mistake in the order, for there were not enough favours to go round, and Mr. Rumple, who sat next to Blanche, found a ten-pound note under the roll in his napkin.

As usual, Mrs. Parker wore a high-necked dress and no jewels; Miss Parker was à la Paquin and went in to dinner with the Duke of Clandevil. There was no attempt at precedence, and Lord Froom was in a towering rage that Mrs. Parker went in with Mr. Frame. But I think it was very bad taste of him, as his favour was a gold watch, with the Froom crest and motto in diamonds, and as the Parkers are foreigners and kings in their own country every excuse should be made for them.

Clandevil is stopping at Astley Court, and rumour has it his engagement to Miss Parker will soon be made public. I pity her, for she seems a decent sort, and we all know what the duke is. He is five years younger than she, and only the ha'penny papers published his cross-examination in the Ventry divorce. But I suppose even an American king's daughter would not refuse an English duke, and Mrs. Parker was heard to tell Mr. Frame with a sigh that it would cost such a lot to stop the leaks in a seven-acre roof.

Mr. Parker Junior

Mr. Parker, Junior, is very retiring and can hardly be got to speak or do anything. Blanche thinks him stupid, but Mrs. Chevington says he has what she calls "a head for business," for he never goes to the Stock Exchange without causing a panic. Considering the food and the presents, the dinner was a huge success, but Mr. Parker would persist in telling Lady Beatrice how he had made his money, and that fifty years ago, "when you and I were young, Lady Beatrice, I was a barefoot newsboy in Broadway."

Boys Troublesome

You amuse me with your account of the Westaways. I don't pity Lady Westaway very much for having such a daughter-in-law; if she had used tact with Billy he would probably have listened to reason. I am so glad, darling, that you are a girl and not a boy; boys are such a source of anxiety in families of our station. They are always getting into trouble, and they pick up such vulgar tastes. Why is it, I wonder, that one never hears of girls marrying beneath them, but it takes all the ingenuity we possess to keep the boys out of mésalliance. Billy Westaway is a fool, and there are so many like him.

Between us, I would rather have a son as bad as Clandevil than one as silly as Billy Westaway; but if it came to marrying one of them I should prefer it to be the other way about.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER VII

Hotel National, Lucerne
18th August

Darling Elizabeth:

Lucerne

How surprised you will be to see the above address. Blanche Blaine and I came here on the spur of the moment, the day after you left for Croixmare.

Glacier Garden

Blanche came over in the morning, and asked me if I would go with her to Lucerne for a fortnight. The idea struck me as rather lively, and we went up to London that night in time to catch the Club train for Paris the next day. We were lucky to get rooms at the National, for they are turning people away to-day. We have apartments on the second floor, with a lovely view of the lake and Pilatus; the only blot on the landscape is the yacht belonging to the hotel. As I write in my balcony, I can see it over the tops of the chestnuts on the quai bobbing alongside of the jetty with a huge "Quaker Oats" on the sail. The weather is perfect, and the air makes you feel as if you were breathing champagne. This morning we went to see the Lion, to get it over as Blanche said. We saw hundreds in the shop-windows before we got there, and they all looked so sorry for themselves, as if they thought, "We can't help it they made us like this, go a little higher up and you'll see the real thing." The real thing is made of plaster, and you pay fifty centimes to see it in a boutique, where they sell Swiss quartz and post-cards. The gigantic thing carved out of the rock is really quite imposing, but the crowds vulgarise it so that it no longer has the atmosphere of meditation and romance Thorvaldsen meant it to have. A party of "personally conducteds" were doing it with Baedekers in their hands and edelweiss in their hats, and they made such funny comments, and asked such quaint questions about it, I am sure that they had never heard of it before, and most of them bought post-cards and wrote on them with stylographs. Then they all went into the Glacier Garden, and the water was turned on to show them glacial action on the rocks.

At Hugenin's

On the way back, Blanche and I stopped at Hugenin's, and had champagne frappé and meringues at a table on the pavement under an awning, and some people dressed as Tyrolese peasants yodelled in the garden of a café across the street. Crowds of people passed us; some were very smartly dressed, but most of the women wore bicycle skirts with buttons in the back and felt hats with a feather at the side, and carried edelweiss. Blanche said Continental life made her feel wicked, and she bought a package of Turkish cigarettes from such a good-looking Italian boy, with a performing monkey, and a basket on his arm filled with post-cards of the Lion and Pilatus cigarettes. He was so delighted that he made the monkey go through his tricks, and some horrid men in dress suits came and stood about with their hands in their pockets and no hats on their heads. I think they must have been waiters, for presently a gong sounded and they all bolted into the Lucernerhof. The Italian boy gave us such a graceful bow when we went away that Blanche felt sure he was a Count in disguise. She said she had heard that poor Italian noblemen wandered about the Continental watering-places in the summer with monkeys, just like the poor Baronets who sing Christy Minstrel songs to banjos on the sands at Brighton, and that you could always tell them by their manners. She was sure of it, because Sir Dennis O'Desmond had told her he had made quite a lot of money that way one year.

The Hungarian Band

We got back to the National just in time to change for lunch. Thérèse had our frocks and curling-irons ready for us, and was in such a temper because her meals were not to be served in her room. We had lunch in the big salle-à-manger, which is also the ball-room; the food was excellent and very well served; all the people looked smart, but we didn't know any of them. The Hungarian band played, and the conductor was such a handsome man; he wore a blue jacket trimmed with astrachan and silver buttons, and black satin knee-breeches with blue stockings. He was very tall and finely proportioned, with flashing black eyes and curly hair. Blanche, who is always jumping to conclusions, believes he is the man who eloped with the Princess de Chimay.

After lunch, we had coffee and liqueur and cigarettes in the hall. The chairs were luxurious, and as all the doors and windows were open it was delightfully breezy; there was no glare, and it was great fun watching the people.

Dip in the Lake

At three o'clock Blanche went across to the baths and had a dip in the lake, and I drew a sofa in front of my balcony and had a snooze in the shade. When Blanche came back she said the bathing was perfect, but that the boards which separated the "Herren" from the "Frauen" were riddled with holes, and that as far as privacy was concerned the two sexes might as well have bathed together. She insisted on having tea on the terrasse of the Kursaal where she heard a band playing. When we got there the place was deserted save for some men who were drinking beer at a table with a very démodér woman and little child. We afterwards recognised them as the croupiers who ran the Petits Chevaux. Later on all the tables were taken. The people were mostly cheap Germans and Americans, and they encored the Boer Volkslied which the orchestra played with great spirit. It was the first time I had heard the Transvaal National Anthem. It is like a trek in the spirit of the Marseillaise; you could hear the bullock carts rumbling over the veldt.

At the Cathedral

At six o'clock we went to the Cathedral to hear the organ. Every seat was taken, and the music was superb; the prima donna from the Dresden Opera sang. The twilight gradually faded into darkness, and they didn't light the candles. The effect of the vox humana was very solemn, and the music seemed to be far away up in the darkness like a chorus of angels chanting. I felt very good.

The smart people were very smart, at dinner, and all seemed to know one another. They took the best seats in the verandah afterwards, and watched the flash-light and illuminations on the Stanzerhorn. We are going to spend the day on the lake to-morrow.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER VIII

Hotel National, Lucerne
20th August

Darling Elizabeth:

Fluëlen

Yesterday Blanche and I went to Fluëlen. The boat was crowded, but we got two comfortable seats in front of the wheel and had a perfect view. The scenery was indescribably lovely, and the air was so clear that we could actually see the people walking about on the top of the Rigi. Some Swiss peasants got on at Brunen, and they all had goitre; one was such a good-looking young fellow about twenty; his neck looked positively uncomfortable, but he didn't seem to mind it at all. Nearly all the hotels are du Lac or des Alpes, and have terrasses planted with chestnuts, and there was always excitement when the steamer Bicyclistsstopped. Two bicycle fiends got off at Brunen; they were English, and we saw them afterwards scorching along the Axenstrasse in clouds of dust, evidently trying to get to Fluëlen before us. It seemed so ludicrous to see bicycles in such a country as Switzerland, that I told Blanche that I was sure that people only brought them there out of a sort of bravado, and that they didn't really enjoy themselves. An American who was sitting near, overheard, and said in quite an offended way that he had biked over the Brunig from Interlaken to Lucerne, and was going over the Furka in the same manner. I replied, I believed if there was a road to the top of Titlis one would find a pair of knickerbockers astride a pneumatic trying to make the ascent. He smiled contemptuously, and said it was evident I had never ridden. I told him I had tried to learn, and had bought an Elswick, but that the day it arrived a new stable-boy rode it into Taunton without my knowledge, and punctured the tire, which was a blessing in disguise if it had saved me from making an exhibition of myself on a Swiss pass. He became quite talkative after this, and pointed out a great many things of interest like a Baedeker, without the bother of having to find the places. We saw the Tellsplatte and chapel, and the American told us that there were as many arrows that had killed Gessler in various parts of Switzerland as bits of the True Cross in European churches. We thought of returning in the same steamer and having lunch on board, but he told us we ought to go to Altdorf and see the new Tell monument, and that we could get lunch at an inn there. So we thought while we were about it we might as well do all there was to be done, and return by a later boat.

At Fluëlen

At Fluëlen we had great difficulty in getting seats in any of the brakes that run to Altdorf, as everybody made a rush for them at once. However, Blanche got a bit of iron bar on the box-seat, and was held on by a German with an alpenstock and edelweiss, who linked his arm in hers, while I was smothered between a Cook's guide, who looked fagged out, and a garrulous female, who told me she came from Chicago and had been hungry ever since she left. She said they didn't know how to make pie in Europe, and had never heard of it; her family seemed specially addicted to pie, and greatly missed this delicacy on their travels. She had a letter that morning from her son, a portion of which she read to me: he was doing the capitals of Europe in three weeks, and had been fortunate in finding pie in Constantinople, quite an American pie, only it was made of pumpkin instead of Howard squash.

Our brake stopped at a des Alpes, and the proprietor came out and made us welcome in the fashion they have on the Continent, as if he were playing the host in a private house. My Chicago acquaintance at once asked for the menu, and you should have seen her face when she found there was no pie on it.

An Omelette Soufflée

As I was very hungry, I had the table d'hôte lunch, which was very good, but Blanche ordered hers à la carte. The only French thing on the menu that Blanche fancied was omelette soufflée. It took twenty minutes to make, and when it came it looked like a mountain. I told Blanche they must have thought her capacity enormous, but when she put her spoon into it, it gave a sort of sigh and collapsed, and before Blanche could get it on her plate there was only as much as you scrape up in a table-spoon.

As the table d'hôte courses were all consumed and time was pressing, she had to content herself with French rolls and honey.

The Tell Monument

Before we left Altdorf the two Englishmen whom we had seen scorching over the Axenstrasse arrived. I never saw such objects, they were fairly reeking with perspiration and covered in white dust. They looked positively filthy. I heard one asking the proprietor of the hotel if he could buy a valve in Altdorf, and they both abused the Swiss roads as if they had expected to find them like the Macadam in Hyde Park. The Tell monument was quite worth coming to see, but I think its situation in the tiny platz of the picturesque village, which the immense mountains seem ready to crush, makes it more imposing than it really is. I am sure if it were in a city one would hardly notice it.

A Bunch of Edelweiss

Blanche was awfully "Cooky," and bought two post-cards with it on to send to Daisy and Mrs. Chevington. At Fluëlen, too, she bought a bunch of edelweiss from a Swiss doll with goitre, and stuck it into the bow on her sailor-hat. We were quite tired when we got back to Lucerne, and had dinner in our rooms, for Thérèse had gone to bed with a migraine and neglected to put out our frocks or have our baths ready. I expect to hear from you to-morrow, and that you are enjoying yourself at Croixmare.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER IX

Hotel National, Lucerne
22nd August

Darling Elizabeth:

On the Quai

This morning between twelve and one, Blanche and I were strolling on the quai when we met Sir Charles Bevon. He seemed glad to see us, and asked if we knew any of the people in society here, and when we told him we had only been in Lucerne four days and that he was the first person we had met that we knew, he invited us to dine with him at the Schweitzerhof to-night. It is from this dinner we have just come, and I must tell you about it before I go to bed.

Anglophobia

Sir Charles asked the Marquis and the Marquise de Pivart, the Vicomte de Narjac, and Mr. Vanduzen, an American naval officer en retraite, to meet us. I sat between the Marquis and Mr. Vanduzen. The Marquis looks like a little black monkey, with a beard à Henri Deux, but his manners are so elegant one never thinks of his looks. He knows the De Croixmares very well, and when I asked him what he thought of Héloise he turned so red and looked so uncomfortable that I at once felt that Jean's charming Comtesse had brisé son cœur at some period of their acquaintance. He dropped the subject as soon as possible, and quite rudely began to talk of the war, and said that England was the Jew among nations. I cooled his Anglophobia for him by remarking that I would much prefer to have him talk of the Comtesse de Croixmare than attack my country. He seemed positively afraid of me after that, so I am sure there must be something between him and Héloise that he doesn't want his wife to know. He got so moody and silent that I told him I thought him very rude, and devoted myself through the rest of dinner to Mr. Vanduzen, who is elderly and "natty." Mr. Vanduzen is quite amusing, but I wish he wouldn't call people by their full names as if they were a species he was labelling for a museum, such as, "Really, Miss Blanche Blaine, you amaze me." "It was very warm to-day, was it not, Madame la Marquise de Pivart?" "Have you made the ascent of Pilatus, Sir Charles Bevon?" You know the style of man, Elizabeth, you must have met one or two like him at Nazeby or Hazeldene. If they are English they are called snobs, but when they come from the Land of Canaan on the other side of the pond they are put down quite likely as "so American."

The Marquise

The Marquise is a fascinating creature, she knows the full value of her figure as one of her attractions, and she clothes it accordingly. Her bust is like alabaster, the neck and shoulders are perfect; her eyes are rather wide apart, which gives her a naïve expression; her smile is simplicity itself, and she talks with a tabloid voice. Sir Charles seemed to admire her, for he addressed nearly all his conversation to her, and he poked me so hard under the table once or twice that I was compelled to say, "The table leg is on the other side, Sir Charles," and he gave the Marquise such a reproachful glance.

Blanche had the Vicomte all to herself, and he seemed to like it. He has an automobile and talked of nothing else, and Sir Charles says he does nothing else in Paris. He is going to take Blanche and the Marquise in it to-morrow for a spin in the valley of the Reuss.

Everybody talked at once, as they always do on the Continent, and the effort to be general was quite fatiguing to me who am accustomed to the English method of monopolising one's neighbours. The foreign custom certainly gives more "go" to a dinner, but I think when I am not the hostess I prefer conversation à deux.

Don Carlos

After dinner we had coffee in the salon instead of outside on the verandah, for Sir Charles said we ought to see Don Carlos and suite go in to dinner. The suite were already in the salon, and they occupied the most comfortable chairs and looked rather sulky, which I suppose was from having to wait so long for their dinner. Don Carlos has thirty rooms on the first floor, but he will neither take his meals in private or at the usual hour with everybody else. He makes quite a point of dinner, and has it in the salle-à-manger when the general public have finished. He must be a great advertisement for the Schweitzerhof, for crowds come nightly to see him and the Duchess go in to dinner. When they entered the salon there was as much etiquette among the suite as if they were at a levée. They formed themselves in a line in order of precedence; the men all kissed the Duchess's hand and the ladies curtseyed, then Don Carlos gave his arm to his wife and led the way to dinner. As the door of the salle-à-manger was open we could see them eating; everybody talked at once, and the suite ate as if it was the only dinner they had had for a week. I am sure they were hungry.

Don Carlos is a splendid-looking Spaniard, with exile written all over him; whether natural or cultivated, the pose was perfect—the sadness and abstraction, the forced amusement, the far-away look in the eyes—but it wasn't melodramatic, and you didn't feel like laughing. The Duchess of Madrid was reine aux bouts des ongles and an ideal consort for a banished monarch. She must have been very beautiful at one period of her life, and is still strikingly fine-looking. She was dressed as the great ladies on the Continent know how to dress, and wore some lovely diamonds. She had the same melancholy far-away expression as Don Carlos, and they both seemed rather bored, as if they had had too much of the suite, who are really nothing but pensioners. Sir Charles says they have not a peseta to bless themselves with, and live entirely on the bounty of Don Carlos. They follow him wherever he goes and form a sort of court for him; they are nothing but a pack of conspirators and professional revolutionists who dare not go back to Spain, and as they have all been broken in the Carlist cause, and still continue to intrigue and make themselves useful, Don Carlos has to put up with them. And I must say I think he does it right royally, keeping up a fine old Bourbon custom, for these people can still say, like the needy noblesse in Louis XIV.'s time, that they "bank with the king."

The Kursaal

When we had "done" Don Carlos and his dinner-party, Sir Charles suggested that we should go to the Kursaal and try our luck at Petits Chevaux. We found the room crowded, and most of the people looked like those I saw at the Monico in London the night Algy Chevington took me there for supper, when he couldn't get a table at the Trocadero. At first we couldn't get near the tables, but the Marquise went and stood behind the croupier, and got him a place for her. Then a man, who I am sure was a High Church curate, for he had cut off his coat collar and let his hair grow long like a French abbé, offered me his seat if I would touch his money for him. But he gave me bad luck till he was cleared out, and then I began to win. It was such fun, and I raked in quantities of gold and some five-franc pieces made of lead. The Marquise and I won, but the others had no luck, and I saw the Marquis somewhere in the back drinking beer with an impossible female, and I told him so afterwards, and that I thought it was very rude to the ladies in his party, and he looked as if he would like to choke me. The Vicomte told Blanche that he believed the croupier tampered with the machinery and could make any horse win he liked, and the croupier heard. For an instant I thought there was going to be a "scene," but the Marquise said such a cochon as the croupier wouldn't dare to strike the Vicomte, who it seems spends the time he can spare from automobiling in Paris in duelling. "Mais, comme il est sale, ce croupier," the Marquise said to me, and then added that the croupiers at Monte Carlo were as beautiful as Lucifer, and that a friend of hers, a Comtesse Jean d'Outremer, had eloped with one. A bêtise she called it. I told Sir Charles after that that I thought we had better go, and they all walked with us as far as the National. The Marquis and the Vicomte kissed my hand, and Sir Charles told me to call on the Marquise to-morrow, as she expected it. My kindest regard to Madame de Croixmare and the family at the château.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER X

Hotel National, Lucerne
24th August

Darling Elizabeth:

Smart People

This morning Blanche and I were sitting in the wicker chairs under the chestnuts on the quai in front of the National, when Sir Charles and the Vicomte passed. They both stopped and chatted for a while, then the Vicomte saw some very smart people who were sitting near and introduced us to them. They were the Duchesse de Vaudricourt and Mrs. Wertzelmann, the wife of the American Minister. The Duchesse is Empire and the Wertzelmanns are nouveaux riches, but they are at the very top of all the society here. A great many other people came up to speak to them; Blanche and I were introduced, and, as Sir Charles said, before you could say "Jack Robinson" we were rangé. As we both had on Paquin we felt quite as well turned out as the other women, who were beautifully dressed. You should have seen the people on the quai stare as they passed.

Telling Fortunes

Blanche made quite a sensation by telling fortunes, and everybody wanted their hands read. She did it awfully well, and told the right things to the right people. She told the Duchesse de Vaudricourt, who is fifty if she is a day, but makes up twenty-five, that the only tragedy in her life would be her death, and to beware of a beau sabreur who carried her photograph in a locket on his watch chain. When pressed as to the reason she should be cautious of this unknown, Blanche told her that he was destined to perish in a duel over her. The Duchesse was delighted, for it is said that she longs for the éclat of men killing themselves over her, but that up to the present no one has ever even fought about her. Mrs. Wertzelmann was to have her portrait, which has been painted by Constant, hung in the Luxembourg, and to marry her daughter to a Serene Highness, both of which Sir Charles had told us were her supreme desires. The Vicomte had a very interesting personality, and was irresistible with women and greatly respected by men, and was to die in a collision of automobiles, which made him turn rather green. Mr. Wertzelmann, the American Minister, who had joined us, held out a hand like a working-man's, and asked Blanche what was going to happen to him. She said she saw great things in the lines, and something else which she thought could only be confided to his ear in private.

He was so excited, and Blanche wrinkled her eyes at him in the prettiest way, that he insisted on taking her to the verandah of the National, and hearing the rest of his fortune in private. I don't know what Blanche told him, but he ordered champagne frappé, and when they came back his face fairly beamed.

Mrs. Wertzelmann was very gracious, and said that though we hadn't called she wanted us to come out to-morrow afternoon to her villa to a garden-party; that she hated ceremony and etiquette and calling, and we might leave our cards when we came. For it seems it is the custom here for strangers to make the first call, but it is really very silly calling at all, for nobody ever seems to be at home, and one meets the same people half-a-dozen times a day at the National, which is the rendezvous of the smart set.

Comte Belladonna

It is the thing to have tea in the garden of the National, where the Hungarian band plays from four to six. It is very recherché, and the prices are so high that the canaille, as the Marquise de Pivart calls the tourists, don't come. So this afternoon we met the same set again, and also a dear little old man, over eighty, who had the most perfect manners, and was dressed faultlessly. In fact the Marquise told me that his only occupation was dressing and paying compliments. His name is Comte Belladonna, and he has a face like the carving on a cameo. He is the most distingué person here, and was something to Victor Emanuel, and has seen only the best society all his life. He is quite poor, and has a pension which just about pays for his gloves and handkerchiefs, but everybody adores him; he gives tone to everything, and nothing is complete without his presence. He is like the old beaux we used to see at Cannes and Biarritz, and it is a wonder how at his age he manages to keep Advertising Custompace with his invitations. Sir Charles says he has a room on the top floor of the National which he gets for nothing, for his name is always put first on the list of the hotel guests in the papers as an advertisement.

There is an Austrian nobleman at the Schweitzerhof who is accommodated there in the same way for the use of his name in the visitors' list, and I think it is very convenient, for it saves all the worry of trying to make ends meet, and one is actually paid for existing, and supported in the best style. I am sure if the Irish peers knew that there was such a custom in vogue they would move it should be adopted at Scarborough and Harrogate, and the other places, only, of course, we haven't any villes de luxe at home as they have on the Continent.

Comte Belladonna spends his summers at the National and his winters in Rome, where the Marquise says the Government, in consideration for his past services to the State, have given him a post in a bureau, where all that he has to do is to occasionally sign his name to documents of which he never reads the contents. He is quite the most youthful old boy I have ever met; he doesn't rise at six and walk ten miles before breakfast like old Lord Merriman, who hunts with the West Somerset Harriers in all weathers and golfs on the Quantocks. Comte Belladonna rises at eleven like a gilded youth, clothes himself in the most faultless flannels, and descends to the wicker chairs under the chestnuts on the quai, where he reads the "Osservatore Romano," and chats with the beau monde of Lucerne who gather there; at one he lunches like an epicure, after which he is ready for any social amusement. He is a charming polished beau, a master of ceremonies, a courtier, and he at present affects an American girl of nineteen, who is quite ready to play May to his January. But Comte Belladonna belongs to the country of Machiavelli, and la belle Américaine has only her face for her fortune.

Dinner at a Café

To-night we dined at a café with the Vicomte de Narjac; Sir Charles and the Wertzelmanns were the only others of the party. A troupe of Swedish singers sang and danced and passed round a tambourine, and after dinner we went to the Kursaal theatre to see "Puppenfee."—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER XI

Hotel National, Lucerne
26th August

Darling Elizabeth:

The De Pivarts' Villa

Such a jolly time as we had yesterday! In the morning before lunch Blanche and I clambered up the hill behind the National to call on the De Pivarts. They live in a mite of a box of a villa. It is at the end of a street so steep that you feel as if you were going to pitch head-first down it when you begin to descend. The De Pivarts were not at home, according to a man-servant who came to the door in his shirt sleeves and without a collar, and took our cards in fingers that I am sure had previously been engaged in blacking the Marquis's boots or lighting the kitchen fire. But as we came up the hill we saw a man like the Marquis en déshabille leaning out of the tiny balcony, and we distinctly heard a female exclaim: "Mon Dieu, je suis perdu! Il n'y a pas des Geraudels! Marie, vite, vite, descendez à la ville pour chercher une boîte."

So we knew where the Marquise got her voice from.

In spite of the villa being so high up, the air seemed quite stuffy, for the hill is full of six-francs-a-day pensions, where there are enough Baedekers to start a library, and where they ring ranz des vaches instead of dinner-gongs.

Lunch at the Gütsch

We intended to lunch at the National, but Sir Charles met us on the quai and said he had been hunting all over the town for us, as he wanted us to lunch with him at the Gütsch, and go on to the Wertzelmanns' afterwards. In front of the Schweitzerhof we found the Vicomte, who had been automobiling all the morning, and Sir Charles asked him to join us.

The Gütsch is much higher than the De Pivarts' villa, and you reach it by a funicular which creeps straight up the side of the hill like a lift. The view was lovely and so was the cooking; we had a table in front of a huge window overlooking the terrasse. Afterwards we strolled in the glades of the pine forest where the light was like the pictures called "Studies in Colour," which one sees in the Academy and nowhere else.

Morale of Lucerne Society

Blanche and Sir Charles were in front, while the Vicomte and I, owing to the Vicomte's laziness, were considerably in the rear. For once he talked of something else than his automobile, but his conversation was not very edifying, save as giving me a pretty vivid idea of the morale of Lucerne society. The Vicomte talked the most outrageous scandal, but in so witty a way that it was impossible to take offence. He knew the histoire of everybody, which, if true, proves that Continental society, especially at a ville d'eaux, is very much the same as in English country houses where the people are smart. As he spoke in French he sailed straight into the wind, where an Englishman would have tacked a half-a-dozen times before reaching port. The voyage was quite exciting, and when I expected him every moment to be wrecked on the rocks of a Moulin Rouge episode he dexterously dropped anchor in calm water. When we got back to the Gütsch I felt as if I had been listening to one of Gyp's spiciest novels in which I knew all the characters. They manage these things differently in England, and when Mrs. Smith looks purry-purry, puss-puss at Lord Valmond you may be sure that each sees the ghost of a conscience, and it has the face of Sir Francis Jeune.

Schloss Gessler

From the Gütsch we went straight to Schloss Gessler in the Vicomte's automobile. We tore through Lucerne at top speed; it was great fun, and the Vicomte said there was no danger, for the road was straight, and that nobody would dare get in the way. Going up the hill outside of the town somebody's Maltese terrier with bells round its neck came tearing after us and got under the wheels. But we didn't stop, and as we turned into the avenue leading to the Schloss one of Mr. Wertzelmann's geese committed suicide by throwing itself in front of the automobile.

Nothing could have been more hospitable than the welcome the Wertzelmanns gave us. Everybody we knew was there, and many more whom we didn't. Mr. Wertzelmann took me to see the ruins, but all that is left is a bit of stone wall, which looks as if it had begun with the intention of encircling a kitchen-garden, but had decided to visit the stables, and never got any further. Mr. Wertzelmann told me it had once sheltered Gessler, hence the name of the Schloss, but that the place had recently been restored by a Swiss engineer who had made a fortune out of funiculars. Certainly in its present state Schloss Gessler is very fine, and the view from the terrace, which Mr. Wertzelmann insisted were the old battlements, was lovely.

We saw Mrs. Wertzelmann's portrait by Constant and heard the price it cost; we also went down to the jetty, and as many as could got into the steam launch and went for a spin on the lake. Blanche was among the number, but I preferred to remain on the lawn where the Marquise was playing croquet. Her maid had evidently found the Geraudels, for her voice was more tabloid than ever. Some people who looked as if they lived in pensions, and were no doubt Americans, who had come to pay their respects to their Minister and his handsome wife, strolled about the grounds aimlessly and looked uncomfortable. One of them carried on a polite conversation with a lackey who spoke English, and whom he addressed as "Sir." But the Wertzelmanns devoted their whole attention to their personal friends, and left the representatives of their nation to amuse themselves in their own way.

Mr. Vanduzen brought the Duchesse de Vaudricourt and Comte Belladonna in the cab with him, and I overheard him squabbling with the cabman over the fare, for, from what passed between them, I judged that the Duchesse had been a second thought with Mr. Vanduzen, who had only arranged with the cabman for himself and the Comte. The cabman evidently won, and Mr. Vanduzen arrived on the lawn so perturbed that he forgot to kiss Mrs. Wertzelmann's hand, a custom he has affected since taking up his residence abroad.

An Austrian Nobleman

Behind Mr. Vanduzen's cab there drove up a very smart landau belonging to Mrs. Solomon G. Isaacs of St. Louis, who is stopping at the National with her mother and daughter. The Austrian nobleman, whose name heads the Schweitzerhof visitors' list, for which they give him his room and food when the latter article is not supplied to him by Mrs. Isaacs, with whose daughter he is épris, came with them. He is even plus distingué than Comte Belladonna, for it is whispered he was a friend of Crown Prince Rudolph's, and knows so much about his death that the Emperor has requested him to live out of Austria. Mrs. Isaacs, who is a widow, well conservée, would, I think, sooner than let him slip out of the family, take him herself, but he prefers the daughter, who is an extremely beautiful and innocent girl of seventeen. The disposal of the dollars, of which they appear to possess millions, rests with Mrs. Isaacs's mother, an impossible old woman, who looks as if she had acquired the etiquette of the salon after a very thorough knowledge of that of the kitchen. Her thirst for information is apparently unquenchable, and I heard her ask Count Albert if he was related to a hofdame at Vienna, whose name I forget. He replied that his maternal grandmother was a Hohenzollern and his great-uncle had married a Hapsburg, which information so delighted Mrs. Johnson that she smacked her lips as if she were tasting some of the sauces she used to make in the good old days. I believe, old as she is, that she would marry Count Albert herself if he asked her; and I am sure that he would not hesitate to do so, if he were certain the fortune was entirely hers.

Madame Colorado

Mrs. Wertzelmann has a very pretty French woman stopping at Schloss Gessler, a Madame Colorado; she is really lovely, and has the dearest little girl in the world. Madame Colorado knows all the people you have met at Croixmare. On the way back to the National the Vicomte told me she was angelic, as I can well believe; she was married to a brute of a Chilian, who happily killed himself and left her free; she at one time thought of taking the veil, and the Vicomte says her charities in Paris are enormous and that the breath of scandal has never touched her name. I feel quite drawn to her, and shall try to know her better.

The Schweitzerhof

To-night after dinner several of us went down to the Schweitzerhof to see the fireworks and hear the music. As everybody was in the salon waiting to see Don Carlos and his Duchesse pass through on their way to dinner, we got splendid seats on the balcony. The night was superb.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER XII

Hotel National, Lucerne
28th August

Darling Elizabeth:

New People

The season is in full swing, and yesterday a number of new people "descended," as the French say, at the National. First in importance were the Prince and Princesse di Spezzia from Florence; the Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise; Mademoiselle Liane de Pougy of the Folies Bergère; and Professor Chzweiczy, who has discovered the bacillus of paralysis, and whose great scientific work "The Blot on the Brain" has been translated into all the European languages. This morning there was an enormous crowd on the quai in front of the hotel; Blanche said she was sure a crowned head had arrived, but I thought it was more likely that someone had had a fit, for we could see a circle had been formed round something or someone, people were tiptoeing and crushing one another, and I expected a sergent de ville to cry every moment, "Air! air!" as they did in Regent Street that morning when we were coming out of Fuller's and found the Duchesse of Rougemont's footman foaming on the pavement. But Blanche insisted it was an emperor, and she was backed up by Thérèse, who said it was just like the crowds she had seen in Paris when the Czar came. We found everybody we knew sitting in the hall of the hotel and in very bad humour, because it was awfully hot and stuffy, and the waiters had brought all the chairs inside lest they should be broken by the crowd. I asked the Marquise what had happened, and she said, with a shrug, it was only Liane de Pougy taking the air under the chestnuts. Professor Chzweiczy sat in the same spot all the afternoon reading "The Blot on the Brain," and the letters on the cover were so big that the Vicomte said you could distinguish them across the quai, but nobody paid any attention to him.

Signor Stefano Crestfallen

The Princesse di Spezzia held quite a court in the hall, and stared at everybody through her lorgnettes; they say she is at the head of Florentine society and a young Italian, who has a magasin on the quai Schweitzerhof, and comes to the dances at the National because men are scarce, has begged Mr. Vanduzen to present him. But Mr. Vanduzen refused, and Signor Stefano went off crestfallen, finding it, I daresay, quite impossible to reconcile the selling of precious stones behind a counter with his social ambitions.

Blanche spent the morning yesterday automobiling with the Vicomte and the Marquise, while I remained in the verandah to rest, as we were to drive after lunch with Sir Charles to a Schloss twenty miles away to a garden party. Mrs. Johnson kept me company, and told me that Count Albert had gone to the Rigi for the day with Mrs. Isaacs and Rosalie. She said they had been presented at Berlin and Brussels, and had intended to enjoy the same experience at Dresden last winter, as they had letters to the Minister there, but he made some paltry objection and she had not pressed the matter, though she added that she had written to the Senator, to whom the Minister owed his place, and that he would make it hot for him.

Shopping and Sightseeing

I asked her if they had been to London, and she said only for a week, and had never had such a dull time, as they knew nobody, and her room at the Carlton was so cold it gave her rheumatism. They did some shopping and sight-seeing, and had gone from the Bank to Shepherd's Bush in the Tu'penny Tube, but she preferred the Elevated in New York, because of the scenery. However, Mrs. Johnson told me quite in confidence, that if Count Albert didn't propose to Rosalie, they thought of going to London next year for the season, and she asked me if I could recommend a Countess who would run them, and she wanted to know if there was any institution to which she could write and engage one, for she had heard in St. Louis that poor Countesses did quite a business that way. I told her we were not so progressive in England as in the States, and that I did not think there was as yet any association of distressed gentlewomen where one could hire a Countess for the London season, but that perhaps if she wrote to the editor of one of the Society papers, I daresay he could provide a suitable person who would get her access to the best houses. Mrs. Johnson at once pulled a note-book out of her pocket, and jotted down the names of two or three papers I gave her, then she looked at me rather shrewdly, and asked what I thought would be the fee. I said I didn't think she could do the London season the way she would want to much under ten thousand pounds all told.

"Well," she said, "Count Albert won't cost us as much as that, and if we secure him we shan't go to London. From what I can find out Continental society is less expensive than English and just as good."

Automobile Accident

Blanche returned just before lunch in a great state of excitement: it seems that in going up the hill to the De Pivarts, something went wrong with the automobile, and it began to descend backwards at a frightful pace; the Marquise screamed so loud that a number of people, not knowing what was the matter, rushed into the middle of the road, and the automobile knocked down one who happened to be the croupier at the Kursaal, and he was so badly hurt he had to be taken to the hospital. Just as they expected to batter down a wall at the foot of the hill, and perish horribly, the automobile suddenly stopped; they jumped out instantly, and it was just in time, for it at once blew up with such a noise, that the porter at the Pension Thorvaldsen took it for the one o'clock gun and began sounding the dinner-gong.

Blanche says that the Vicomte took it quite coolly; he declared he always knew the automobile would end like that, and he should compel the company in Paris to give him another, as they had guaranteed it to run without accident for a year. The Marquise fainted, and when Blanche left her she was in hysterics in the Pension Thorvaldsen; it all happened so quickly, that Blanche said it was all over before she could realise the danger. She was not even shaken.

Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise

At lunch the maître d'hôtel made a mistake and put some Germans at the table occupied by the Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise, and when she hobbled in, leaning on her cane, and followed by Bijou, her pug, there was no place for her to sit. She was in a towering rage, and shook her stick at the maître d'hôtel, and Bijou looked as if he contemplated making his lunch off the waiter's leg. A seat was eventually found for her at our table, and another for Bijou, who finished his chop in the Maréchale's lap. She glared at us several times as if she thought it was an impertinence for us to sit at the same table with her, and she frightened the waiters out of their wits and found fault with everything. I am sure she is horribly old, for Sir Charles says she was no chicken in the last year of the Empire, when her salon was the most suivi in Paris. Her coiffure is jet black, and her eyebrows are bald and pencilled in arches. She is awfully badly made up, but, as Blanche says, it would take tons of rouge to hide the gutters on her face which is lined like a railway-map. All her clothes are made in the fashion of 1870; she is covered at all times with jewels and wears a daguerreotype brooch of the late Maréchal.

But, of course, she is très grande dame, and everyone tries to mollify her, and they wait on her and Bijou hand and foot, and the Duchesse de Vaudricourt, who hates her because the Maréchale asked her before the Vicomte and Mr. Vanduzen if she remembered a certain ball at the Tuileries in '68, calls her "Ma chère maréchale."

Time to Retire

Thérèse has rapped twice to ask if I am ready to retire, so unless she should pull my hair out by the roots to spite me for keeping her up so late I must say good-night.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER XIII

Hotel National, Lucerne
30th August

Darling Elizabeth:

The Sonnenburgs

I never told you of the garden party at Schloss Sonnenburg the other day, and as it will give quite another aspect of Lucerne life from that of the National and Schloss Gessler, I will try to remember what happened. It is rather difficult, for so much transpires in the course of the day that I am apt to forget what I did the day before.

A Disagreeable Drive

In the first place Baroness Sonnenburg is an Englishwoman, and Sir Charles knows her quite well. So he offered to drive us out to the Schloss and introduce us, telling us it would be quite comme il faut, and that the Sonnenburgs would be only too delighted to meet us. The Vicomte occupied the vacant seat in the landau, and we started immediately after lunch, for we had over twenty miles to drive. To know what dust is you must come to Switzerland in August; the road was like driving through sand, we were powdered with it, a nasty, white, itchy powder, and the flies, having devoured the horses which flew along maddened with pain, came to add their sting and buzzing to our own sufferings from the dust. I nearly shrieked with the discomfort of it all, and longed for my balcony at the National. The Vicomte began to talk of love to me, but knowing the danger of such a subject I peevishly begged him to desist, and a huge bottle-green fly, with a most irritating buzz, having drawn blood from his cheek, the Vicomte became as peevish as I. It seemed as if the journey would never end, which made the thought of the return to Lucerne épouvantable, and we were none of us in a good mood when a great yellow and black building, whose walls were like a draught-board, suddenly loomed out of a forest of pine trees on the brow of a steep cliff.

Warm Welcome

When we drove up to the front door two footmen in livery helped us out of the carriage, and I could have cried from the nervousness that the drive had fretted me into. However, we found a maid with brushes and water and perfumes, and when we were at all presentable again, another carriage drove up with Mrs. Johnson, Mrs. Isaacs and Rosalie, and their Austrian Count. They were in as bad a temper as we were from the dust and the flies, and I heard Mrs. Johnson say that if "Mrs. Sonnenburg hadn't been a baroness" she would never have come. We passed down a long hall whose walls were covered with family portraits, more than enough to make up the twenty-four quarterings of the Sonnenburg arms. At the end of the hall was a room into which we were shown by a footman. A grand-looking man, who was introduced by Sir Charles as Baron Sonnenburg, gave us the warmest welcome in English, and led us across the room where we were presented to his wife and mother. Baroness Sonnenburg spoke English with an accent which was not affected, for she told us she had not been in England for over twenty years. She was one of the Trevorleys of Devonshire, and the present baronet is her first cousin. I doubt if she ever heard the name of Paquin, and I suppose her clothes are made by a seamstress in Lucerne, yet there was no disguising the gentility of her appearance and the breeding of her manners.

A Pretty Custom

Blanche and I, who, from constant observation of the people we mix with, are rapidly becoming Continental, curtseyed to the Dowager Baroness and kissed the hand she held out. I think it is such a pretty custom, and one we could adopt to advantage in England, where every trace of the manners of the ancien régime has disappeared. Such a number of people were in the room that we did not get the chance I should have liked to converse with our hosts, and we sauntered into an enormous octagonal apartment, which we were told jutted sheer over the precipice on which the Schloss is built. The view from the windows was very fine and extensive, and it made one quite giddy to look down into the valley which is nine hundred feet below.

There was a visitors' book here which Sir Charles was signing for us when suddenly there were shrieks of surprise and everybody rushed to the windows. Through a cleft of pine woods standing out against the bright blue sky was a glittering, dazzling mass. It was the Jungfrau, Baron Sonnenburg said, and was only seen on rare occasions, and nothing could be more fortunate than that it should unveil its peerless loveliness to-day of all days for the benefit of his guests.

An Al Fresco Repast

An al fresco repast was served on the old battlements which have been turned out into a terrasse. An awkward, blushing youth was brought up to me by Baron Sonnenburg and presented as his son, and I was told he was going to England in the autumn to learn English, of which he doesn't know a word. Two rather pretty, but shockingly badly-dressed girls, were talking to two Swiss officers, but the attitudes of all were so stilted and forced that I am sure they were not enjoying the unusual liberty permitted on this occasion.

The Duchesse de Vaudricourt whispered to me that they were Baroness Sonnenburg's daughters and were considered very English. I was on the point of asking her what she thought I was, but thought better of it, and merely said, that from the extreme diffidence they displayed, I should have taken them for French girls whose dot had not yet been settled.

The Wertzelmanns

The Wertzelmanns came late; they brought Madame Colorado, who looked perfectly angelic in a marvellous white crêpe de chine, and a hat that killed you at a glance. They brought the news of the accident to the Vicomte de Narjac's automobile, and Mrs. Wertzelmann excitedly told a circle, who had gathered to admire her clothes and her jewels, that it was the sensation of the season, she had never heard of anything so dreadful. And Baron Sonnenburg, who had never seen either Blanche or the Vicomte before, and had forgotten their names already, was told how the Vicomte's automobile had run away and exploded, terribly mangling the croupier at the Kursaal, blowing the Vicomte and Miss Blaine, such a sweet English girl, to smithereens, and that the poor Marquise de Pivart had gone mad from the shock.

An Amusing Story

Mrs. Wertzelmann dwelt on the horrible details with a tenacity there was no shaking, and at every exclamation of pity uttered by her audience she but made the story more graphic. The Vicomte and Blanche, who all the while had listened quietly, unobserved by Mrs. Wertzelmann, stuffed their mouths with handkerchiefs to keep from shrieking. But when the Vicomte heard that a boatman had found one of his arms clinging to a fragment of automobile in the lake, and that they were picking his brains off the walls of the Pension Thorvaldsen, he could contain himself no longer.

You should have seen Mrs. Wertzelmann's face when she saw Blanche and the Vicomte bursting with laughter, and she looked about the terrasse as if she expected to see the Marquise and the croupier eating ices in Baron Sonnenburg's beach chairs; and later when we left I am sure she wondered why we drove off in the landau with the fly-bitten horses instead of in the automobile.

"If Maria once begins to tell a story," said Mr. Wertzelmann to me, "there is no stopping her. I knew she would end by putting her foot into it."

As Mrs. Wertzelmann's confusion was so great, and she volunteered no explanation, I fancy the Sonnenburgs, who do not go into Lucerne frequently, are wondering why the Swiss and Nice Times have given no account of the terrible automobile disaster.

Don't ask me how we got back to Lucerne, but four more pitiable-looking objects you never would wish to see. We were utterly exhausted, and I never made any appearance the next day till lunch.

I am glad you are having such a good time at Croixmare. Give my kind regards to your Godmamma and my best love to Héloise. I am glad you have been such a success; I pride myself that whether in England or in France l'ingénue va bien.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER XIV

Hotel National, Lucerne
1st September

Darling Elizabeth:

The Ball of the Season

The invitations are out to a cotillon at Schloss Gessler on the 7th. It is to be a grand affair, the favours are to come from the Maison Bail at Paris, the supper and the music from the National, and the money to pay for it all out of Mr. Wertzelmann's bank account, which it goes without saying is a big one.

Count Albert's Proposal

Everybody seems to have been invited, and Mr. Wertzelmann told me he intended that it should be remembered as the ball of the season. Old Mrs. Johnson came and sat next to me on the quai this morning, and broke the news that Count Albert has proposed to Rosalie and been accepted. She didn't seem to like it when I said I felt sorry for the girl, because she was too good for Count Albert, who was old enough to be her father, and I advised her to look him up and all his antecedents at Vienna before the marriage ceremony. But she was quite satisfied that he was a real, live Count, because the "Schweitzerhof knew all about him." I shouldn't be surprised, however, that she takes my advice, for she is a shrewd old woman, but just fancy anyone taking a husband on a hotel guarantee!

A very pretty woman—a blonde, with a figure that the Venus de Milo might envy, and dressed, oh! là là! shades of Paquin and Worth!—passed us several times, walking up and down the quai. Everybody turned round to stare at her, and everybody asked who she was, and the Princesse di Spezzia, who was talking to Comte Belladonna, put up her lorgnettes. The Duchesse de Vaudricourt leaned over the arm of her chair and whispered to me:—

"Voilà la plus belle courtisane de Florence. C'est une des bijoux de M. le Prince di Spezzia. La fameuse Vittoria Lodi!"

Monsieur le Prince

Later on the Prince di Spezzia sauntered out of the National on the arm of the Marquis de Pivart, both dressed faultlessly as usual, à l'Anglais, and they actually stopped and spoke to the demi-mondaine. The Duchesse de Vaudricourt became quite excited over it, and gave me a regular New-York-Herald-Paris-Edition of Monsieur le Prince. He is very English in appearance, but then Poole makes all his clothes, and he could easily pass for an Englishman, which I think would please him immensely. But why—why will these smart foreigners who affect English fashions always wear lavender or buff-coloured French kid gloves? Perhaps you will say, for the same reason that Englishwomen who are for ever talking of Paris fashions wear English corsets. So under all the artificiality of civilisation national traits come out in a pair of gloves or a pair of stays!

The Prince looks as if he would improve on acquaintance, but I think it distinctly rude and bad form of him to stop and talk to such a woman as la belle Lodi within a stone's throw of his wife. The Duchesse says he has been a mauvais sujet since sixteen, when he disguised himself as a priest and confessed dozens of people, and if it hadn't been that his uncle was a Cardinal, he would have got into some very hot water. He drives with the Lodi daily in the Cascine at Florence, and makes her follow him wherever he goes. She has an apartment at the Schweitzerhof. The Princesse doesn't seem to mind; I don't suppose it would make any difference if she did. She is always beautifully dressed, and spends most of her time staring at people through her lorgnettes.

Professor Chzweiczy

Poor Professor Chzweiczy (you can pronounce this name to suit yourself, for nobody knows what it should be, and Blanche calls it Squeezey) sits every day on the quai; he holds the "Blot on the Brain" close in front of his face as if he were near-sighted. I think he must have a cast in his eyes, for they always seem to be looking over the top of the book at the people passing. I am sure that if it were known that he is one of the greatest medical scientists of the day, he would be besieged like Liane de Pougy; but nobody ever even glances at him; they have got his name spelled wrong in the hotel visitors' list, and wedged in out of sight between some people whose names have a globe-trotting sound and who look like a party of Cook's "Specials."

Liane de Pougy

Liane de Pougy sits now in the garden of the National, for the crowds nearly suffocated her on the quai. She is very beautiful and dresses very quietly; you would never dream that she is as well known in Paris as a monument or a boulevard. A young Frenchman has for the last two days been doing his best to attract her attention by sitting near her, and pretending to read her "L'Insaisissable." I believe that since her arrival there are nearly as many copies of this roman vécu, as she calls it, as Baedekers at the National. It is hard to say which is the most interesting—herself or her book. I caught her looking at the old Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise yesterday with the most untranslatable expression. I am not quite sure but that in spite of her triumphs she would change places with the Maréchale if she could, and wear the old harridan's moustache and the daguerreotype brooch of the late Maréchal and feed Bijou and all. As it is, not a woman at the National would dream of speaking to her, and the Maréchale would as soon think of strangling Bijou as of sitting down at the same table as the famous Liane.

A Comedy

Blanche has just come in to say that a Count Fosca has arrived at the National, having automobiled all the way from Paris, and that the Vicomte is completely bouleversé. She is laughing so over something that Thérèse is telling her that I cannot write any more.

I can only catch the words, "Mrs. Johnson," "Prince di Spezzia," "Ascenseur," "no lights." I leave it to you to make a comedy out of the missing links.—Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER XV

Hotel National, Lucerne
3rd September

Darling Elizabeth:

A Mishap

It rained yesterday for the first time since we have been in Lucerne. As I was looking at the lake which the wind had turned into an ocean with waves mountains high, I saw Comte Belladonna soaked to the skin hurrying along the quai to the hotel. Poor little old beau! He had got himself up as usual in spotless flannels, patent-leather boots, straw hat, and lavender kids, and was coming from the direction of the pension where his inamorata lives—the pretty, portionless American girl—when the rain had overtaken him. His legs, unaccustomed to the unusual exercise of running, seemed inclined one moment to run into the flower-beds on the quai and another to contemplate a plunge into the lake. Sheets of water fell from the brim of his straw hat, his gloves and his boots were irretrievably spoilt, and his flannels had that heavy, soppy look that bathing-suits have. He was as full of water as a sponge, and I am sure he would have been the better for a squeeze.

I called Blanche to look at him, and we both agreed that he would catch a chill after such a wetting that would carry him off. But when we went down to lunch we found him dry and chirpy, and paying his devoirs to the Princesse di Spezzia, as if he had made his toilet for the first time that day.

A Funny Thing

A funny thing happened in the afternoon in connection with the old beau's wetting that would have covered anybody else but such a consummate old courtier with ridicule. After lunch it cleared off, and the sun came out very hot and dried up things so quickly that everybody had tea as usual in the garden of the hotel. The Hungarian band had just finished playing a valse of Waldeuffel, and the Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise had hobbled out into the garden and settled herself comfortably in her favourite seat next to the Princesse di Spezzia when something slowly descended from the sky performing curious evolutions. Everybody speculated as to what it could be and where it came from, when it calmly lighted on the head of the Maréchale, who gave a wizened shriek, and having disengaged herself from it shied it away savagely with the end of her stick. Bijou at once seized it in his mouth, and having gambolled about the grass with it proceeded to improvise it into a broom and sweep up the gravel path with it. The difficulty of getting him to relinquish his possession of it caused a great deal of merriment, and the young man who reads "L'Insaisissable" and ogles Liane de Pougy at the same time suddenly put his foot on it with such force that Bijou, who was scampering off as hard as he could go with an end in his mouth, was brought up short, and, having turned a rather violent somersault in the air, let go and went off whimpering to the Maréchale, who looked as if she could have eaten the young Frenchman. He picked up Bijou's mysterious plaything and held it up, so that everybody could see—a white flannel jacket, or what was left of it, of the jauntiest cut in the world. No one claiming it, he handed it to a waiter who discovered on a tag the chiffre of Comte Belladonna! Instead of at once withdrawing with the garment he informed the Comte that it belonged to him. The Comte, who knew it all the time and had not cared to make himself the butt of the National, examined it, shook his head, examined it again, and bursting into a laugh exclaimed to the Princesse di Spezzia with the utmost self-possession:—

"My dear Princesse, alas! this rag is indeed mine. This morning, spotless and sweet-smelling, I arrayed my old bones in it, and its mate, whose legs you may see dangling out of that window up there under the roof; but, as if envious of the figure I cut in it, the elements having determined to deprive me of it, flooded me out of it. Not being an American millionaire, I hung it out of my window to dry, and the wind did the rest. Heaven grant that the trousers do not come to look after the jacket. Pity me, Princesse, I had worn it but once; it was cut at 'Old England.' Here, garçon, it is yours now."

It was not the words, which were funny enough, but the manner in which they were uttered, that made every one laugh with the Comte instead of at him.

Signor Stefano

The Princesse is a dear; she proved to-night that she is really a grande dame, and that it is neither her name nor her pose which makes her one. Young Signor Stefano, a shopkeeper, we would call him in England, came again to the National to-night to dance. The proprietor, who is very anxious that these dances should be a success, has given him, and two or three other young fellows like him, the entrée. Of course, according to the Continental custom, they can ask any one they like to dance, but a natural and creditable diffidence has kept them from forcing themselves upon any of the smart set, and they are generally to be seen reversing and chasséeing with the people from the pensions, who sit at one end of the ball-room and stare at the other.

Stefano Recognised

Young Stefano is very good-looking, and dances divinely, and has attracted the attention of all of us women, and everybody who has been in the magasin, where he is in charge of the precious stone department, has remarked his quiet gentlemanly behaviour. I think I wrote you that he asked Mr. Vanduzen to present him to the Princesse di Spezzia and was refused, and I must say when he came into the room to-night he looked so much a gentleman and so handsome that I horrified Mr. Vanduzen by telling him to bring Stefano to me.