The new-comer interested me exceedingly. In my own mind I instantly set him down as a _dilettante_ Englishman of good birth and education. He looked the sort of being who would spend the greater part of his time in foreign picture-galleries and cathedrals; who would carry his Ruskin continually in his pocket, and who would probably end by writing a volume of travels "_for private circulation only_." I should not have been surprised had I been told that he dabbled a little in water-colours, or to have heard that he regarded Ruskin as the greatest writer, and Turner as the greatest painter, of our era. One thing at least was self-evident, and that was the fact that he was a person of considerable importance at this particular hotel. The Commissionaire bowed before him as if he were a foreign potentate, while the _maitre d'hotel_ received him with as much respect as if he had been an American millionaire. When he in his turn disappeared into the building, I beckoned the Commissionaire to my side. "Who is that gentleman that has just entered the hotel?" I enquired. "Is it possible that Monsieur does not know him?" the man replied, with an expression of wonderment upon his face. His answer more than ever convinced me that the other was a very great man, at least a German princeling, perhaps an Austrian archduke. "No," I said, "I do not know him. As a matter of fact, I do not remember ever having seen him before. Who is he?" "He is Monsieur Dickie Bucks," answered the Commissionaire, with as much respect as if he were talking of the Czar of all the Russias. My illusion vanished in a trice. "Dickie Bucks,--Dickie Bucks," I repeated to myself. "Gracious heavens! what a name for such a man! And pray who is Mr Dickie Bucks, for I assure you his fame has not yet reached me?" "Monsieur surely knows the great bookmaker," said the man, with an air of incredulity. "He is the great bookmaker, the very greatest, perhaps, in all England. Monsieur is not perhaps aware that there are races at Auteuil to-morrow." And so my _dilettante_ Englishman, my artist, my amateur author, was, after all, nothing more than a famous betting man, who, had I spoken to him of Ruskin, would probably have offered to lay me five to one against him for the Lincolnshire Handicap, and would have informed me that there was a general opinion in Sporting Circles that "Sesame and Lilies" was not the stayer she was popularly supposed to be. Well, well, it only proves how little our judgment is to be trusted, and how important it is that we should not pin our faith upon externals.