profound, his talk was perhaps all the more charming. It came straight from the heart, and flowed without restraint. [Illustration: Ch. Maurice de Talleyrand] Although Madame de Périgord was present, the duties of the table entirely devolved upon the prince. He served all the dishes, suggested all the wines, addressing each guest in a few sprightly and kindly words. If, perchance, some one attempted to turn the conversation into the channel of politics, which in Vienna is a very habitual weakness, at that very moment he began to talk of this or that thing so utterly foreign to the question just broached as to cause one to think that diplomacy was altogether antipathetic to him. He told us that he was so fond of receiving birthday wishes that, as a rule, he kept up two days, the Saint Charles and the Saint Maurice, without forgetting his real birthday. ‘Those two saints,’ he added, ‘would always prove the best landmarks in my recollections, if ever the fancy took me to write my own life. With their aid I could co-ordinate all my years, happy or sad, and I should be able to say where I was on the days of their appearance in the calendar.’ Madame de Périgord told us that she had received that very morning a Latin manuscript on the history of Courland. It was dedicated by the author to Prince Louis, the husband of her mother. ‘A manuscript!’ interrupted the prince, somewhat excitedly. ‘That reminds me of one of the most curious circumstances of my life. When, after my return from America, I was in Hamburg, I made the acquaintance of a gentleman who, like myself, lodged at the inn of the Römische Kaiser. We had met at the _table d’hôte_, and he had asked me to read the manuscript of a work of his--I no longer remember the subject. I accepted the ordeal, and went to my room. It so happened that on that same day I had been to MM. de Chapeau-Rouge, my bankers, and taken from the remains of a very small credit about fifteen louis. When I got to my room, I opened the manuscript to read it, and between its leaves I deposited my small treasure, wrapped in a sheet of paper. At six in the morning there was a violent knocking at my door, and my author rushed in to inform me that he was going to take ship at that very moment for London, and that he would be pleased to have his manuscript. Half awake and half asleep, I made him a sign to take his manuscript, which was lying on his table, and half sarcastically called to him, “A pleasant journey.” Then I turned round in my bed and fell asleep again. Alas, the wretch took my money with him, and chance did for him what no publisher would have done for his manuscript. I never saw him again, or my fifteen louis, and was obliged to return to my bankers in a sad frame of mind to withdraw the rest left to me, promising myself that they would not catch me examining manuscripts again.’