I had not come to Paris as an unsophisticated provincial. I had spent two brilliant seasons in London, and, thanks to the long and intimate relations of my uncle with our ambassador, an intimacy which my father and my aunt had reminded him of in introducing me to him when I was on my voyage, I had been presented to the best and most aristocratic society in England. Now the English aristocracy, proud, overbearing, and justly vain of its incontestable superiority in wealth and influence to all the other aristocracies of Europe, is excessively reserved towards strangers who seek to enter its charmed circle; but when one has gone through this ordeal, nowhere is one treated with more perfect cordiality or put more at one's ease. Nevertheless, in the "_vie Parisienne_," which cannot in any way pretend to rival or approach that splendid existence that one leads in London, there is to be found that which must be sought vainly in London or elsewhere; it is a fascinating charm not to be explained, which even the most calm and stolid natures seldom escape. Parisian society, in its real acceptation and perfect flower, is limited to the elegant and refined existence led by the élite of five or six salons, in the one or two quarters of the city that are the rendezvous of all pleasure-seekers of the upper class. On my arrival in Paris, I fortunately did not have to undergo that apprenticeship to material life which generally costs strangers so much money and so many disappointments. My father had lived there such a long time that, being well informed as to the most comfortable mode of existence, I was able to avoid mistakes. Thus, instead of housing myself at a high price and with very little space in one of those swarming and noisy apartment-houses five or six stories high, which begin on the ground floor in a magnificent store, and end in a miserable garret, I rented a little house near the Champs Élysées, brought my horses and servants from Serval, and started my establishment in a proper way. I called on several relatives or distant connections of my family, who received me with great cordiality, some on account of my name and the respect they bore to my father, others because they had daughters to marry, and I was doubtless in their eyes what is called a "great catch;" while some were polite because idle people are always delighted to have one more visitor on their list, and thus to be able to pass one more of their unoccupied hours. Among these last was to be found M. le Comte Alfred de Cernay; one of my former London friends who knew him intimately had given me letters to him, and had given me very credible information about him, whose character I found had been truthfully described.