"_Excusez_, Monsieur, those _gentlemen_ are great politicians," (_grand_ again, thought I!) "and one of them is deputy for the Department--M. de Beauparler: he has just been voting against the Ministry, sir; he is a great friend of M. Lafitte, sir; oh, sir! _c'est le plus grand orateur de notre pays!_ You ought to hear him, sir. As for the young ladies, sir, they are _les Demoiselles Leroy_: it was their father that you were remarking just now--the old gentleman--very short-sighted, sir--he is immensely rich; _Pardi! que sais-je?_" (here he shrugged up his shoulders to his ears,) "they say he has 50,000 francs a-year!--_c'est assommant!_" (here he shut his eyes and raised his nose at an angle of forty-five degrees.) "_Quant aux demoiselles, elles sont_"----(he was evidently at a loss for an expression; so he extended his first two fingers to his lips, closing tightly the others and his thumb, and then blew a kiss with them to the winds.) Tap! tap! at the door. "Pierre! are you coming down, then? they are asking for you every where!" And the tightly girded, and somewhat _altius accincta, fille-de-chambre_--a spruce little black-eyed _Auvergnate_,--tripped into the room. "_Excusez, milor!_ but Pierre is such a gossip!" "My good girl, I will detain neither Pierre nor yourself: give me my coat, dust my room well, and now show me to the _salle-a-manger_." As good luck would have it, Pierre had placed a chair for me next to Madame de Mirepoix, her husband was on the other side of his lady,--'twas impossible to be in better company. Opposite to me was a venerable white-haired mustached gentleman, evidently a military man, and next to me was a lady, some five-and-forty, or thereabouts, with a strong Spanish cast of countenance and complexion, and her husband, a short thick-necked apoplectic-looking man, by her side. The rest of the company, though various enough in their physiognomical aspect, were evidently persons of the upper ranks of society, and among them were several choice specimens of the best and oldest nobility of France. They seemed all to make one joyous family party, as if they had been relations rather than strangers; every body was laughing and chatting with his neighbour; they were plying their forks most vigorously, and the noise and bustle was excessive. "What do you think of our baths?" said my lovely neighbour; "for of course you have already been immersed in, and have tasted the waters." I humbly alleged the negative. "Well! I declare this _phlegme Britannique_ is insupportable. Why, sir, we were at the bath-house before six this morning." "Had I but known it, Madame"----