I have already spoken of the audiences that we gave. They were stupid beyond words. One received strangers under conditions of formality that made them more strange, asked silly little questions of the women--“Are you married?” “How many children have you?”--smiled politely, and waited for the next one. It is the sort of thing that you might expect from the Chinese. And the purely Court receptions were even worse. There you had not even strangers, so you could not ask them whether they were married. You knew--or you were expected to know--all the dignitaries, statesmen, officials, aides, and diplomats who make up the Court circle; you met them again and again, for a perfunctory moment, said something innocuous, and passed on--until you met again. The problem was to think of something to say each time. Once after a Royal chapel--when we always had to make a circle of a roomful of officials lined up around the walls--I noticed, as we approached one officer, that he wore black gloves with his uniform. It is a sign of deep mourning. The others of the Royal Family, preceding me, made the usual conventional attempts to say a little of nothing as if it were something worth saying; and so, when I came to him, although I had no idea who he was, I said, “I was deeply sorry to hear of your bereavement.” The others, overhearing me, were mortified that they had not offered him their condolences too; and when the reception was over they spoke to me about it. Whom had he lost? How had I remembered it? And when I explained what I had done, without knowing who the man was, even the King was envious. It was so difficult to have anything to say, and a Royal Family is always so haunted by the problem that my little ruse quite made a reputation for me. And, if you can believe it, the officer was deeply touched and gratified, poor soul, by my knowing of his grief. It is on such trifles that a king makes his personal popularity. But what a life! When my brother married the Duc’s daughter, Mercedes, we had that beautiful and charming creature added to our circle; but they were such lovers and so happy together that we had our brother less, though we had Mercedes more. By this time I had quite lost interest in the daughters of the grandees whom my brother invited to Court to make companionship for us. They could play no game more active than croquet, which they played languidly. When I drove them behind my four ponies they wanted always to go to the parks, where they could look sidelong at the young men; and I preferred the country drives with more freedom. I soon wearied of a conversation that was all holy water and fiancés.