Mrs. Dalrymple's carriage had continued its course. It was now on its way to her dressmaker's, Madame Damereau. Dead now, and the once large business dispersed, Madame Damereau, a Frenchwoman, was famous in that gone-by day. An enormous custom--clientèle she used to call it--had she. Her house was handsome, and, so far as its appearance went, strictly private. It was in a private street, amidst other handsome houses, and there was nothing to betray its business except the brass-plate on the wide mahogany door--"Madame Damereau." It was as handsome inside as out; its rooms were a mixture of Parisian taste and English comfort, with their velvet carpets, rich crimson furniture, brilliant mirrors, and ornamental objects of porcelain, all delicate landscape painting and burnished gold. Surely, rooms so elaborately fitted up were not needed to carry on the business of a milliner and dressmaker, great though that business was! Needed or not, there they were. Madame Damereau had taste, and liked them. There was a hall and a reception-room; and a painted glass-door at the end of a passage, as the clientèle turned to ascend a handsome staircase that led to the show-rooms; through which glass-door might be caught glimpses of a paved court with green shrubs and plants. Above the stairs came an anteroom, and a trying-on room--and I know not how much more. Madame Damereau was as fascinating, in her line, as Mrs. Dalrymple in hers. Ask the ladies who were for ever paying her visits, and they would tell you that, once within reach of the fascinations of herself and her show-rooms, there they were contentedly fixed; there was no getting away, and there was no trying to get away. Madame's expenses were very great, and she had feathered her nest pretty well: somebody paid for it. When madame's nest should be sufficiently well feathered--or what she would consider so--it was her intention to return to La Belle France--pays chéri!--and quit England and its natives--les barbares!--for ever. Every thought of madame had reference to this enchanting finale: not a dress did she make, a bonnet sell, a mantle improvise, but the charges for them (very high generally) were elaborated with this one desirable end in view. Apart from this propensity to gain, madame was not bad at heart. Very good, in fact; and many a little kindness did she enact in private, especially to her poor countrymen and women domiciled here. What though she did stick on ruinous prices for those who could pay?--a person must live. Que voulez-vous?