The room which I entered was a large, lofty saloon, hung with rich tapestry, and furnished with antique chairs and tables, the dark hues of which, together with the sombre aspect of the carved oak plafond, gave a gloomy air of other days to the whole scene, so that I could have fancied myself carried back to the reign of Francis I. A large lamp, containing several lights, hung by a chain from the ceiling, and immediately under this, leaning back in a capacious easy chair, sat a gentleman with a book in his hand, which he was reading, and evidently enjoying, for at the moment we entered he was laughing till the tears rolled over his cheeks. As soon as he heard a step, however, he laid down his book, and turned towards the door, struggling to compose his countenance into some degree of gravity. As I advanced, he rose and addressed me with that frank and pleasing affability which is the best and surest key to the human heart. "Count Louis de Bigorre, I believe?" he said; "you catch me in an occupation which the proverb attributes to fools--laughing by myself; but with such a companion as Sancho Panza, one may be excused, though the same jest has made my eyes water a hundred times. However, be you most welcome, for you have been a long-expected guest at Sedan. Yet now you are arrived," he added, "however great the pleasure may be to me, perhaps it would have been better for yourself had you remained absent." I replied, as a matter of course, that I could not conceive anything better for myself, than the honour of being attached to the Count de Soissons. "Heaven only knows," said he, "what may be the event to you or me. But sit down, and tell me when you left Paris--whom you saw there--and what news was stirring in that great capital?" "I have been four days on the road," replied I, bringing forward one of the smaller chairs, so as to be sufficiently near the prince to permit the conversation to flow easily, without approaching to any degree of familiar proximity. "Perhaps," I continued, "as I rode my own horses, I might not have had the honour of seeing your highness till to-morrow, had I not found it necessary to hurry forward to avoid a disagreeable companion." "How so?" demanded the Count. "I hope no attempt was made to impede your progress hither; for if that has been the case, it is time that I should look to my communications with my other friends in France." I gave the Count a somewhat detailed account of my adventures on the road, that he might judge what measures were necessary to insure the secrecy of his correspondence with Paris.