There is a tremendous excitement here! Can you imagine it, Mamma? They have actually got an automobile! It came this morning, and if it had been a flying machine it could not have been considered more wonderful. It is Uncle John's fiftieth wedding present to Aunt Maria!--and they are going in it on the same tour they took on their wedding journey! Aunt Maria, as you know, has never been abroad since. We all went into the stable yard to see it. The face of the coachman! (You remember him?--always the same one.) It was a mixture of contempt and defiance. They did suggest having him taught a chauffeur's duties, but the man who came from the place they bought the car wisely suggested it might, at his age, be dangerous, and Aunt Maria also feared it would be bad for his sore throat--it is still sore!--so they have abandoned this idea. They start on Monday--the anniversary of their wedding--and they have asked me to go with them, and I really think I shall. The most marvellous preparations are being made. One would think it was a journey to the South Pole. Aunt Maria spends hours each day in writing and rewriting lists of things she must have with her, and then Uncle John protests that only the smallest amount of luggage can be taken. So she consults with Janet Mackintosh, her maid, and then she turns to me and in a loud whisper says that of course she has to be patient with poor Janet as she is a newcomer and does not yet know her ways! She has been with her five years now, ever since her last Methuselah died, so one would have thought that long enough to learn, wouldn't one, Mamma? The automobile is most remarkable, as it has a rumble on the back, because, as Aunt Maria explained, her maid and Uncle John's valet went in the rumble of the carriage on their wedding journey, and it is the proper place for servants, so she insisted upon the motor being arranged in the same way. Janet and the valet will have a suffocatingly dusty drive--enveloped in complete coverings of leather. Agnès is to sit beside the chauffeur and we three inside. I suppose everyone will scream with laughter as we career through the towns, but what matter! I shall go down to Cannes with them and join Octavia there if I find it too boring, and Harry cannot have a word to say to my travelling with my own relations. I feel like crying, dearest Mamma, so I won't write any more now. Your affectionate daughter, ELIZABETH. TONNERRE HOTEL DE LA POULE D'OR, TONNERRE. _(Somewhere on the way to Dijon.)_