admiration and respect for all those whose duty compels them to pass their days in the contemplation of dull columns of meaningless figures! In my personal distaste for all the petty details pertaining to the direction of a household, I was therefore but the more disposed to feel sympathy for good Frau Baring, and indeed for all her myrmidons, having often had occasion to observe the conscientious zeal with which all of these, every maid-servant and laundress down to the meanest scullion, performed the duties laid on them. So many instances have I known of these humblest functions patiently and punctiliously discharged, that I for one can never join in the complaints too often raised against the servant-class. Every service rendered us seemed always to be a labour of love, and this experience can surely not have been confined to ourselves alone. I have often thought that I perhaps owed my magnificent health in a certain measure to my nurse, the simple peasant-woman picked out for her own [Illustration: H. M. QUEEN ELISABETH OF ROUMANIA] fine _physique_ and sound constitution to be my foster-mother. In any case it must have been from her that I derived my simple tastes in matters gastronomic, and this has doubtless much contributed to my well-being my whole life long. As a young girl I exulted frankly in my health and strength, nor was I in the least ashamed of my rosy cheeks and plumpness, the pallid and enervated type of woman not being then proposed as a model, and no one having the slightest desire to look like a ghost. But I thought little enough of such matters--I was better employed, with my books, my work, my music, and whenever our own dear invalids did not demand my special care, in paying visits to the sick people on our estates. A dull sad existence, some might say, for a growing girl, but it had its joys, and deeper and holier ones than can ever spring from the mere quest of happiness. Moments of depression and discouragement at times were mine, for who is there has not known such, but the natural buoyancy of youth prevailed, and already in the exercise of my pen, I had a source of comfort ever at hand.