But at such a time as this there’s always one person who seems interested in what I say—a German gentleman, a professor, who sits next to me at dinner and whom I must tell you more about another time. He’s very learned, but wants to push further and further all the time; he appreciates a great many of my remarks, and after dinner, in the salon, he often comes to me to ask me questions about them. I have to think a little sometimes to know what I did say or what I do think. He takes you right up where you left off, and he’s most as fond of discussing things as William Platt ever was. He’s splendidly educated, in the German style, and he told me the other day that he was an “intellectual broom.” Well, if he is he sweeps clean; I told him that. After he has been talking to me I feel as if I hadn’t got a speck of dust left in my mind anywhere. It’s a most delightful feeling. He says he’s a remorseless observer, and though I don’t know about remorse—for a bright mind isn’t a crime, is it?—I’m sure there’s plenty over here to observe. But I’ve told you enough for to-day. I don’t know how much longer I shall stay here; I’m getting on now so fast that it has come to seem sometimes as if I shouldn’t need all the time I’ve laid out. I suppose your cold weather has promptly begun, as usual; it sometimes makes me envy you. The fall weather here is very dull and damp, and I often suffer from the want of bracing. VI FROM MISS EVELYN VANE IN PARIS TO THE LADY AUGUSTA FLEMING AT BRIGHTON PARIS, _September_ 30. DEAR LADY AUGUSTA,