Add to these a piano and a guitar, on both of which she accompanies herself with considerable taste and some skill, and an embroidery frame, at which she produces works that put to shame the best of those exhibited for sale in England; so that you see she is positively compelled at times to resort to some amusement becoming her sex, as a relief from those more masculine or unworthy occupations in which, according to her reverend enemies, she emulates alternately the example of Peter the Great and Catharine II. The rest of the appointments of the place are in keeping: the coach-house and stabling (her equipages are extremely modest and her household no more numerous or ostentatious than those of a gentlewoman of means), the culinary offices, and an exquisite bath-room, into which the light comes tinted with rose-colour. At the back of the house is a large flower-garden, in which, during the summer, most of the political consultations between the fair Countess and her sovereign are held. "For her habits of life, they are simple. She eats little, and of plain food, cooked in the English fashion; drinks little, keeps good hours, rises early, and labours much. The morning, before and after breakfast, is devoted to what we must call semi-public business. The innumerable letters she receives and affairs she has to arrange, keep herself and her secretary constantly employed during some hours. At breakfast she holds a sort of _levee_ of persons of all sorts--ministers _in esse_ or _in posse_, professors, artists, English strangers, and foreigners from all parts of the world. As is usual with women of an active mind, she is a great talker; but although an egotist, and with her full share of the vanity of her sex, she understands the art of conversation sufficiently never to be wearisome. Indeed, although capable of violent but evanescent passions--of deep but not revengeful animosities, and occasionally of trivialities and weaknesses very often found in persons suddenly raised to great power--she can be, and almost always is, a very charming person and a delightful companion. Her manners are distinguished, she is a graceful and hospitable hostess, and she understands the art of dressing to perfection. "The fair despot is passionately fond of homage. She is merciless in her man-killing propensities, and those gentlemen attending her _levees_ or her _soirees_, who are perhaps too much absorbed in politics or art to be enamoured of her personal charms, willingly pay respect to her mental attractions and conversational powers.