At the close of the concert I was solemnly informed by the very polite little intendant of the theatre that M. Blanc, the principal owner of the Casino, the opera, the gambling tables, the Hotel de Paris, in fact everything which draws the hundred-franc notes from the grateful tourist, had expressed a desire to meet me and to thank me for the “_concert exquis_.” I was accordingly piloted to another part of the building, where, in an anteroom, five or six people were waiting as if in a doctor’s outer office, while flunkies in livery were silently walking around or delivering whispered messages to this or that man. One of these approached my little intendant with a message, who turned to me and, with a face radiant with pride, said: “Think of it! He will see us first before all the others!” We followed the flunky into an inner room where I found a tired-looking, gray-mustached little man whom I had noticed sleeping in one of the boxes during about half an hour of the concert. He congratulated me on the “splendid concert and the exquisite playing of the orchestra,” and as I sat there I marvelled at it all. Here was a man whom we in America would call a gambling-house keeper, but he is certainly a king among them. He has provided his gambling tables with a setting so exquisite that words cannot describe it. Nature in her most charming mood, beautiful architecture, delightful music, exquisite cooking—all these so skilfully combined as to create an agreeable atmosphere for the thousands who come every year with full pockets and generally leave with empty ones. Incidentally he makes millions by thus cleverly pandering to the gambling instincts which are inherent in almost every man (and woman). To me the most delightful feature of the concert, except of course the visit of Jean de Reszke, was a large audience of seventy-five who sat behind the scenes as there was no room for them in front. They were the orchestra of the Monte Carlo Opera, an excellent body of men who embraced us in true southern fashion between the parts and at the end of the concert.