“Why, got out again as fast as you could,” said the literal attache. “No such thing, I was too frightened: I stood still and screamed for assistance.” Madame D’Anville was delighted, and Miss Paulding astonished. Mr. Aberton muttered to a fat, foolish Lord Luscombe, “What a damnation puppy,”--and every one, even to the old Madame de G--s, looked at me six times as attentively as they had done before. As for me, I was perfectly satisfied with the effect I had produced, and I went away the first, in order to give the men an opportunity of abusing me; for whenever the men abuse, the women, to support alike their coquetry and the conversation, think themselves called upon to defend. The next day I rode into the Champs Elysees. I always valued myself particularly upon my riding, and my horse was both the most fiery and the most beautiful in Paris. The first person I saw was Madame D’Anville. At that moment I was reining in my horse, and conscious, as the wind waved my long curls, that I was looking to the very best advantage, I made my horse bound towards her carriage, which she immediately stopped, and speaking in my natural tone of voice, and without the smallest affectation, I made at once my salutations and my court. “I am going,” said she, “to the Duchesse D--g’s this evening--it is her night--do come.” “I don’t know her,” said I. “Tell me your hotel, and I’ll send you an invitation before dinner,” rejoined Madame D’Anville. “I lodge,” said I, “at the Hotel de--, Rue de Rivoli, au second at present; next year, I suppose, according to the usual gradations in the life of a garcon, I shall be au troisieme: for here the purse and the person seem to be playing at see-saw--the latter rises as the former descends.” We went on conversing for about a quarter of an hour, in which I endeavoured to make the pretty Frenchwoman believe that all the good opinion I possessed of myself the day before, I had that morning entirely transferred to her account. As I rode home I met Mr. Aberton, with three or four other men; with that glaring good-breeding, so peculiar to the English, he instantly directed their eyes towards me in one mingled and concentrated stare. “N’importe,” thought I, “they must be devilish clever fellows if they can find a single fault either in my horse or myself.” CHAPTER XI. Lud! what a group the motley scene discloses, False wits, false wives, false virgins, and false spouses.--Goldsmith’s Epilogue to the Comedy of the Sisters. Madame D’Anville kept her promise--the invitation was duly sent, and accordingly at half past ten to the Rue D’Anjou I drove.