“The place was kept by Madame Busque, who had been a governess in a private family in the south of France, and having saved a little money, had come to Paris and opened a creamery. The very day she opened her shop, Mr. Chase, Paris correspondent of the New York _Times_, passing by, was attracted by the clean look of the place, and stepped in for his early breakfast of coffee and rolls. The little back room contained two round tables, and beyond was the kitchen with the usual charcoal broiler and little furnaces. Chase was so pleased that he came again, and getting acquainted with Madame, who was well educated and very ladylike and anxious to please, arranged for a dinner at 6.30 for a party of four. Everything was good and so well served that soon she had a regular custom of American residents,--literary men, artists, and students of all kinds, art, scientific, literary, and medical,--and soon the place became famous. American dishes were introduced,--mince and pumpkin pies and buckwheat cakes. It was not easy to reproduce these things in Paris. The pumpkin pie was a trouble. Madame was told how to make it by a man who only knew how it looked and tasted, and who neglected to mention the crust; and as Madame had no knowledge of pies in general, she served the first pumpkin pie as a soup in a tureen. Just at that time came in a bright young woman, introduced by one of the _habitués_, who offered to come next forenoon and show Madame Busque how to make a genuine Yankee pumpkin pie, which she did; and the pies produced in that little creamery were famous and were sent out to Americans all over Paris. Fine carriages, including that of the American minister, to the amazement of the neighborhood, would call for these pies to take home. “Among the _habitués_ was young Whistler, then an art student. He was bright, original, and amusing, but gave at that time no promise of any particular ability as an artist. His drawing was careless. I remember one of his pictures,--a woman seated at the piano, a little child playing on the floor. The piano was so out of drawing that it looked as if it were falling over. As students are always fond of guying each other, one said to Whistler, ‘Hurry and put a fifth leg under that piano or it will fall and smash the baby.’