“She is one of those would-be grandees,” said Arthur, “who think that, by tacking on to their surname all their spare Christian-names, with hyphens between, they can give it an aristocratic flavour. As if it wasn’t trouble enough to remember _one_ surname!” By this time the room was getting crowded, as the guests, invited for the evening-party, were beginning to arrive, and Lady Muriel had to devote herself to the task of welcoming them, which she did with the sweetest grace imaginable. Sylvie and Bruno stood by her, deeply interested in the process. “I hope you like my friends?” she said to them. “Specially my dear old friend, Mein Herr (What’s become of him, I wonder? Oh, there he is!), that old gentleman in spectacles, with a long beard?” “He’s a grand old gentleman!” Sylvie said, gazing admiringly at ‘Mein Herr,’ who had settled down in a corner, from which his mild eyes beamed on us through a gigantic pair of spectacles. “And what a lovely beard!” “What does he call his-self?” Bruno whispered. “He calls himself ‘Mein Herr,’” Sylvie whispered in reply. Bruno shook his head impatiently. “That’s what he calls his _hair_, not his _self_, oo silly!” He appealed to me. “What doos he call his _self_, Mister Sir?” “That’s the only name _I_ know of,” I said. “But he looks very lonely. Don’t you pity his grey hairs?” “I pities his _self_,” said Bruno, still harping on the misnomer; “but I doosn’t pity his _hair_, one bit. His _hair_ ca’n’t feel!” “We met him this afternoon,” said Sylvie. “We’d been to see Nero, and we’d had _such_ fun with him, making him invisible again! And we saw that nice old gentleman as we came back.” “Well, let’s go and talk to him, and cheer him up a little,” I said: “and perhaps we shall find out what he calls himself.” CHAPTER XI. THE MAN IN THE MOON. The children came willingly. With one of them on each side of me, I approached the corner occupied by ‘Mein Herr.’ “You don’t object to _children_, I hope?” I began. “_Crabbed age and youth cannot live together!_” the old man cheerfully replied, with a most genial smile. “Now take a good look at me, my children! You would guess me to be an _old_ man, wouldn’t you?” At first sight, though his face had reminded me so mysteriously of “the Professor,” he had seemed to be decidedly a _younger_ man: but, when I came to look into the wonderful depth of those large dreamy eyes, I felt, with a strange sense of awe, that he was incalculably _older_: he seemed to gaze at us out of some by-gone age, centuries away. [Illustration: MEIN HERR’S FAIRY-FRIENDS] “I don’t know if oo’re an _old_ man,” Bruno answered, as the children, won over by the gentle voice, crept a little closer to him. “I thinks oo’re _eighty-three_.” “He is very exact!” said Mein Herr. “Is he anything like right?” I said.