I was once going to the opera in company with a Polish lady; she came and begged me to wait a few minutes, as she was not quite ready; she was magnificently dressed in dark crimson velvet, a profusion of jewels, lace, and marabout feathers. I took a seat in the drawing-room, next to her _cabinet de toilette_, whilst she completed her head-dress. Suddenly I heard a tremendous noise in the adjoining apartment; mistress and maid seemed to be endeavouring to outscold each other; but as they spoke Polish I did not understand what it was all about. Presently a loud crash, and the fall of a heavy body on the floor, announced that some catastrophe had happened. Very soon after the lady made her appearance, smiling with all the politeness possible, and expressing her regret at having kept me waiting. I made no remark, of course, nor did she allude to the mysterious fracas that had just taken place; but I afterwards learned the facts of the case: the maid had not pleased her in her coiffure; the lady scolded; the girl answered impertinently, which so enraged her amiable mistress, that, with the chair on which she was sitting, she knocked her down with so much violence that two of _her front teeth_ were broken off in her fall! An amusing anecdote was told me by a French lady. One of her countrywomen was engaged as dressing-maid to a lady of rank in Russia: one day, while combing out her mistress’s long back hair, she hurt her head; the lady turned round and gave her a slap on the face. The Frenchwoman, who had hold of her hair, which she was on the point of tying, so that it was all gathered together in her hand, grasped it tightly, and then inflicted a sound correction on the lady’s ears with the hair-brush. Perhaps it may be thought that she was immediately punished by being taken to the police, or at the least summarily dismissed from the household. Far from it; the maid knew the character of the Russians well, and also what she was about: she was perfectly aware that her mistress would not dare to expose her, on account of the disgrace to herself; for it would be an indelible one for a noble lady to have been beaten (in any place but _Count Orloff’s_ office), and especially by a menial: she therefore not only took the whole quietly, but presented the Frenchwoman with thirty silver roubles and a new gown, to buy her silence; she was ever after treated with much consideration, and at the time the anecdote was told to me was still in the same situation.