Mrs. Gouverneur never did anything by halves. She made herself agreeable to Mrs. Hilbrough on the evening of the reception and complimented her heartily on the distinguished people she had brought together. For there was the learned president of the Geographical, with overhanging brows and slow and gentle speech; there was the foreign corresponding secretary of the Historical, a man better known as a diplomatist and an author, whose long years abroad had liberalized his mind without spoiling his open-hearted American manners. There were some of the directors of the Metropolitan Museum, to which institution Pohlsen had given some Central American pottery. The senior New York poet wandered in his childlike way among the guests, making gentle and affectionate speeches to friends, who wondered at the widely contrary moods to which his susceptible nature is subject. Bolton, known in two hemispheres by his prose and poetry, had come out of complaisance, protesting rather indignantly to his friends that he didn't believe in Americans making such an ado over a mere baron. In him the stranger saw a slight figure full of character and not in any way to be trifled with; only men of letters and his friends knew what pains he could be at to oblige and to help the humblest of struggling fellow-craftsmen, provided he was not forbidden to accompany the unstinted assistance with a little grumbling at the fearful wreck of his time which all sorts of people, even the tramps of the literary profession, make without remorse. "Charley," said Philip Gouverneur, when he got Millard into a corner, "what have you been doing? This is society and it isn't; it is more like what Carlyle calls a 'lion soiree.'" "Well," said Millard, "it's either society or better. You understand that the Baron's reputation as a scholar has modified things." "I say, Charley," said Philip, "I was ashamed to find my little self lost among these know-it-alls until I met Mrs. Maginnis. She said, 'Oh, Mr. Gouverneur, I am so glad to see somebody that I know. Who are all these people?' So I pointed out the university president over there; and I told her that St. John was our great sculptor, though I'm not sure she makes any clear distinctions between a sculptor and a maker of gravestones; and I assured her that we had several magazine editors, and writers, and illustrators, and painters, and leading journalists, and some of the very foremost of our German citizens. 'Oh, yes,' she replied, 'newspaper men, artists, and Germans! Just what I thought; but there are not more than a dozen people here who were invited to Marshmallow's great ball last winter.'" "It mightn't be a bad thing," said Millard, "if Marshmallow, who pretends to be the boss of society, were to include more people of artistic and literary distinction such as we have here to-night."