“I'll tell you, then. Get half a dozen of your own set together to-morrow morning, vote the whole story an atrocious falsehood, and go in a body and tell the Countess your mind. You know as well as I, Princess, that social credit is as great a bubble as commercial; we should all of us be bankrupts if our books were seen. Ay, by Jove! and the similitude goes farther too; for when one old established house breaks, there is generally a crash in the whole community around it.” While they thus talked, a knot had gathered around the carriage, all eager to hear what opinion the Princess had formed on the catastrophe. Various were the sentiments expressed by the different speakers,--some sorrowfully deploring the disaster; others more eagerly inveighing against the infamy of the man who had proclaimed it. Many declared that they had come to the determination to discredit the story. Not one, however, sincerely professed that he disbelieved it. Can it be, as the French moralist asserts, that we have a latent sense of satisfaction in the misfortunes of even our best friends; or is it, as we rather suspect, that true friendship is a rarer thing than is commonly believed, and has little to do with those conventional intimacies which so often bear its name? Assuredly of all this well-bred, well-dressed, and wellborn company, now thronging the courtyard of the palace and the street in front of it, the tone was as much sarcasm as sorrow, and many a witty epigram and smart speech were launched over a disaster which might have been spared such levity. At length the space slowly began to thin. Slowly carriage after carriage drove off,--the heaviest grief of their occupants often being over a lost _soirée_, an unprofited occasion to display toilette and jewels; while a few, more reflective, discussed what course was to be followed in future, and what recognition extended to the victim. The next day Florence sat in committee over the lost Countess. Witnesses were heard and evidence taken as to her case. They all agreed it was a great hardship,--a terrible calamity; but still, if true, what could be done?