When Dr. Franklin was received at the French court as American minister, he felt some scruples of conscience in complying with their _fashions as to dress_. "He hoped," he said to the minister, "that as he was himself a very plain man, and represented a plain republican people, the king would indulge his desire to appear at court in his usual dress. Independent of this, the season of the year, he said, rendered the change from warm yarn stockings to fine silk, somewhat dangerous." The French minister made him a bow, but said, that THE FASHION was too sacred a thing for him to meddle with, but he would do himself the honour to mention it to his MAJESTY. The king smiled, and returned word that Dr. Franklin was welcome to appear at court in _any dress he pleased_. In spite of that delicate respect for strangers, for which the French are so remarkable, the courtiers could not help staring, at first, at Dr. Franklin's quaker-like dress, and especially his "BLUE YARN STOCKINGS." But it soon appeared as though he had been introduced upon this splendid theatre only to demonstrate that, great genius, like true beauty, "needs not the foreign aid of ornament." The court were so dazzled with the brilliancy of his mind that they never looked at his stockings. And while many other ministers who figured in all the gaudy fashions of the day are now forgotten, the name of Dr. Franklin is still mentioned in Paris with all the ardour of the most affectionate enthusiasm. CHAPTER XLII. Imagination can hardly conceive a succession of pleasures more elegant and refined than those which Dr. Franklin, now on the shady side of threescore and ten, continued daily to enjoy in the vicinity of Paris--his mornings constantly devoted to his beloved studies, and his evenings to the cheerful society of his friends--the greatest monarch of Europe heaping him with honours unasked, and the brightest WITS and BEAUTIES of his court vying with each other in their attentions to him. And thus as the golden hours rolled along, they still found him happy--gratefully contrasting his present glory with his humble origin, and thence breathing nothing but benevolence to man--firmly confiding in the care of Heaven--and fully persuaded that his smiles would yet descend upon his countrymen, now fighting the good fight of liberty and happiness.