According to all accounts, the Prince did not take his position very much to heart, for, in truth, an estrangement between the Court and the representatives of his house afforded little in the nature of a new experience. At any rate, he shook the dust of the capital off his boots, and set out on a tour through Europe. On this journey he tarried for some days in the city of Berne, betraying a keen desire to participate in all that mediæval town could afford him by way of interest and entertainment. Among these Curtius’s studio--which had now acquired something of the dignity of a private museum--was not allowed to escape his attention. No account of his visit to this establishment has been handed down, but a few words uttered by the Prince on leaving conveyed, beyond all doubt, his genuine admiration for the doctor-artist’s skill in his new profession as a sculptor in wax. “If you will leave Berne and come to Paris, I will undertake to find you a suitable atelier in which to carry on your work, and hold myself responsible for your receiving as many commissions as you feel disposed to executive. Come,” he urged. “You will not regret it.” One wonders what kindred foibles, what curious traits of disposition in common, existed between this Prince and the artist that there should have been struck so readily a chord of sympathy between them. For the offer, as we shall hereafter learn, had not been lightly made, nor had its ready acceptance been inspired without betraying a ready confidence most men would have deemed it highly imprudent to concede. CHAPTER II Curtius leaves Berne for Paris--The Hôtel d’Aligre--The Court of Louis XV--Madame arrives in Paris. In response to the Prince de Conti’s invitation, Curtius left Berne for Paris a few months later, and for once the time-honoured adage proffering a warning to those prone to rely upon the promises of princes had no bearing, for this Prince kept his word. On his arrival at Paris, Curtius found a handsome suite of apartments awaiting him at the Hôtel d’Aligre, hard by the Croix du Trahoir in the Rue St. Honoré. They were spacious and well furnished, and in style and comfort far exceeded his expectation. The Rue St. Honoré on the north, the Rue Bailleul on the south, the Rue de l’Arbre Sec on the east, and the Rue des Poulies on the west, outline to this day the ground on which the hotel, with its gardens, then stood. The Hôtel d’Aligre was a place that had seen better days. It had, like so many of the great family dwellings that existed in Paris towards the end of the eighteenth century, demanded of its owners a longer and more speedily replenished purse than they possessed. The sheltering of a stately and magnificent household had long been unknown to this once famous residence, and its handsome rooms had been divided up and let as separate tenements.