The darning done, we had some music. M. de Schlözer improvised on the piano, and after the Grand Duke had played some Chopin I sang. M. de Schlözer went through his little antics as advance-courier of my singing: he screwed the piano-stool to the proper height (he thinks it must be just so high when I accompany myself); he removed all albums from sight for fear people might be tempted to glance in them; he almost snatched fans from the hands of unoffending ladies, fearing they might use them; no dogs were to be within patting distance, _and no smoking_; he turned all the chairs to face the piano so that no one should turn his back to it. These are all heinous crimes in his eyes. He would, if he could, have pulled down all the portières and curtains, as he does in his own house when I sing there. What must people think of him? You ask me, "What kind of a cook have you?" Don't speak of it--it is a sore subject! We have the black cook from the White House (so her certificate says). She is not what our fancy painted her. Neither is the devil as black as he is painted (I don't know why I associate them in my mind). We had painted this cook white. I shudder to think how the White House must have lived in those years when she did the cooking. Our dinners are simply awful. Although she has _carte blanche_ to provide anything and everything she wants, our dinners are failures. I look the fact in the face and blush. Our musical parties are better when I do the cooking and Johan does the serving--I mean when I sing and he fills the gaps. The diplomats groan. "Think," they say, "what a finished cook would do with all the delicious things they have here--all these wonderful birds and meats and vegetables, and only the one sauce!"