This afternoon we are going to pay a visit of ceremony to the Comte and Comtesse de Tournelle; we are going with them on their yacht down the Seine to-morrow. It is Jean and Héloise who have arranged to take me--it is kind of them, and it will be fun; and I am glad it is not considered proper for young French girls to go without their mothers, because we shall get rid of Victorine, and the voyage will be more agreeable. Agnès and the other maids and valets are going by train, and will meet us with the luggage at the different places we stop at each night, as the _Sauterelle_ is too small to carry everything. I must go and get ready now, so good-bye, dear Mamma.--Your affectionate daughter, Elizabeth. YACHT "SAUTERELLE" Yacht _Sauterelle_, _17th August_. [Sidenote: _Yacht "Sauterelle"_] Dearest Mamma,--I am writing as we float down the Seine, it is too enchanting. We are a party of ten. The Comte and Comtesse de Tournelle; her mother, the Baronne de Larnac, and her uncle, the Baron de Frémond, Jean, Héloise, and me; the Marquise de Vermondoise, and two young men, officers in the Cavalry, stationed at Versailles. One is the Vicomte Gaston de la Trémors, and the other's name is so long that I can't get it, so you must know him by "Antoine"--he is some sort of a relation of Héloise's. The Baronne is a delightful person, the remains of extreme good looks and distinction. She was a beauty under the Empire, and her feet are so small, she is just as _soignée_ as if she was young, and so vain and human. She lives with her daughter while they are in the country--it seems the custom here, these huge family parties living together all the summer. [Sidenote: _A Visit of Ceremony_] The young people have their _appartement_ in the Champs Elysées in Paris, and the old ones go to the family hotel in the _Faubourg St. Germain._ We _did_ say a lot of polite things when we went to pay our visit yesterday, and although they know one another so well--as it was a "visit of ceremony" to introduce me--we all had our best clothes on, and sat in the large salon--(there are four Louis XVI. arm chairs, sticking out each side of the fireplaces, in all the salons here). Héloise and the Comtesse de Tournelle are great friends. The Comte de Tournelle is charming, he is like the people in the last century Memoirs, he ought to have powdered hair, and his manners have a distinction and a wit quite unlike anything in England. One can see he is descended from people who had their heads cut off for being aristocrats. Jean says he does not belong to _le Sporting_, and is fearfully effeminate. He can't even put on his own socks without his valet, and he never rides or bicycles or anything, but just does a little motor-carring, and fights a few duels.