People like the French nobles, engaged in sulking and attempting to overthrow or boycott each succeeding régime, must naturally lose their influence. They have held aloof so long—fearing to compromise themselves by any advances to the powers that be, and restrained by countless traditions from taking an active part in either the social or political strife—that little by little they have been passed by and ignored; which is a pity, for amid the ruin of many hopes and ambitions they have remained true to their caste and handed down from generation to generation the secret of that gracious urbanity and tact which distinguished the Gallic noblewoman in the last century from the rest of her kind and made her so deft in the difficult art of pleasing—and being pleased. Within the last few years there have, however, been signs of a change. Young members of historic houses show an amusing inclination to escape from their austere surroundings and resume the place their grandparents abdicated. If it is impossible to rule as formerly, they at any rate intend to get some fun out of existence. This joyous movement to the front is being made by the young matrons enlisted under the “Seven little duchesses’” banner. Oddly enough, a baker’s half-dozen of ducal coronets are worn at this moment, in France, by small and sprightly women, who have shaken the dust of centuries from those ornaments and sport them with a decidedly modern air! It is the members of this clique who, in Paris during the spring, at their châteaux in the summer and autumn, and on the Riviera after Christmas, lead the amusements and strike the key for the modern French world. No one of these light-hearted ladies takes any particular precedence over the others. All are young, and some are wonderfully nice to look at. The Duchesse d’Uzès is, perhaps, the handsomest, good looks being an inheritance from her mother, the beautiful and wayward Duchesse de Chaulme. There is a vivid grace about the daughter, an intense vitality that suggests some beautiful being of the forest. As she moves and speaks one almost expects to hear the quick breath coming and going through her quivering nostrils, and see foam on her full lips. Her mother’s tragic death has thrown a glamor of romance around the daughter’s life that heightens the witchery of her beauty.