On the Royal birthday, the cast assembled at the embassy. Mme. Ristori, dressed as Clio, the Muse of History, opened the evening with a recitation. She had not long retired from the stage; her majestic presence, her wonderful deep voice, her classic face, thrilled her audience, as I had known them thrill American audiences in “Marie Stuart” or in “Lucrezia Borgia.” I was still under the spell of her grand manner when she came to oversee the draping of her mantle on my shoulders. She called for a needle and thread and came towards me with a look so dramatic that I trembled; the needle might have been a dagger from the intensity of her face and gesture. She herself took the necessary stitch to stay the mantle’s folds upon my shoulder; as she left me to take my pose she whispered: “Forget yourself; remember only that you are Aspasia, that Pericles is by your side, that Phidias and his statue are before you!” Just before the curtain was raised, a queen’s jewels lately discovered in an ancient Etruscan tomb and belonging to Castellani, the great jeweler archeologue, were handed me. I put the earrings in my ears and clasped the bracelets on my wrists with a sense of awe. Our tableau was much applauded, Queen Margherita, who sat in the front seats with the French Ambassadress, Mme. de Noailles, asked to have it repeated. We took the prize; this success was not wonderful when I remember that Adelaide Ristori, Herr Helbig, Guglielmo Castellani, Signor Tale, and I forget how many other masters of their craft had a share in it! CHAPTER XII EGYPT. PALESTINE. GREECE. Our great adventure lasted more than two years. I kept no diary, wrote few letters. My mother’s journal for these months is briefer than usual; we lived at such a pace that there was not time to record the experiences of each day. What I remember are the unforgettable things. Of Holland, the artists, Franz Hals and Rembrandt, the great organ at Haarlem, the sturdy peasants, the round red cheeses that resemble them. Belgium is clearer; besides the picture of Rubens and Van Dyck, I can see Bruges with its fine belfry, Ghent with the lace makers, the smiling countryside with straight white roads bordered by poplars. Of Normandy and Brittany, I remember the mystery of the Druid stones, those strange dolmens and menhirs, footsteps of a mighty race, the grave reserve of the Bretons and the peasant costumes that vary with every town. We soon learned to recognize them. “That woman is from Quimperlé,” my mother would say, or, “That man wears the dress of St. Pol de Léon.” Was it at one of these towns or somewhere in Holland that J. found the design for my mother’s cap? In Brittany we traveled by carriage. One afternoon we stopped to gather some fine high-bush blackberries that grew by the roadside.