The cult for beauty was unlike anything I have ever known before or since. The aesthetic movement was at its height, and the “short-haired women and long-haired men”, familiar figures at all the great routs and public _fêtes_, waited to see the entrance of one of the “beauties”, as people wait to see Royalty pass. The photographs of the professional beauties were on sale in the shops with those of the royal family, leading statesmen, and popular actors. We owed our glimpses of the world of sport largely to Lord Dunraven, owner of the famous yacht _Thistle_, who was attentive to us for Uncle Sam’s sake. He drove us down to the Derby, where we were his guests in the royal inclosure, and had a close view of the Prince and Princess of Wales. The Prince, later Edward VII, was not far from forty, and looked rather like Holbein’s portrait of Henry the Eighth. The Princess was much beloved, though the people of the court and the diplomats found her hard to talk with on account of her deafness. She was elegant in dress, and for good looks held her own with the professional beauties. Like the Queen, she was devoted to her family, but during the season could not have had much time for her children. Every waking hour of her day seemed filled with official engagements. She was forever opening hospitals, presiding at _fêtes_, charity bazaars, and graduating exercises. We went to Ascot with Lord Dunraven, and I remember dimly some yachting excursion with him. This was ten years before the race between the _Thistle_ and the _Mayflower_ for the _America’s_ cup. There was some dispute about this race, and many people felt that Dunraven had not been well treated by our American judges. Feeling ran high in yachting circles and I overheard one sporting character say to another: “Dunraven they call him,--Done racin’, I call him!” Lady Dunraven was very unlike her husband in tastes and interests. I remember her as one of the most perfectly bred women I ever met, gentle, domestic, and devoted to her children.