ce a young Secretary of
Embassy was officiating,--one of those admirably dressed and inimitably
gloved young gentlemen whom France despatches to foreign countries
as representatives of her skill in neckcloths and waistcoats, and her
incomparable superiority in lacquered leather. Monsieur de Bussenac was
a veritable type of Paris dandyism,--vain, empty, and conceited, with
considerable smartness in conversation, and unquestionable personal
courage; his life was passed in abusing England and affecting the most
ludicrous imitation of all that was English,--in dress, equipage, and
livery.

Although my name was not unknown to him, he received me with the
condescending courtesy the diplomatist usually assumes in his
intercourse with the soldier: protested his regret that the gay season
was over, that Naples was thinning every day, that he hardly knew where,
or to whom, to present me.

I assured him that pleasure was not among the ambitions of an invalid
like myself; but, next to the care of my health, one of my objects in
Naples was to press a claim upon the Spanish Government, to which
the residence of a Spanish Minister of high rank at that court gave a
favorable opportunity; and with this preface I gave a brief history of
my loss and imprisonment. The young Charge d'Affaires looked horridly
bored by my story, of which, it was clear, he only heard a very small
part; and when I concluded, he made a few notes of my statement, and
promised to see the Spanish Ambassador upon it that very day.

I believe that my experience is not a singular one; but from the moment
that I announced myself as a person claiming the aid of the "Mission,"
the doors of the Embassy were hermetically sealed against me. If I
called, "His Excellency" (everything is Excellency to an embassy porter)
was either in conference with a colleague, or replying to a despatch, or
with the court. If I wrote, my answer was always a polite acknowledgment
of my note, and no more. Even when we met passingly in the street, his
salute was cold and markedly distant; so that I began to suspect that
either he had heard something to my disadvantage among his colleagues,
or that he had received some hint respecting me.

I knew if I were to address the Duc de St. Cloud on the subject, that
my essenced friend would at once receive a check, and possibly a heavy
reprimand; but I was too proud to descend to this, and resolved to right
myself without calling in the aid of others