rch past of the elect began, most of them being invited
either to lunch or dinner. Wilhelm found them very peculiar and
uncongenial, and, on the whole, derived but little satisfaction from
their acquaintance. Pilar had a small weakness; according to her
account, each one of her more intimate friends was a striking and
original character, the possessor of the rarest qualities. It was the
only touch of snobbishness of which one could have accused her. She
announced the arrival of an old Spanish general, "a hero of quite the
antique, classic type, one of the most remarkable figures in the
history of modern warfare," and there entered to them a little old man,
shuffling in with the flurried, dragging gait of a paralytic, unable to
lift his feet from the ground, stammering out a few commonplaces, who
could not keep his gold eyeglasses on his nose, and who, when he was
informed that Wilhelm had fought in the Franco-Prussian War, frankly
admitted that, though he had commanded at many a grand review, he had
never been in real action.

Another time a Great Thinker was to appear, a profound sage, with whom
Wilhelm would be delighted, thoroughly versed in German philosophy, a
critic of immense and independent spirit. But what Wilhelm really saw
was a slovenly, pock-marked man, with a very arrogant manner, who
smoked cigarettes without intermission, and preserved an obstinate
silence, behind which one was naturally free to imagine the profoundest
thoughts, if one wished it; and who, when Pilar tried to lead him on to
air his opinions on German philosophy, answered sententiously: "I do
not care for Kant; his was not a republican spirit." A man who was said
to be famed for his wit perpetrated such atrocious puns that even Pilar
was forced to admit after he left that he had had a surprisingly bad
day. An aristocratic member of the Jockey Club, "a truly distinguished
being"--when Pilar wished to give any one the highest praise she always
alluded to them as "a being"--"and not superficial like the most of his
class," talked for two consecutive hours of the coming elections to the
Jockey Club, and of the attempt to bring in the wearing of bracelets as
a fashion among gentlemen. The only figure in this gallery which made
anything like a favorable impression on Wilhelm was a Catalonian,
naturalized in France, a professor at a Paris lycee. He had simple,
winning manners, spoke and looked like an intelligent person, and met
Wilhelm with much