than other children," and the girl's prediction was true.

Every month of the year was a pleasure to the happy children at the
Hotel de Noailles, but to both vivacious Louise and quiet Adrienne
summer was the crowning joy of their year, for then they were always
taken to visit their grandfather, the Marechal de Noailles, who
cheerfully gave himself up to making the visit as gay for the children
as possible. He played games with them in the house, delightful games
such as they never played at home, and better yet, planned wonderful
picnics for them, when with other cousins, and a governess in charge of
the cavalcade, they rode on donkeys to the appointed spot. The
governess, it is said, was a tiny person, blonde, pinched, and touchy,
and very punctilious in the performance of her duties. Once mounted on
her donkey, however, she entirely lost her dignity and appeared so
wild-eyed, scared, and stiff that one could not look at her without
feeling an irresistible desire to smile, which made her angry, though
what angered her most was the peals of laughter when she tumbled off her
donkey, as she seldom failed to do on an excursion. She usually fell on
the grass and the pace of her donkey was not rapid, so she was never
hurt, and the frolicsome children filed by her, for if one of them tried
to help her up, as Adrienne always wanted to do, a scolding was the
reward.

In sharp contrast to the happy summer visits were those paid every
autumn to the home of Madame D'Ayen's father, who lived at Fresnes. He
was old and deaf and wished the children to be so repressed, that had
Madame D'Ayen not made the visits as short as she could there would
doubtless have been some disastrous outbreak in their ranks.

For the other months of the year, life at the Hotel de Noailles was a
charmed existence for the children, especially for nature-loving
Adrienne, who spent most of her time in the beautiful garden surrounding
the house,--a garden celebrated throughout Paris for its marvellously
kept flower beds, separated by winding, box-bordered paths. A flight of
steps led from the house into this enchanting spot, and on either side
three rows of great trees shed their long shadow over the near-by walks,
while from the foot of the garden could be seen the wonderful panorama
of the Tuileries. The garden was indeed an enchanted land, and the
children played all sorts of games in its perfumed, wooded depths, only
pausing when their mother passed th