erm applied by any Englishman of whatever
rank to a member of the royal family. Our committees, when princes
visit America, usually address them in notes as "Your Royal Highness."
But "Your Royal Highness" is not a vocative: it can be used only
in the third person. However, the princes are then in America, and
perhaps we are under no obligation to know everything of their ways at
home. Should the reader ever meet a prince in that prince's country,
I should advise him to do just as other people do there. He will
probably question, and not unreasonably, if he should accept the
implied inferiority; but the best of all principles for extempore
action is to do what seems the usual thing, unless we have previously
decided from mature consideration to do the unusual thing. It is not
the prince's fault that he is a prince: he means to be civil to you,
and you can do no good by making him and yourself uncomfortable.
Indeed, a truculent person does not succeed in asserting his equality.
The prince has been so long in that kind of life that he probably has
thought through the mistake under which the republican stranger is
laboring, and considers him a goose. Moreover, an American may reflect
that he will probably have very little in life to do with princes, and
that his interview with a prince has been an "experience." It would be
about as foolish to assert one's dignity with the Mammoth Cave or the
Matterhorn.

Besides these balls and concerts there are yet the queen's and prince
of Wales's breakfasts or garden-parties, which come off about 3
P.M. These are the most exclusive and unattainable of all the court
entertainments. There are two or three of these in a season, and out
of all London society only a couple of hundred are invited. There are
certain persons who are always invited, and others who are eligible
and are invited occasionally. A large part of the diplomatic corps
are always present. Each ambassador or minister, with one or two
secretaries of legation, is invariably among the guests; but a queen's
breakfast is the highest point which a secretary of legation can
touch. No secretary ever dines with the queen: the minister himself
only goes once a year, and he "not without shedding of blood."

The dress worn by gentlemen at these breakfasts is a curious one, and
anything but pretty: it consists of a dress-coat and light trousers.
The dress which our diplomatic representatives are now compelled to
wear at the other co