rt necessary for a
woman: it is to thoroughly understand that she must never be a
_seccatura_. A woman may be beautiful, admirable, a paragon of virtue, a
marvel of intellect; but if she be a _seccatura--addio_! Whereas, she
may be plain, small, nothing to look at in any way, and a very monster
of sins, big and little; but if she know how to amuse your dull sex, she
is mistress of you all. It is evident that this great art is not studied
at Coombe-Bysset.

* * * * *

_From the Princess di San Zenone, Coombe-Bysset, to the Lady Gwendolen
Chichester, St. Petersburg._

OH, MY DEAR GWEN,--

It is too dreadful, and I am so utterly wretched! I cannot tell you what
I feel. He is quite determined to go to Trouville by Paris at once, and
just now it is such exquisite weather. It has only rained three times
this week, and the whole place is literally a bower of roses of every
kind. He has been very restless the last few days, and at last,
yesterday, after dinner, he said straight out that he had had enough of
Coombe, and he thought we might be seen at Homburg or Trouville next
week. And he pretended to want every kind of thing that is to be bought
at Paris and nowhere else. Paris!--when we have been together just
twenty-nine days to-day! Paris!--I don't know why, but I feel as if it
would be the end of everything. Paris!--we shall dine at restaurants; we
shall stay at the Windsor; we shall go to theatres; he will be at his
club, he belongs to the Petit Cercle and the Mirliton; we shall be just
like anybody else,--just like all the million-and-one married people who
are always in a crowd. To take one's new-born happiness to an hotel! It
is as profane as it would be to say your prayers on the top of a drag.
To me, it is quite horrible. And it will be put in "Galignani" directly,
of course, that the "Prince and Princess San Zenone have arrived at the
Hotel Bristol." And then all the pretty women who tried to flirt with
him before will laugh and say, "There, you see, she has bored him
already!" Everybody will say so, for they all know I wished to spend the
whole summer at Coombe. If he would only go to his own country, I would
not say a word. I am really longing to see his people, and his palaces,
and the wonderful gardens, with their statues and their ilex woods, and
the temples that are as old as the days of Augustus, and the fire-flies,
and the magnolia-groves, and the peasants who are always sin