at Rambouillet, a curtain only separated his chamber and
the levee-room. In the latter room are several portraits of the Peers of
France during the reign of Louis the Fifteenth, with those of some
Spanish Grandees.

We visited several other rooms, all of them magnificently furnished, and
all the furniture apparently of the same aera. The grand saloon appeared
to me to be the largest room I had ever seen; the floor is of white
marble, as are likewise two ranges of Corinthian pillars on each side of
the apartment. Its height, however, is not proportioned to its length, a
defect which, added to its narrowness, gives it the air of a gallery
rather than of a banquetting-room.

We had not time enough to walk over the gardens; but, from a cursory
view of them, did not much regret our loss. They appeared spacious
enough; but so divided and intersected into plots, borders, narrow and
broad walks, terraces, and flowerbeds in the shape of stars, as to
resemble any thing but what would be called a garden in England and
America. This style of gardening was introduced into France by Le Notre,
and some centuries must yet pass away before the French gardeners will
acquire a more correct taste. What would not English taste have effected
with the capabilities of Rambouillet? A park of two thousand acres in
front, and a forest of nearly thirty thousand behind--all this, in the
hands of Frenchmen, is thrown away; the park is but a meadow, and the
forest a neglected wood.

Upon our return to dinner, we found the _Cure_ of the village in rapid
conversation with Madame. The appearance of our equipage, consisting of
four horses in the coach, and three riding horses, had attracted him to
the inn; and Madame, having seen him, had invited him to join us at
dinner. He was a pleasant little man, and related to us many traditional
anecdotes of Louis the Fourteenth. This King was notoriously one of the
most gallant of the race of Capet. "Whilst resident at Rambouillet,"
said the Cure, "being one day hunting, and separated from his suite, he
fell in with two young girls, the daughters of the better kind of French
farmers. The girls were nutting in the forest, and perfectly strangers
to the King's person. Louis entered into conversation with them, and--"

The good Cure's narrative was here interrupted by dinner, much to the
disappointment of Mademoiselle St. Sillery, who entreated him to resume
his narrative upon the disappearance of the first dish.