ses we set out on a house hunt.
We had not gone far when our search was rewarded by a veritable find.
This was on the Avenue de Courcelles, not far from the Pare Monceau;
newly furnished; reasonable charges; the lady manager a beautiful
well-mannered woman, half Scotch and half French.

We moved in. When dinner was called the boarders assembled in the very
elegant drawing-room. Madame presented us to Baron ----. Then followed
introductions to Madame la Duchesse and Madame la Princesse and Madame
la Comtesse. Then the folding doors opened and dinner was announced.

The baron sat at the center of the table. The meal consisted of eight or
ten courses, served as if at a private house, and of surpassing quality.
During the three months that we remained there was no evidence of a
boarding house. It appeared an aristocratic family into which we had
been hospitably admitted. The baron was a delightful person. Madame la
Duchesse was the mother of Madame la Princesse, and both were charming.
The Comtesse, the Napoleonic widow, was at first a little formal,
but she came round after we had got acquainted, and, when we took our
departure, it was like leaving a veritable domestic circle.

Years after we had the sequel. The baron, a poor young nobleman, had
come into a little money. He thought to make it breed. He had an equally
poor Scotch cousin, who undertook to play hostess. Both the Duchess and
the Countess were his kinswomen. How could such a menage last?

He lost his all. What became of our fellow-lodgers I never learned,
but the venture coming to naught, the last I heard of the beautiful
high-bred lady manager, she was serving as a stewardess on an ocean
liner. Nothing, however, could exceed the luxury, the felicity and
the good company of those memorable three months _chez l'Avenue de
Courcelles, Pare Monceau_.

We never tried a _pension_ again. We chose a delightful hotel in the
Rue de Castiglione off the Rue de Rivoli, and remained there as fixtures
until we were reckoned the oldest inhabitants. But we never deserted
the dear old Boeuf a la Mode, which we lived to see one of the most
flourishing and popular places in Paris.

II

In the old days there was a little hotel on the Rue Dannou, midway
between the Rue de la Paix and what later along became the Avenue de
l'Opera, called the Hotel d'Orient. It was conducted by a certain Madame
Hougenin, whose family had held the lease for more than a hundred years,
and