old -- Rebuffs -- Louis Napoleon's retorts
-- Mdlle. de Montijo's attempt at wit and sprightliness -- Her
iron will -- Her beauty -- Her marriage -- She takes
Marie-Antoinette for her model -- She fondly imagines that she
was born to rule -- She presumes to teach Princess Clotilde the
etiquette of courts -- The story of two detectives -- The hunts
at Compiegne -- Some of the mise en scene and _dramatis personae_
-- The shooting-parties -- Mrs. Grundy not banished, but
specially invited and drugged -- The programme of the gatherings
-- Compiegne in the season -- A story of an Englishman accommodated
for the night in one of the Imperial luggage-vans 288

CHAPTER XV.

Society during the Empire -- The series of guests at Compiegne --
The amusements -- the absence of musical taste in the Bonapartes
-- The programme on the first, second, third, and fourth days --
An anecdote of Lafontaine, the actor -- Theatrical performances
and balls -- The expenses of the same -- The theatre at Compiegne
-- The guests, male and female -- "Neck or nothing" for the
latter, uniform for the former -- The rest have to take "back
seats" -- The selection of guests among the notabilities of
Compiegne -- A mayor's troubles -- The Empress's and the
Emperor's conflicting opinions with regard to female charms --
Bassano in "hot water" -- Tactics of the demi-mondaines --
Improvement from the heraldic point of view in the Empress's
entourage -- The cocodettes -- Their dress -- Worth -- When every
pretext for a change of toilette is exhausted, the court ladies
turn themselves into ballerinas -- "Le Diable a Quatre" at
Compiegne -- The ladies appear at the ball afterwards in their
gauze skirts -- The Emperor's dictum with regard to
ballet-dancers and men's infatuation for them -- The Emperor did
not like stupid women -- The Emperor's "eye" for a handsome
woman -- The Empress does not admire the instinct -- William I.
of Prussia acts as comforter -- The hunt -- Actors, "supers," and
spectators -- "La Comtesse d'Escarbagnas" -- The Imperial
procession -- The Empress's and Emperor's unpunctuality --
Louis-Napoleon not a "well-dressed man" -- The Empress wished to
get back before dark -- The reason of this wish -- Though
unpunctual, punctual on hunt-days -- The polic