to recite at their
entertainments. This may be a mere surmise of mine; I have no better
grounds for it than an expression of hers one day when we were
discussing London society. "Oui, les Anglais, ils sont tres aimables,
mais ils paraissent avoir peur des artistes, comme des betes sauvages,
car ils vous parquent comme elles au Jardin des Plantes." I found out
afterwards that it was a kind of grudge she bore the English for having
invariably improvised a platform or enclosure by means of silken ropes.
Certain is it that, beyond a few casual remarks at long intervals upon
London, she seemed reluctant to discuss the subject with me. Not so with
regard to Potsdam after her return whence in August, '51. In the
beginning of July of that year she told me that she had a special
engagement to appear before the court on the 13th of that month. I did
not see her until a few weeks after she came back, and then she gave me
a full account of the affair. I repeat, after the lapse of so many
years, I cannot reproduce her own words, and I could not, even half an
hour after her narrative, have reproduced the manner of her telling it;
but I can vouch for the correctness of the facts.

"About six o'clock, Raphael [her brother], who was to give me my cues,
and I arrived at Potsdam, where we were met by Schneider, who had made
the engagement with me. You know, perhaps, that Schneider had been an
actor himself, that afterwards he had been promoted to the directorship
of the Royal Opera House, and that now he is the private reader to the
king, with the title of privy or aulic councillor.

"Schneider is a very nice man, and I have never heard a German speak our
language so perfectly. Perhaps it was as well, because I dread to
contemplate what would have been the effect upon my nerves and ears of
lamentations in Teutonized French."

"Why lamentations?"? I asked.

"Ah, nous voila!" she replied. "You remember I was in mourning. The
moment I stepped out of the carriage, he exclaimed, 'But you are all in
black, mademoiselle.' 'Of course I am,' I said, 'seeing that I am in
mourning.' 'Great Heaven! what am I to do? Black is not admitted at
court on such occasions.' I believe it was the birthday of the Czarina,
but of course I was not bound to know that.

"There was no time to return to Berlin, and least of all to get a dress
from there, so Raphael and he put their heads together; the result of
which conference was my being bundled rather than h