nife-thrust, which so affected Canning in a court of assize. Not one
of the women who blame the Duchess would make a declaration worthy of
ancient times. It is heroic of Mme de Langeais to proclaim herself so
frankly. Now there is nothing left to her but to love Montriveau. There
must be something great about a woman if she says, 'I will have but one
passion.'"

"But what is to become of society, monsieur, if you honour vice in this
way without respect for virtue?" asked the Comtesse de Granville, the
attorney-general's wife.

While the Chateau, the Faubourg, and the Chaussee d'Antin were
discussing the shipwreck of aristocratic virtue; while excited young men
rushed about on horseback to make sure that the carriage was standing in
the Rue de Tournon, and the Duchess in consequence was beyond a doubt in
M. de Montriveau's rooms, Mme de Langeais, with heavy throbbing pulses,
was lying hidden away in her boudoir. And Armand?--he had been out all
night, and at that moment was walking with M. de Marsay in the Gardens
of the Tuileries. The elder members, of Mme de Langeais' family were
engaged in calling upon one another, arranging to read her a homily
and to hold a consultation as to the best way of putting a stop to the
scandal.

At three o'clock, therefore, M. le Duc de Navarreins, the Vidame de
Pamiers, the old Princesse de Blamont-Chauvry, and the Duc de Grandlieu
were assembled in Mme la Duchesse de Langeais' drawing-room. To them, as
to all curious inquirers, the servants said that their mistress was not
at home; the Duchess had made no exceptions to her orders. But these
four personages shone conspicuous in that lofty sphere, of which the
revolutions and hereditary pretensions are solemnly recorded year by
year in the _Almanach de Gotha_, wherefore without some slight sketch of
each of them this picture of society were incomplete.

The Princesse de Blamont-Chauvry, in the feminine world, was a most
poetic wreck of the reign of Louis Quinze. In her beautiful prime, so it
was said, she had done her part to win for that monarch his appellation
of _le Bien-aime_. Of her past charms of feature, little remained save
a remarkably prominent slender nose, curved like a Turkish scimitar, now
the principal ornament of a countenance that put you in mind of an old
white glove. Add a few powdered curls, high-heeled pantoufles, a cap
with upstanding loops of lace, black mittens, and a decided taste for
_ombre_. But to do full j