p being a young man, and was not ill pleased at having to enlarge his
waistcoats, and to show a little grey in his moustache. His errors
were forgotten: he was bien vu by the Government. He might have had
the Embassy Extraordinary to Queen Pomare; but the health of Madame la
Princesse was delicate. He paid his wife visits every morning: appeared
at her parties and her opera box, and was seen constantly with her in
public. He gave quiet little dinners still, at which Clive was present
sometimes: and had a private door and key to his apartments, which
were separated by all the dreary length of the reception-rooms from the
mirrored chamber and jonquil couch where the Princess and Betsy reposed.
When some of his London friends visited Paris he showed us these rooms
and introduced us duly to Madame la Princesse. He was as simple and as
much at home in the midst of these splendours, as in the dirty little
lodgings in Leicester Square, where he painted his own boots, and cooked
his herring over the tongs. As for Clive, he was the infant of the
house: Madame la Princesse could not resist his kind face; and Paul was
as fond of him in his way as Paul's mother in hers. Would he live at the
Hotel de Florac? There was an excellent atelier in the pavilion, with a
chamber for his servant. "No! you will be most at ease in apartments
of your own. You will have here but the society of women. I do not rise
till late: and my affairs, my board, call me away for the greater part
of the day. Thou wilt but be ennuyd to play trictrac with my old father.
My mother waits on him. My sister au second is given up entirely to
her children, who always have the pituite. Madame la Princesse is not
amusing for a young man. Come and go when thou wilt, Clive, my garcon,
my son: thy cover is laid. Wilt thou take the portraits of all the
family? Hast thou want of money? I had at thy age and almost ever since,
mon ami: but now we swim in gold, and when there is a louis in my purse,
there are ten francs for thee." To show his mother that he did not think
of the Reformed Religion, Paul did not miss going to mass with her
on Sunday. Sometimes Madame Paul went too, between whom and her
mother-in-law there could not be any liking, but there was now great
civility. They saw each other once a day: Madame Paul always paid
her visit to the Comte de Florac: and Betsy, her maid, made the old
gentleman laugh by her briskness and talk. She brought back to her
mistress the m