to Mrs. Solomon G. Isaacs of St. Louis, who is stopping at the National
with her mother and daughter. The Austrian nobleman, whose name heads
the Schweitzerhof visitors' list, for which they give him his room and
food when the latter article is not supplied to him by Mrs. Isaacs, with
whose daughter he is _épris_, came with them. He is even _plus
distingué_ than Comte Belladonna, for it is whispered he was a friend of
Crown Prince Rudolph's, and knows so much about his death that the
Emperor has requested him to live out of Austria. Mrs. Isaacs, who is a
widow, well _conservée_, would, I think, sooner than let him slip out of
the family, take him herself, but he prefers the daughter, who is an
extremely beautiful and innocent girl of seventeen. The disposal of the
dollars, of which they appear to possess millions, rests with Mrs.
Isaacs's mother, an impossible old woman, who looks as if she had
acquired the etiquette of the salon after a very thorough knowledge of
that of the kitchen. Her thirst for information is apparently
unquenchable, and I heard her ask Count Albert if he was related to a
_hofdame_ at Vienna, whose name I forget. He replied that his maternal
grandmother was a Hohenzollern and his great-uncle had married a
Hapsburg, which information so delighted Mrs. Johnson that she smacked
her lips as if she were tasting some of the sauces she used to make in
the good old days. I believe, old as she is, that she would marry Count
Albert herself if he asked her; and I am sure that _he_ would not
hesitate to do so, if he were certain the fortune was entirely hers.
{_Madame Colorado_}
Mrs. Wertzelmann has a very pretty French woman stopping at Schloss
Gessler, a Madame Colorado; she is really lovely, and has the dearest
little girl in the world. Madame Colorado knows all the people you have
met at Croixmare. On the way back to the National the Vicomte told me
she was angelic, as I can well believe; she was married to a brute of a
Chilian, who happily killed himself and left her free; she at one time
thought of taking the veil, and the Vicomte says her charities in Paris
are enormous and that the breath of scandal has never touched her name.
I feel quite drawn to her, and shall try to know her better.
{_The Schweitzerhof_}
To-night after dinner several of us went down to the Schweitzerhof to
see the fireworks and hear the music. As everybody was in the salon
waiting to see Don Carlos and his Duchesse pass through on their way to
dinner, we got splendid seats on the balcony. The night was
superb.--Your dearest Mamma.
LETTER XII
HOTEL NATIONAL, LUCERNE
28th August
DARLING ELIZABETH:
{_New People_}
The season is in full swing, and yesterday a number of new people
"descended," as the French say, at the National. First in importance
were the Prince and Princesse di Spezzia from Florence; the Maréchale de
Vichy-Pontoise; Mademoiselle Liane de Pougy of the Folies Bergère; and
Professor Chzweiczy, who has discovered the bacillus of paralysis, and
whose great scientific work "The Blot on the Brain" has been translated
into all the European languages. This morning there was an enormous
crowd on the _quai_ in front of the hotel; Blanche said she was sure a
crowned head had arrived, but I thought it was more likely that someone
had had a fit, for we could see a circle had been formed round something
or someone, people were tiptoeing and crushing one another, and I
expected a _sergent de ville_ to cry every moment, "Air! air!" as they
did in Regent Street that morning when we were coming out of Fuller's
and found the Duchesse of Rougemont's footman foaming on the pavement.
But Blanche insisted it was an emperor, and she was backed up by
Thérèse, who said it was just like the crowds she had seen in Paris when
the Czar came. We found everybody we knew sitting in the hall of the
hotel and in very bad humour, because it was awfully hot and stuffy, and
the waiters had brought all the chairs inside lest they should be broken
by the crowd. I asked the Marquise what had happened, and she said, with
a shrug, it was only Liane de Pougy taking the air under the chestnuts.
Professor Chzweiczy sat in the same spot all the afternoon reading "The
Blot on the Brain," and the letters on the cover were so big that the
Vicomte said you could distinguish them across the _quai_, but nobody
paid any attention to him.
{_Signor Stefano Crestfallen_}
The Princesse di Spezzia held quite a court in the hall, and stared at
everybody through her lorgnettes; they say she is at the head of
Florentine society and a young Italian, who has a _magasin_ on the
_quai_ Schweitzerhof, and comes to the dances at the National because
men are scarce, has begged Mr. Vanduzen to present him. But Mr. Vanduzen
refused, and Signor Stefano went off crestfallen, finding it, I daresay,
quite impossible to reconcile the selling of precious stones behind a
counter with his social ambitions.
Blanche spent the morning yesterday automobiling with the Vicomte and
the Marquise, while I remained in the verandah to rest, as we were to
drive after lunch with Sir Charles to a Schloss twenty miles away to a
garden party. Mrs. Johnson kept me company, and told me that Count
Albert had gone to the Rigi for the day with Mrs. Isaacs and Rosalie.
She said they had been presented at Berlin and Brussels, and had
intended to enjoy the same experience at Dresden last winter, as they
had letters to the Minister there, but he made some paltry objection and
she had not pressed the matter, though she added that she had written to
the Senator, to whom the Minister owed his place, and that he would
make it hot for him.
{_Shopping and Sightseeing_}
I asked her if they had been to London, and she said only for a week,
and had never had such a dull time, as they knew nobody, and her room at
the Carlton was so cold it gave her rheumatism. They did some shopping
and sight-seeing, and had gone from the Bank to Shepherd's Bush in the
Tu'penny Tube, but she preferred the Elevated in New York, because of
the scenery. However, Mrs. Johnson told me quite in confidence, that if
Count Albert didn't propose to Rosalie, they thought of going to London
next year for the season, and she asked me if I could recommend a
Countess who would run them, and she wanted to know if there was any
institution to which she could write and engage one, for she had heard
in St. Louis that poor Countesses did quite a business that way. I told
her we were not so progressive in England as in the States, and that I
did not think there was as yet any association of distressed gentlewomen
where one could hire a Countess for the London season, but that perhaps
if she wrote to the editor of one of the Society papers, I daresay he
could provide a suitable person who would get her access to the best
houses. Mrs. Johnson at once pulled a note-book out of her pocket, and
jotted down the names of two or three papers I gave her, then she looked
at me rather shrewdly, and asked what I thought would be the fee. I said
I didn't think she could do the London season the way she would want to
much under ten thousand pounds all told.
"Well," she said, "Count Albert won't cost us as much as that, and if we
secure him we shan't go to London. From what I can find out Continental
society is less expensive than English and just as good."
{_Automobile Accident_}
Blanche returned just before lunch in a great state of excitement: it
seems that in going up the hill to the De Pivarts, something went wrong
with the automobile, and it began to descend backwards at a frightful
pace; the Marquise screamed so loud that a number of people, not knowing
what was the matter, rushed into the middle of the road, and the
automobile knocked down one who happened to be the croupier at the
Kursaal, and he was so badly hurt he had to be taken to the hospital.
Just as they expected to batter down a wall at the foot of the hill, and
perish horribly, the automobile suddenly stopped; they jumped out
instantly, and it was just in time, for it at once blew up with such a
noise, that the porter at the Pension Thorvaldsen took it for the one
o'clock gun and began sounding the dinner-gong.
Blanche says that the Vicomte took it quite coolly; he declared he
always knew the automobile would end like that, and he should compel the
company in Paris to give him another, as they had guaranteed it to run
without accident for a year. The Marquise fainted, and when Blanche left
her she was in hysterics in the Pension Thorvaldsen; it all happened so
quickly, that Blanche said it was all over before she could realise the
danger. She was not even shaken.
{_Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise_}
At lunch the _maître d'hôtel_ made a mistake and put some Germans at the
table occupied by the Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise, and when she hobbled
in, leaning on her cane, and followed by Bijou, her pug, there was no
place for her to sit. She was in a towering rage, and shook her stick at
the _maître d'hôtel_, and Bijou looked as if he contemplated making his
lunch off the waiter's leg. A seat was eventually found for her at our
table, and another for Bijou, who finished his chop in the Maréchale's
lap. She glared at us several times as if she thought it was an
impertinence for us to sit at the same table with her, and she
frightened the waiters out of their wits and found fault with
everything. I am sure she is horribly old, for Sir Charles says she was
no chicken in the last year of the Empire, when her salon was the most
_suivi_ in Paris. Her _coiffure_ is jet black, and her eyebrows are bald
and pencilled in arches. She is awfully badly made up, but, as Blanche
says, it would take tons of rouge to hide the gutters on her face which
is lined like a railway-map. All her clothes are made in the fashion of
1870; she is covered at all times with jewels and wears a daguerreotype
brooch of the late Maréchal.
But, of course, she is _très grande dame_, and everyone tries to mollify
her, and they wait on her and Bijou hand and foot, and the Duchesse de
Vaudricourt, who hates her because the Maréchale asked her before the
Vicomte and Mr. Vanduzen if she remembered a certain ball at the
Tuileries in '68, calls her "Ma chère maréchale."
{_Time to Retire_}
Thérèse has rapped twice to ask if I am ready to retire, so unless she
should pull my hair out by the roots to spite me for keeping her up so
late I must say good-night.--Your dearest Mamma.
LETTER XIII
HOTEL NATIONAL, LUCERNE
30th August
DARLING ELIZABETH:
{_The Sonnenburgs_}
I never told you of the garden party at Schloss Sonnenburg the other
day, and as it will give quite another aspect of Lucerne life from that
of the National and Schloss Gessler, I will try to remember what
happened. It is rather difficult, for so much transpires in the course
of the day that I am apt to forget what I did the day before.
{_A Disagreeable Drive_}
In the first place Baroness Sonnenburg is an Englishwoman, and Sir
Charles knows her quite well. So he offered to drive us out to the
Schloss and introduce us, telling us it would be quite _comme il faut_,
and that the Sonnenburgs would be only too delighted to meet us. The
Vicomte occupied the vacant seat in the landau, and we started
immediately after lunch, for we had over twenty miles to drive. To know
what dust is you must come to Switzerland in August; the road was like
driving through sand, we were powdered with it, a nasty, white, itchy
powder, and the flies, having devoured the horses which flew along
maddened with pain, came to add their sting and buzzing to our own
sufferings from the dust. I nearly shrieked with the discomfort of it
all, and longed for my balcony at the National. The Vicomte began to
talk of love to me, but knowing the danger of such a subject I peevishly
begged him to desist, and a huge bottle-green fly, with a most
irritating buzz, having drawn blood from his cheek, the Vicomte became
as peevish as I. It seemed as if the journey would never end, which made
the thought of the return to Lucerne _épouvantable_, and we were none of
us in a good mood when a great yellow and black building, whose walls
were like a draught-board, suddenly loomed out of a forest of pine trees
on the brow of a steep cliff.
{_Warm Welcome_}
When we drove up to the front door two footmen in livery helped us out
of the carriage, and I could have cried from the nervousness that the
drive had fretted me into. However, we found a maid with brushes and
water and perfumes, and when we were at all presentable again, another
carriage drove up with Mrs. Johnson, Mrs. Isaacs and Rosalie, and their
Austrian Count. They were in as bad a temper as we were from the dust
and the flies, and I heard Mrs. Johnson say that if "Mrs. Sonnenburg
hadn't been a baroness" she would never have come. We passed down a long
hall whose walls were covered with family portraits, more than enough to
make up the twenty-four quarterings of the Sonnenburg arms. At the end
of the hall was a room into which we were shown by a footman. A
grand-looking man, who was introduced by Sir Charles as Baron
Sonnenburg, gave us the warmest welcome in English, and led us across
the room where we were presented to his wife and mother. Baroness
Sonnenburg spoke English with an accent which was not affected, for she
told us she had not been in England for over twenty years. She was one
of the Trevorleys of Devonshire, and the present baronet is her first
cousin. I doubt if she ever heard the name of Paquin, and I suppose her
clothes are made by a seamstress in Lucerne, yet there was no
disguising the gentility of her appearance and the breeding of her
manners.
{_A Pretty Custom_}
Blanche and I, who, from constant observation of the people we mix with,
are rapidly becoming Continental, curtseyed to the Dowager Baroness and
kissed the hand she held out. I think it is such a pretty custom, and
one we could adopt to advantage in England, where every trace of the
manners of the _ancien régime_ has disappeared. Such a number of people
were in the room that we did not get the chance I should have liked to
converse with our hosts, and we sauntered into an enormous octagonal
apartment, which we were told jutted sheer over the precipice on which
the Schloss is built. The view from the windows was very fine and
extensive, and it made one quite giddy to look down into the valley
which is nine hundred feet below.
There was a visitors' book here which Sir Charles was signing for us
when suddenly there were shrieks of surprise and everybody rushed to the
windows. Through a cleft of pine woods standing out against the bright
blue sky was a glittering, dazzling mass. It was the Jungfrau, Baron
Sonnenburg said, and was only seen on rare occasions, and nothing could
be more fortunate than that it should unveil its peerless loveliness
to-day of all days for the benefit of his guests.
{_An Al Fresco Repast_}
An _al fresco_ repast was served on the old battlements which have been
turned out into a _terrasse_. An awkward, blushing youth was brought up
to me by Baron Sonnenburg and presented as his son, and I was told he
was going to England in the autumn to learn English, of which he doesn't
know a word. Two rather pretty, but shockingly badly-dressed girls, were
talking to two Swiss officers, but the attitudes of all were so stilted
and forced that I am sure they were not enjoying the unusual liberty
permitted on this occasion.
The Duchesse de Vaudricourt whispered to me that they were Baroness
Sonnenburg's daughters and were considered very English. I was on the
point of asking her what she thought _I_ was, but thought better of it,
and merely said, that from the extreme diffidence they displayed, I
should have taken them for French girls whose _dot_ had not yet been
settled.
{_The Wertzelmanns_}
The Wertzelmanns came late; they brought Madame Colorado, who looked
perfectly angelic in a marvellous white crêpe de chine, and a hat that
killed you at a glance. They brought the news of the accident to the
Vicomte de Narjac's automobile, and Mrs. Wertzelmann excitedly told a
circle, who had gathered to admire her clothes and her jewels, that it
was the sensation of the season, she had never heard of anything so
dreadful. And Baron Sonnenburg, who had never seen either Blanche or the
Vicomte before, and had forgotten their names already, was told how the
Vicomte's automobile had run away and exploded, terribly mangling the
croupier at the Kursaal, blowing the Vicomte and Miss Blaine, such a
sweet English girl, to smithereens, and that the poor Marquise de Pivart
had gone mad from the shock.
{_An Amusing Story_}
Mrs. Wertzelmann dwelt on the horrible details with a tenacity there was
no shaking, and at every exclamation of pity uttered by her audience she
but made the story more graphic. The Vicomte and Blanche, who all the
while had listened quietly, unobserved by Mrs. Wertzelmann, stuffed
their mouths with handkerchiefs to keep from shrieking. But when the
Vicomte heard that a boatman had found one of his arms clinging to a
fragment of automobile in the lake, and that they were picking his
brains off the walls of the Pension Thorvaldsen, he could contain
himself no longer.
You should have seen Mrs. Wertzelmann's face when she saw Blanche and
the Vicomte bursting with laughter, and she looked about the _terrasse_
as if she expected to see the Marquise and the croupier eating ices in
Baron Sonnenburg's beach chairs; and later when we left I am sure she
wondered why we drove off in the landau with the fly-bitten horses
instead of in the automobile.
"If Maria once begins to tell a story," said Mr. Wertzelmann to me,
"there is no stopping her. I knew she would end by putting her foot into
it."
As Mrs. Wertzelmann's confusion was so great, and she volunteered no
explanation, I fancy the Sonnenburgs, who do not go into Lucerne
frequently, are wondering why the _Swiss and Nice Times_ have given no
account of the terrible automobile disaster.
Don't ask me how we got back to Lucerne, but four more pitiable-looking
objects you never would wish to see. We were utterly exhausted, and I
never made any appearance the next day till lunch.
I am glad you are having such a good time at Croixmare. Give my kind
regards to your Godmamma and my best love to Héloise. I am glad you have
been such a success; I pride myself that whether in England or in France
_l'ingénue va bien_.--Your dearest Mamma.
LETTER XIV
HOTEL NATIONAL, LUCERNE
1st September
DARLING ELIZABETH:
{_The Ball of the Season_}
The invitations are out to a _cotillon_ at Schloss Gessler on the 7th.
It is to be a grand affair, the favours are to come from the Maison Bail
at Paris, the supper and the music from the National, and the money to
pay for it all out of Mr. Wertzelmann's bank account, which it goes
without saying is a big one.
{_Count Albert's Proposal_}
Everybody seems to have been invited, and Mr. Wertzelmann told me he
intended that it should be remembered as the ball of the season. Old
Mrs. Johnson came and sat next to me on the _quai_ this morning, and
broke the news that Count Albert has proposed to Rosalie and been
accepted. She didn't seem to like it when I said I felt sorry for the
girl, because she was too good for Count Albert, who was old enough to
be her father, and I advised her to look him up and all his antecedents
at Vienna before the marriage ceremony. But she was quite satisfied that
he was a real, live Count, because the "Schweitzerhof knew all about
him." I shouldn't be surprised, however, that she takes my advice, for
she is a shrewd old woman, but just fancy anyone taking a husband on a
hotel guarantee!
A very pretty woman--a blonde, with a figure that the Venus de Milo
might envy, and dressed, oh! là là! shades of Paquin and Worth!--passed
us several times, walking up and down the _quai_. Everybody turned round
to stare at her, and everybody asked who she was, and the Princesse di
Spezzia, who was talking to Comte Belladonna, put up her lorgnettes. The
Duchesse de Vaudricourt leaned over the arm of her chair and whispered
to me:--
"Voilà la plus belle courtisane de Florence. C'est une des bijoux de M.
le Prince di Spezzia. La fameuse Vittoria Lodi!"
{_Monsieur le Prince_}
Later on the Prince di Spezzia sauntered out of the National on the arm
of the Marquis de Pivart, both dressed faultlessly as usual, _à
l'Anglais_, and they actually stopped and spoke to the _demi-mondaine_.
The Duchesse de Vaudricourt became quite excited over it, and gave me a
regular _New-York-Herald-Paris-Edition_ of Monsieur le Prince. He is
very English in appearance, but then Poole makes all his clothes, and he
could easily pass for an Englishman, which I think would please him
immensely. But why--why will these smart foreigners who affect English
fashions always wear lavender or buff-coloured French kid gloves?
Perhaps you will say, for the same reason that Englishwomen who are for
ever talking of Paris fashions wear English corsets. So under all the
artificiality of civilisation national traits come out in a pair of
gloves or a pair of stays!
The Prince looks as if he would improve on acquaintance, but I think it
distinctly rude and bad form of him to stop and talk to such a woman as
la belle Lodi within a stone's throw of his wife. The Duchesse says he
has been a _mauvais sujet_ since sixteen, when he disguised himself as a
priest and confessed dozens of people, and if it hadn't been that his
uncle was a Cardinal, he would have got into some very hot water. He
drives with the Lodi daily in the Cascine at Florence, and makes her
follow him wherever he goes. She has an apartment at the Schweitzerhof.
The Princesse doesn't seem to mind; I don't suppose it would make any
difference if she did. She is always beautifully dressed, and spends
most of her time staring at people through her lorgnettes.
{_Professor Chzweiczy_}
Poor Professor Chzweiczy (you can pronounce this name to suit yourself,
for nobody knows what it should be, and Blanche calls it Squeezey) sits
every day on the _quai_; he holds the "Blot on the Brain" close in front
of his face as if he were near-sighted. I think he must have a cast in
his eyes, for they always seem to be looking over the top of the book at
the people passing. I am sure that if it were known that he is one of
the greatest medical scientists of the day, he would be besieged like
Liane de Pougy; but nobody ever even glances at him; they have got his
name spelled wrong in the hotel visitors' list, and wedged in out of
sight between some people whose names have a globe-trotting sound and
who look like a party of Cook's "Specials."
{_Liane de Pougy_}
Liane de Pougy sits now in the garden of the National, for the crowds
nearly suffocated her on the _quai_. She is very beautiful and dresses
very quietly; you would never dream that she is as well known in Paris
as a monument or a boulevard. A young Frenchman has for the last two
days been doing his best to attract her attention by sitting near her,
and pretending to read her "L'Insaisissable." I believe that since her
arrival there are nearly as many copies of this _roman vécu_, as she
calls it, as Baedekers at the National. It is hard to say which is the
most interesting--herself or her book. I caught her looking at the old
Maréchale de Vichy-Pontoise yesterday with the most untranslatable
expression. I am not quite sure but that in spite of her triumphs she
would change places with the Maréchale if she could, and wear the old
harridan's moustache and the daguerreotype brooch of the late Maréchal
and feed Bijou and all. As it is, not a woman at the National would
dream of speaking to her, and the Maréchale would as soon think of
strangling Bijou as of sitting down at the same table as the famous
Liane.
{_A Comedy_}
Blanche has just come in to say that a Count Fosca has arrived at the
National, having automobiled all the way from Paris, and that the
Vicomte is completely _bouleversé_. She is laughing so over something
that Thérèse is telling her that I cannot write any more.
I can only catch the words, "Mrs. Johnson," "Prince di Spezzia,"
"Ascenseur," "no lights." I leave it to you to make a comedy out of the
missing links.--Your dearest Mamma.
LETTER XV
HOTEL NATIONAL, LUCERNE
3rd September
DARLING ELIZABETH:
{_A Mishap_}
It rained yesterday for the first time since we have been in Lucerne. As
I was looking at the lake which the wind had turned into an ocean with
waves mountains high, I saw Comte Belladonna soaked to the skin hurrying
along the _quai_ to the hotel. Poor little old beau! He had got himself
up as usual in spotless flannels, patent-leather boots, straw hat, and
lavender kids, and was coming from the direction of the pension where
his inamorata lives--the pretty, portionless American girl--when the
rain had overtaken him. His legs, unaccustomed to the unusual exercise
of running, seemed inclined one moment to run into the flower-beds on
the _quai_ and another to contemplate a plunge into the lake. Sheets of
water fell from the brim of his straw hat, his gloves and his boots were
irretrievably spoilt, and his flannels had that heavy, soppy look that
bathing-suits have. He was as full of water as a sponge, and I am sure
he would have been the better for a squeeze.
I called Blanche to look at him, and we both agreed that he would catch
a chill after such a wetting that would carry him off. But when we went
down to lunch we found him dry and chirpy, and paying his _devoirs_ to
the Princesse di Spezzia, as if he had made his toilet for the first
time that day.
{_A Funny Thing_}