game before you, and I wish I was near enough
to hear you avail yourself of it; but I shall
have to put you at the other end of the
table."

"I'll tell you afterwards what I said."

"Oh, there'll be no need of that, la Perkenstein
herself will repeat every word of it. The
next in the faction is Madame Faulenzer, whose
husband eloped with an opera-singer, but was
forgiven. Then comes the Countess
Schnabeloffsky, wife of a former Russian minister, who
was sent to Siberia, but returned in less time
than it takes for the single journey. You may
ask Madame Perkenstein what is the first stage
to Siberia, and whether she thinks some people
get any further. She will understand if you
don't, and if you want the choicest piece of
gossip that has ever circulated, she will probably
tell it you."

"Any more?"

"Plenty more, though these form, the triumvirate
(or should it be triummulierate?) of that
faction, and it is safer confining yourself to the
leaders. However, you may allude casually to
orders of merit, because Baron Strudelwitz got
an order by promising the servant who was
always sent out with them a goodish bribe if he
would bring him one, and of course the servant
plagued his superiors till the order was duly
conferred on the baron. You may talk of
shooting, because Count Prudelwitz has a
keeper to fire at the same time as himself, and
swear that his master's shot was successful.
These two gentlemen are the great allies of the
three principal ladies, and perhaps at her next
divorce Madame Wasch-Mugdorff will marry
one of them."

Armed with this information, I descended into
the drawing-room a little before dinner-time,
and began to scrutinise the guests as they
assembled. The host himself had not made his
appearance, and I heard Lady Fitzgig apologise
for his absence to every fresh arrival. At last
the number was complete; but no Sir Hercules.
I had marked out two ladies who must, I
imagined, be the heads of the two factions, from the
grand curtseys they swept to each other, and
the overdone affability with which they entered
in conversation. I made my way to Lady
Fitzgig and stated my conjecture.

"You have guessed right," she said, and was
evidently pleased with my penetration.

"But where is Sir Hercules, to present
me?" I asked; "and which of the two is my
destined companion?"

"I will introduce you," answered the hostess.
"Sir Hercules is detained by most urgent
business. A supplement to the Journal de
Schweinfett has just come out with a most
incendiary attack on the King of Prussia, and Sir
Hercules has to write a despatch on the subject,
to be sent this evening. It is fully expected that
Prussian troops will be marched into the grand-
duchy before the day is over." All this was
conveyed in a mysterious whisper, and then Lady
Fitzgig took me up to my partner. As is
usually the case in introductions, I heard my own
name very distinctly; all I caught of hers was
Madame la Comtesse.

I was received rather stiffly, but I attributed
this to the exclusive feeling of the Schweinfett
society, and the dislike of strangers which I
believe exists in so many of the small German
capitals. The importance of these small places is
so completely cast in the shade by France and
England, that Frenchmen and Englishmen are
snubbed as the only means of protesting against
the size and prominence of their countries.
However, I was determined not to heed any such
trivial matters, and as at this moment Sir
Hercules came in very hurriedly, and handed in one of
the ladies to dinner without even looking round
him, I gave my arm, and we followed.

The place assigned me was at Lady Fitzgig's
end of the table. I could just see Sir
Hercules behind a shrubbery of leaves and
flowers, and the distant glance I had of him
showed that he was perturbed in spirit. The
lady who was by my side had noticed it also, and
she murmured sarcastically, "Sire Ercule est
distrait."

"Evidently, madame," I replied, "it seems
there is a likelihood of political disturbance."

"Ah bah! we make nothing of that here; we
are accustomed to threats of intervention every
week. And, after all, how little you English
must care for the petty quarrels of a diminutive
state like ours."

All this was said with manifest intention, and
I began to see that my guess at the reason of
the lady's stiffness was correct. So I began
some phrase about political importance being
merely relative, when I was interrupted by a
voice in my ear, and my host's own servant
said, in low tones, "Sir Hercules regrets that
his absence till the last moment prevented him
from introducing you himself to Madame la
Comtesse." Sir Hercules was looking at rne from
the end of the table while his message was
being delivered. I looked across at the rival
leader, who was seated exactly opposite, and I
confess I was puzzled.

The countess by my side noticed my perplexity,
and had caught part of the sentence.
"Sire Ercule apologises?" she asked.

"So it seems," I replied, "though I can't tell
why."

"It is very necessary. Don't you know
that it is contrary to all etiquette for a gentleman
to be presented by a lady?"

This, then, was the cause of the stiffness, and
this made Sir Hercules so distressed. Poor
old fellow! To think that he should have been
so thoroughly saturated with the etiquette of a
small German court during the twenty years of
his embassy!

"What do you say about English politics?"
asked the lady, after an embarrassing pause.

"That, madame, is a subject on which I never
talk," I said, decidedly, though I was not a
little surprised at her introduction of it. "I
will take you further afield. What do you say
to Russia?"

"Ah, you allude to the Poles, of course; I