The royal visit over, our borrowed plumes were returned.  Hardly was the apartment bare again when there came a court lackey telling our bewildered valet that the “Crown Prince would be at the house in a short moment.”  Our colleagues most amiably sent the rugs, etc., down again, and we sat in state and waited.

The Prince came, bringing a large photograph of himself, and said many nice things, expressing his sorrow that we were going to leave Stockholm, and bade us good-by.

The time was gradually approaching when I should put on my hat to depart.

There were still a lot of things to be attended to at the last moment.  Our people had to be bid good-by and paid, and thousands of trifles, as you may imagine, to be thought of, and I began to despair of getting away.  I seriously proposed to J. to pretend to leave, bidding people good-by at the station, and stop at the first place, to return the next morning and finish quietly what seemed so impossible to do then.

What was our dismay, then, at receiving a telephone message from Prince Carl, asking if I could receive him.  Of course, I answered I would be proud, and our colleagues above, learning of this new complication, sent, without begging, the useful and ornamental things which had adorned our salon before.

Prince Carl came.  He brought me a little bunch of lilies-of-the-valley, intending a gentle allusion to my name.  We were very sad at the idea that we were to part, but part we must, and pretty soon.  The tired rugs were taken back once more.

Prince Eugen kindly telephoned that he wished to say good-by.  It was already so late that there was no question of the rugs, for it was within an hour of our departure; therefore we were obliged to receive the Prince without any accessories.  He came with a little offering of flowers.  However, that did not make any difference, because we all stood up.  It is the custom here in Stockholm that every one goes to the station to speed the parting guest.  The station was overcrowded.  We were showered with the good wishes of two hundred and fifty people, and flowers were in such quantities that we had to have an extra compartment for them.

[Illustration:  A LETTER IN ENGLISH FROM KING OSCAR]

PARIS, 1897-1902

PARIS, May, 1897.

Dear L.,—­I can hardly believe that we have been here a month.  The time has slipped by, as it has a way of doing when one is frightfully busy; in my case it was particularly exasperating.

Johan’s secretary took rooms for us at the Hotel Chatham, which was not a very good choice, as you will see.

The day for Johan to present his lettres de creance was fixed for the 20th of April.  M. Crozier, the gentleman who introduces Ambassadors and Ministers to the President, appeared with two landaus, escorted by a detachment of the Garde Nationale.