She is decorated all over with beads and bracelets and embroidered dandelions; but her principal decoration consists of the softest little gray eyes in the world, which rest upon you with a profundity of confidence—­a confidence that I really feel some compunction in betraying.  She has a tint as white as this sheet of paper, except just in the middle of each cheek, where it passes into the purest and most transparent, most liquid, carmine.  Occasionally this rosy fluid overflows into the rest of her face—­by which I mean that she blushes—­as softly as the mark of your breath on the window-pane.

Like every Anglaise, she is rather pinched and prim in public; but it is very easy to see that when no one is looking elle ne demande qu’a se laisser aller!  Whenever she wants it I am always there, and I have given her to understand that she can count upon me.  I have reason to believe that she appreciates the assurance, though I am bound in honesty to confess that with her the situation is a little less advanced than with the others. Que voulez-vous?  The English are heavy, and the Anglaises move slowly, that’s all.  The movement, however, is perceptible, and once this fact is established I can let the pottage simmer.  I can give her time to arrive, for I am over-well occupied with her concurrentes. Celles-ci don’t keep me waiting, par exemple!

These young ladies are Americans, and you know that it is the national character to move fast.  “All right—­go ahead!” (I am learning a great deal of English, or, rather, a great deal of American.) They go ahead at a rate that sometimes makes it difficult for me to keep up.  One of them is prettier than the other; but this hatter (the one that takes the private lessons) is really une file prodigieuse. Ah, par exemple, elle brule ses vais-seux cella-la!  She threw herself into my arms the very first day, and I almost owed her a grudge for having deprived me of that pleasure of gradation, of carrying the defences, one by one, which is almost as great as that of entering the place.

Would you believe that at the end of exactly twelve minutes she gave me a rendezvous?  It is true it was in the Galerie d’Apollon, at the Louvre; but that was respectable for a beginning, and since then we have had them by the dozen; I have ceased to keep the account. Non, c’est une file qui me depasse.

The little one (she has a mother somewhere, out of sight, shut up in a closet or a trunk) is a good deal prettier, and, perhaps, on that account elle y met plus de facons.  She doesn’t knock about Paris with me by the hour; she contents herself with long interviews in the petit salon, with the curtains half-drawn, beginning at about three o’clock, when every one is a la promenade.  She is admirable, this little one; a little too thin, the bones rather accentuated, but the detail, on the whole, most satisfactory.  And you can say anything to her.  She takes the trouble to appear not to understand, but her conduct, half an hour afterwards, reassures you completely—­oh, completely!