On our arrival at Mons, I was lodged in his house, and found there the Countess his wife, and a Court consisting of eighty or a hundred ladies of the city and country.  My reception was rather that of their sovereign lady than of a foreign princess.  The Flemish ladies are naturally lively, affable, and engaging.  The Comtesse de Lalain is remarkably so, and is, moreover, a woman of great sense and elevation of mind, in which particular, as well as in air and countenance, she carries a striking resemblance to the lady your cousin.  We became immediately intimate, and commenced a firm friendship at our first meeting.  When the supper hour came, we sat down to a banquet, which was succeeded by a ball; and this rule the Count observed as long as I stayed at Mons, which was, indeed, longer than I intended.  It had been my intention to stay at Mons one night only, but the Count’s obliging lady prevailed on me to pass a whole week there.  I strove to excuse myself from so long a stay, imagining it might be inconvenient to them; but whatever I could say availed nothing with the Count and his lady, and I was under the necessity of remaining with them eight days.  The Countess and I were on so familiar a footing that she stayed in my bedchamber till a late hour, and would not have left me then had she not imposed upon herself a task very rarely performed by persons of her rank, which, however, placed the goodness of her disposition in the most amiable light.  In fact, she gave suck to her infant son; and one day at table, sitting next me, whose whole attention was absorbed in the promotion of my brother’s interest,—­the table being the place where, according to the custom of the country, all are familiar and ceremony is laid aside,—­she, dressed out in the richest manner and blazing with diamonds, gave the breast to her child without rising from her seat, the infant being brought to the table as superbly habited as its nurse, the mother.  She performed this maternal duty with so much good humour, and with a gracefulness peculiar to herself, that this charitable office—­which would have appeared disgusting and been considered as an affront if done by some others of equal rank—­gave pleasure to all who sat at table, and, accordingly, they signified their approbation by their applause.

The tables being removed, the dances commenced in the same room wherein we had supped, which was magnificent and large.  The Countess and I sitting side by side, I expressed the pleasure I received from her conversation, and that I should place this meeting amongst the happiest events of my life.  “Indeed,” said I, “I shall have cause to regret that it ever did take place, as I shall depart hence so unwillingly, there being so little probability, of our meeting again soon.  Why did Heaven deny, our being born in the same country!”