at the point they had all reached together, Mrs. Verver was definitely and by general acclamation in charge of the “social relations” of the family, literally of those of the two households; as to her genius for representing which in the great world and in the grand style vivid evidence had more and more accumulated.  It had been established in the two households at an early stage, and with the highest good-humour, that Charlotte was a, was the, “social success,” whereas the Princess, though kind, though punctilious, though charming, though in fact the dearest little creature in the world and the Princess into the bargain, was distinctly not, would distinctly never be, and might as well, practically, give it up:  whether through being above it or below it, too much outside of it or too much lost in it, too unequipped or too indisposed, didn’t especially matter.  What sufficed was that the whole thing, call it appetite or call it patience, the act of representation at large and the daily business of intercourse, fell in with Charlotte’s tested facility and, not much less visibly, with her accommodating, her generous, view of her domestic use.  She had come, frankly, into the connection, to do and to be what she could, “no questions asked,” and she had taken over, accordingly, as it stood, and in the finest practical spirit, the burden of a visiting-list that Maggie, originally, left to herself, and left even more to the Principino, had suffered to get inordinately out of hand.

She had in a word not only mounted, cheerfully, the London treadmill—­she had handsomely professed herself, for the further comfort of the three others, sustained in the effort by a “frivolous side,” if that were not too harsh a name for a pleasant constitutional curiosity.  There were possibilities of dulness, ponderosities of practice, arid social sands, the bad quarters-of-an-hour that turned up like false pieces in a debased currency, of which she made, on principle, very nearly as light as if she had not been clever enough to distinguish.  The Prince had, on this score, paid her his compliment soon after her return from her wedding-tour in America, where, by all accounts, she had wondrously borne the brunt; facing brightly, at her husband’s side, everything that came up—­and what had come, often, was beyond words:  just as, precisely, with her own interest only at stake, she had thrown up the game during the visit paid before her marriage.  The discussion of the American world, the comparison of notes, impressions and adventures, had been all at hand, as a ground of meeting for Mrs. Verver and her husband’s son-in-law, from the hour of the reunion of the two couples.  Thus it had been, in short, that Charlotte could, for her friend’s appreciation, so promptly make her point; even using expressions from which he let her see, at the hour, that he drew amusement of his own.  “What could be more simple than one’s going through with everything,” she had asked, “when it’s so plain a part