even had he desired it, to wipe out the memory of his predecessors, Lords Granville and Stuart de Rothesay, and above all of the charming daughters of the last-named peer—­beautiful, lovable, and artistic—­who became Lady Waterford and Lady Canning respectively.  Among the ministers I still seem to see the form of Coletti, resplendent in his Greek costume—­a true patriot and a devoted friend to France—­and then there was the Swedish Minister, Comte de Loevenhielm, a charming old gentleman, who had been page-in-waiting on Gustavus III. the night he was murdered.  The Spanish Ambassador changed with every pronunciamiento.  I do not remember the name of any one of them.

As a novelty, we had a Turkish Ambassador.  For centuries there had been none but temporary Ottoman missions.  The first permanently appointed ambassador we had, before Namick and Reschid Pashas, who both spoke French very well, was Ahmed Fethi Pasha.  He did not know a single word of our language.  I was present at a great dinner in his honour at the Tuileries, and this is what took place.  Of course he had been placed on my mother’s right hand at table, with a Foreign Office interpreter, all gold lace and decorations, on his other side.  As soon as dinner began, the pasha conceived it incumbent on him to address my mother with a fine Turkish compliment, which, judging by the way he turned up his eyes, and laid his hands on his heart, and the bows he made her, must have been adorned with every flower of Oriental poetry.  When his speech was finished, the pasha turned to the interpreter for him to translate it to my mother, and this he proceeded to do, the pasha accompanying and accentuating his remarks with more bows and grimacing and pressure of his hands to his heart.

Now, behold the translation, which the dragoman, who no doubt had perused the Bourgeois Gentilhomme, delivered to the Queen.  “Madam, I have a daughter whom I am very anxious to get into the Maison de St. Denis.  To do that I need your Majesty’s powerful support.  Your Majesty will understand my seizing this unequalled chance of making my request.”

And all the time the good pasha kept on making agitated bows, and my mother had to keep on smiling at him and returning them!

As regards the condition of things in general, it appeared pacific enough in that year of grace 1842.  The tempest in the East was almost forgotten, a breath of peace seemed to be passing over Europe, under the influence of which calm and prosperity reigned in France.  We had a magnificent army, in which my brothers took as much interest as I did in the navy.  And the head of the army was an eminent Minister of War, Marshal Soult, who, although he looked on M. Thiers as a tiresome little fidget, employed the fruits of his great experience and long service in the Ministry in bringing every branch of our land forces to perfection gradually, and in the most admirably consistent spirit.  This army was waging an incessant war in Africa under a