Marquise. She was violently angry and did not conceal her hatred for
the woman who had stolen her husband's affections. The Marquise was a
trifle vulgar and common in her manner of manifesting her displeasure,
but the Marquis, a very polite and affable gentleman, did not pay the
slightest attention to his wife's daily recriminations, but continued
to amuse himself with the charming Ninon.

Under such circumstances each was compelled to have a separate social
circle, the Marquis entertaining his friends with the adorable Ninon
as the center of attraction, and Madame la Marquise doing her best to
offer counter attractions. Somehow, Ninon drew around her all the most
desirable partis among the flower of the nobility and wits, leaving
the social circle managed by la Marquise to languish for want of
stamina. It was a constant source of annoyance to the Marquise to see
her rival's entertainments so much in repute and her own so poorly
attended, and she was at her wits' end to devise something that would
give them éclat. One of her methods, and an impromptu scene at one of
her drawing-rooms, will serve to show the reason why Madame la
Marquise was not in good repute and why she could not attract the
élite of Paris to her entertainments.

La Marquise was a very vain, moreover, a very ignorant woman, a
"nouvelle riche" in fact, or what might be termed in modern parlance
"shoddy," without tact, sense, or savoir faire. One day at a grand
reception, some of her guests desired to see her young son, of whom
she was very proud, and of whose talents and virtues she was always
boasting. He was sent for and came into the presence accompanied by
his tutor, an Italian savant who never left his side. From praising
his beauty of person, they passed to his mental qualities. Madame la
Marquise, enchanted at the caresses her son was receiving and aiming