book, magnificently bound in Russia, arrived in a superb moiré case in
the hands of a groom, with an accompanying note from the Infanta
soliciting the honor, &c.

All great men have their antipathies. James I. could not look upon a
glittering sword; Roger Bacon fainted at the sight of an apple; and
blank paper fills me with melancholy.

However, I resigned myself to the decrees of fate, and scribbled, I
don't know what, in the corner, and subscribed my initials as illegible
as those of Napoleon when in a passion.

This, I flattered myself, was the end of the tragedy, but no: a few days
afterwards I received an invitation to a select gathering, in such
amiable terms that I resolved to decline it.

Talleyrand said, "Never obey your first impulse, because it is good;" I
obeyed this Machiavellian maxim, and erred!

"_Eucharis_" was being performed at the opera; the sky was filled with
ugly, threatening clouds; I sought in vain for a companion to get tight
with, and moralize over a few bottles of wine, and so for want of a
gayer occupation I went to the Marquise.

Her apartments are a perfect series of catafalques, and seem to have
been upholstered by an undertaker. The drawing-room is hung in violet
damask; the bed-rooms in black velvet; the furniture is of ebony or old
oak; crucifixes, holy-water basins, folio bibles, death's-heads and
poniards adorned the enlivening interior. Several Zurbarans, real or
false, representing monks and martyrs, hung on the walls, frightening