girls, who had a large
acquaintance in Paris, and took great pride and pleasure in introducing
to it their only brother. We were not only invited to our embassy and on
visiting terms with all the English Colony (that colony whose annals at
that period are written in _The Adventures of Philip_, and to which
Thackeray's mother and nearest relatives, like ourselves, belonged), but
we were, in virtue of some American connections, admitted to the
American embassy on the footing of semi-Americans.

We enjoyed our American friends greatly. I formed the opinion then,
which I retain now, that cultivated Americans, the top-skimming of the
social cream, are some of the most charming people to be met with in
cultivated society. To all that constitutes "nice people" everywhere
they join a _soupcon_ of wild flavor which gives them individuality.
They are to society what their own wild turkeys and canvasbacks are to
the _menu_.

One of my sisters, Amy, the eldest, had been ill that winter, and was
not equal to joining in the gayeties that the others enjoyed. Her
principal amusement was walking in the Gardens of Monceaux, a private
domain of King Louis Philippe in the Batignolles, a quiet, humdrum spot,
where she could set her foot upon green turf and gravel. The streets of
Paris, the Boulevards, and the Champs Elysees were too attractive to a
pleasure-seeker like myself to allow me to content myself with the pale
attractions of Monceaux, but I went there with my sister once or twice,
because French etiquette forbade her walking even in these quiet
garden-paths alone.

One day it was proposed by her that we should go again. I could not, in
common humanity, refuse, and so consented. Poor Amy "put on her things,"
as our girls called it, and we descended to the porte-cochere, intending
to engage the first passing citadine. As we stepped into the street,
however, a gay carriage with high-stepping gray horses, a chasseur with
knife and feathers, and a coachman in a modest livery on a hammer-cloth
resplendent with yellow fringes and embroideries, drew up at our door: a
pretty hand was laid upon the portiere and a voice cried, "Amy! Amy! I
was coming for you."

"My brother--Miss Leare," said Amy.

Miss Leare bowed to me gracefully and motioned to her chasseur to open
the carriage-door. "Get in," she said. "_I_ have the carriage for two
hours: what shall we do with it? Mamma is at the dentist's.--Amy, I
thought you would enjoy a drive,