it may sometimes be, rather than to our own reserve, shyness,
formality, or under whatever other name we please to designate, and seek
to hide its unamiable synonym, pride. Vanity, always a free, is not
seldom an agreeable talker; but pride is ever laconic; while the few
words he utters are generally so constrained and dull, that you would
gladly absolve him altogether from so painful an effort as that of
opening his mouth, or forcing it to articulate. Self-love may be a large
ingredient in both pride and vanity; but the difference of comfort,
according as you have to sit down with one or the other at table, is
indeed great. For whilst pride sits stiff, guarded, and ungenial,
_radiating coldness around him_, which requires at least a bottle of
champagne and an arch coquette to disperse; vanity, on the other hand,
being a _female_, (a sort of Mrs Pride,) has her _conquests to make_,
and loves making them; and accordingly must study the ways and means of
pleasing; which makes _her_ an agreeable _voisine_ at table. As she
never doubts either her own powers to persuade, or yours to appreciate
them, her language is at once self-complacent, and full of good-will to
her neighbour; whilst the vanity of a Frenchman thus leads him to seek
popularity, it seems enough to an Englishman that he is one entitled to
justify himself, in his own eyes, for being as disagreeable as he
pleases.

On the present occasion, not to have joined in a conversation which was
general, at whatever disadvantage we might have to enter into it, would,
we felt, have been to subject ourselves to remark after dinner; so
putting off restraint, and putting on the best face we could, we began
at once to address some remarks to our neighbours. We were not aware at
the moment how far the _Anglomania_, which _began_ to prevail some seven
years ago in Paris, had spread since we left the French capital. There
it began, we remember, with certain members of the medical profession,
who had learned to give calomel in _English_ doses. The public next
lauded Warren's blacking--_Cirage national de Warren_--and then
proceeded to eat raw crumpets as an English article of luncheon. But
things had gone farther since that time than we were prepared to expect.
At the _table d'hote_ of to-day, we found every body had something civil
to say about English products; frequently for no other reason than that
they were English, it being obvious that they themselves had never seen
the