uchess, some members selected from the various departments of the
Institute, and so making his return to the five Academies for their
courteous reception of him and for the complimentary harangue of the
President. Diplomatic society was, as usual, well represented at the
house of a lady whose husband had been Ambassador; but the Institute had
the chief place, and the arrangement of the guests showed the object
of the dinner. The Grand-Duke, seated opposite the hostess, had Madame
Astier on his right, and on his left the Countess Foder, wife of the
First Secretary of the Finnish Embassy, acting as Ambassador. On the
right of the Duchess sat Leonard Astier, and on her left Monsignor
Adriani, the Papal Nuncio. Then came successively Baron Huchenard,
representing the Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres; Mourad Bey, the
Ambassador of the Porte; Delpech the chemist, Member of the Academie des
Sciences; the Belgian Minister; Landry the musician, of the Beaux-Arts;
Danjou the dramatist, one of Picherals 'Players'; and, lastly, the
Prince d'Athis, whose twofold claims to distinction as diplomatist and
Member of the Academie des Sciences Morales et Politiques combined the
characteristics of the two sets in the circle. At the ends of the table
were the General acting as Aide-de-camp to His Highness, the young
Count Adriani, nephew of the Nuncio, and Lavaux, whose presence was
indispensable at every social gathering.

The feminine element was lacking in charm. The Countess Foder,
red-haired, small, and lively, enveloped in lace to the tip of her
little pointed nose, looked like a squirrel with a cold in its head.
Baroness Huchenard, a lady of no particular age and with a moustache,
produced the effect of a very fat old gentleman in a low dress. Madame
Astier, in a velvet dress partly open at the neck, a present from the
Duchess, had sacrificed on the altar of friendship the pleasure she
would have had in displaying her arms and shoulders, the remains of her
beauty; and thanks to this delicate attention the Duchess Padovani
looked as if she were the only woman at dinner. The Duchess is elegantly
dressed, tall and fair, with a tiny head and fine eyes of a golden hazel
colour--eyes whose shifting haughty glance, from under long dark brows
almost meeting, shows their power of expressing kindness, affection,
or anger. Her nose is short, her mouth emotional and sensitive, and her
complexion has the brilliancy of a young woman's, owing to her c