ot up rooms and a dinner in flaring style, with
wax candles, a mob of waiters, ringing of bells, and immense ceremony.
But the lady, like a real princess, while well enough pleased and very
gracious, took all this as a matter of course, and preferred her own
cook, a flat-faced, pug-nosed, yellow-breeched and almond-eyed Oriental,
with a pigtail dangling from his scalp, which was shaved clean,
excepting at the back of the head. This gentleman ran about in the
kitchen-yard with queer little brass utensils, wherein he concocted
sundry diabolical preparations--as they seemed to the English servants
to be,--of herbs, rice, curry powder, etc., etc., for the repast of his
mistress. For the next three or four days, the White Lion was in a
state bordering upon frenzy, at the singular deportment of the
"Princess" and her numerous attendants. The former arrayed herself in
the most astonishing combinations of apparel that had ever been seen by
the good gossips of Bristol, and the latter indulged in gymnastic antics
and vocal chantings that almost deafened the neighborhood. There was a
peculiar nasal ballad in which they were fond of indulging, that
commenced about midnight and kept up until well nigh morning, that drove
the neighbors almost beside themselves. It sounded like a concert by a
committee of infuriated cats, and wound up with protracted whining
notes, commencing in a whimper, and then with a sudden jerk, bursting
into a loud, monotonous howl. Yet, withal, these attendants, who slept
on mats, in the rooms adjacent to that of their mistress, and fed upon
the preparations of her own cuisine, were, in the main, very civil and
inoffensive, and seemed to look upon the Princess with the utmost awe.
The "agent," or "secretary," or "prime-minister," or whatever he might
be called, was very mysterious as to the objects, purposes, history, and
antecedents of her Highness, and the quidnuncs were in despair until,
one morning, the "Bristol Mirror," then a leading paper, came out with a
flaring announcement, expressing the pleasure it felt in acquainting the
public with the fact, that a very eminent and interesting foreign
personage had arrived from her home in the remotest East to proffer His
Majesty, George III, the unobstructed commerce and friendship of her
realm, which was as remarkable for its untold wealth as for its
marvelous beauty. The lady was described as a befitting representative
of the loveliness and opulence of this new