disgraceful, but I go to sleep at the opera, and I sit out the opera bouffe to the last minute, and enjoy it. This evening...”

He mentioned a French actress, and was going to tell something about her; but the ambassador’s wife, with playful horror, cut him short.

“Please don’t tell us about that horror.”

“All right, I won’t especially as everyone knows those horrors.”

“And we should all go to see them if it were accepted as the correct thing, like the opera,” chimed in Princess Myakaya.