My First Years as a Frenchwoman, 1876-1879 | Page 2

I was a stranger and had no ties with any former government. I remember one of my first visits to a well-known Legitimist countess in the Faubourg St. Germain; I went on her reception day, a thing all young women are most particular about in Paris. I found her with a circle of ladies sitting around her, none of whom I knew. They were all very civil, only I was astonished at the way the mistress of the house mentioned my name every time she spoke to me: "Madame Waddington, etes-vous allee a l'Opera hier soir," "Madame Waddington, vous montez a cheval tous les matins, je crois," "Monsieur Waddington va tous les vendredis a l'Institut, il me semble," etc. I was rather surprised and said to W. when I got home, "How curious it is, that way of saying one's name all the time; I suppose it is an old-fashioned French custom. Madame de B. must have said 'Waddington' twenty times during my rather short visit." He was much amused. "Don't you know why? So that all the people might know who you were and not say awful things about the 'infecte gouvernement' and the Republic, 'which no gentleman could serve.'"
[Footnote 1: "W.," here and throughout this book, refers to Madame Waddington's husband, M. William Waddington.]
[Illustration: Monsieur Theirs.]
The position of the German Embassy in Paris was very difficult, and unfortunately their first ambassador after the war, Count Arnim, didn't understand (perhaps didn't care to) how difficult it was for a high-spirited nation, which until then had always ranked as a great military power, to accept her humiliation and be just to the victorious adversary. Arnim was an unfortunate appointment--not at all the man for such a delicate situation. We had known him in Rome in the old days of Pio Nono's reign, where he had a great position as Prussian minister to the Vatican. He and the Countess Arnim received a great deal, and their beautiful rooms in the Palazzo Caffarelli, on the top of the Capitol Hill (the two great statues of Castor and Pollux standing by their horses looking as if they were guarding the entrance) were a brilliant centre for all the Roman and diplomatic world. He was a thorough man of the world, could make himself charming when he chose, but he never had a pleasant manner, was curt, arrogant, with a very strong sense of his own superiority. From the first moment he came to Paris as ambassador, he put people's backs up. They never liked him, never trusted him; whenever he had an unpleasant communication to make, he exaggerated the unpleasantness, never attenuated, and there is so much in the way things are said. The French were very hard upon him when he got into trouble, and certainly his own Government was merciless to him.
One of my first small difficulties after becoming a Frenchwoman was to eliminate some of my German friends from my salon. I could not run the risk of their being treated rudely. I remember so well one night at home, before I was married, seeing two French officers not in uniform slip quietly out of the room when one of the German Embassy came in, yet ours was a neutral house. When my engagement was announced one of my great friends at the German Embassy (Count Arco) said to me: "This is the end, I suppose, of our friendship; I can never go to see you when you are the wife of a French deputy." "Oh, yes, you can still come; not quite so often, perhaps, but I can't give up my friends." However, we drifted apart without knowing why exactly. It is curious how long that hostile feeling toward Germany has lasted in France.
Every year there is a great review of the Paris garrison (thirty thousand men) by the President of the Republic, at Longchamp, on the 14th of July, the national fete--the day of the storming of the Bastile. It is a great day in Paris--one of the sights of the year--and falling in midsummer the day is generally beautiful and very warm. From early dawn all the chairs and benches along the Avenue du Bois de Boulogne are crowded with people waiting patiently for hours to see the show. There is not a seat to be had at Longchamp. Unless one arrives very early the tribunes are packed, and the President's box very crowded, as he invites the diplomatic corps and the ministers and their wives on that day. The troops are always received with much enthusiasm, particularly the artillery, dragging their light field-pieces and passing at a gallop--also the battalion of St. Cyr, the great French military school. The final charge of the cavalry is very fine. Masses of riders come thundering over the plain, the