The things we do!

He might have had the Embassy Extraordinary to Queen Pomare;
but the health of Madame la Princesse was delicate. He paid his wife
visits every morning: appeared at her parties and her opera box, and was
seen constantly with her in public. He gave quiet little dinners still,
at which Clive was present sometimes: and had a private door and key to
his apartments, which were separated by all the dreary length of the
reception-rooms from the mirrored chamber and jonquil couch where the
Princess and Betsy reposed. When some of his London friends visited Paris
he showed us these rooms and introduced us duly to Madame la Princesse.
He was as simple and as much at home in the midst of these splendours, as
in the dirty little lodgings in Leicester Square, where he painted his
own boots, and cooked his herring over the tongs. As for Clive, he was
the infant of the house: Madame la Princesse could not resist his kind
face; and Paul was as fond of him in his way as Paul's mother in hers.


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