We are an amiable people!
Happily, I have forgotten the Joneses and the Tottenhams, and the Courts and the Rhodes! The two "sets" who dwell in my memory—who are, I may say, somewhat linked with my own life, and of whom I have something to tell—were, as a visitor said of the fowls of Boulogne hotels—birds apart. They crossed and re-crossed under Mrs. Rowe's roof until they hooked together; and I was mixed up with them, until a tragedy and a happy event made us part company.
Now, so complicated are our treaties—offensive and defensive—that I have to refer to my note-book, where I am likely to meet any one of them, to see whether I am on speaking terms with the coming man or woman as the case may be.
I shall first introduce the Cockaynes as holding the greater "lengths" on my stage.
CHAPTER IV.
THE COCKAYNES IN PARIS.
The morning after a bevy of "the blonde daughters of Albion" have arrived in Paris, Pater—over the coffee (why is it impossible to get such coffee in England?), the delicious bread, and the exquisite butter—proceeds to expound his views of the manner in which the time of the party should be spent. So was it with the Cockaynes, an intensely British party.
"My dears," said Mr. Cockayne, "we must husband our time. To-day I propose we go, at eleven o'clock, to see the parade of the Guard in the Rue de Rivoli; from there (we shall be close at hand) we can see the Louvre; by two o'clock we will lunch in the Palais Royal. I think it's at five the band plays in the Tuileries gardens; after the band——"
"But, dear papa, we want to look at the shops!" interposes the gentle Sophonisba.