"Sir," was the reply, always commencing by the same word, "I am much troubled at the remembrance that His Royal Highness's appetite at supper was extremely bad. He ate only two plates of soup, one fowl, fifty heads of asparagus, and a small cherry tart."
"Ah! it must have been very bad indeed," said Mr. Philip, with a melancholy air. "He generally eats about a couple of geese and half a dozen pheasants, does he not?"[[7]]
"Sir?" said Monsieur Bontems, interrogatively. "I am happy to say, Sir, that all the members of the Royal House have tolerably good appetites; but scarcely—two geese and six pheasants!—no, Sir!"
"Yes, I have gathered that they have, from what I have heard you say," answered Philip, gravely. "Monsieur Bontems, I am anxious to inform my sister—who speaks no French—of the manner in which His Majesty is served throughout the day. I am not sure that I remember all points correctly. It is your duty, is it not, to present His Majesty's wig in the morning, and to buckle his left garter?"
"The left, Sir?" asked Monsieur Bontems, somewhat indignantly. "The right! Any of His Majesty's ordinary valets may touch the left—it is my high office to attend upon the august right leg of my most venerated Sovereign!"
"I beg your pardon a hundred thousand times!"
"You have it, Sir," said Monsieur Bontems affably. "A young gentleman who shows so much interest in His Majesty's and Monseigneur's health may be pardoned even that. But you are a little mistaken in saying 'buckle.' His Majesty is frequently pleased to clasp his own garters; it is my privilege to unclasp them in the evening."
"Would you kindly explain to me, that I may translate to my sister, His Majesty's mode of life during each day?"
"Sir, I shall have the utmost pleasure," replied Monsieur Bontems, laying his hand Upon his heart. "Madam," he continued, addressing himself to Celia, though she could understand him only through the medium of Philip, "first thing in the morning, when I rise from the watch-bed which I occupy in the august chamber of my Sovereign, having noiselessly dressed in the antechamber, I and Monsieur De St. Quentin, first gentleman of the chamber, reverently approach his royal bed, and presume to arouse our Sovereign from his slumbers. Then Monsieur De St. Quentin turns his back to the curtains, and placing his hands behind him, respectfully presents the royal wigs, properly curled and dressed, for His Majesty's selection."
"Pardon my interrupting you; I thought the King's attendants never turned their backs upon him?"