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The afternoon was pleasantly spent visiting the town hall and the remarkable china manufactories, which turn out very pretty, quaint, and artistic pottery. The evening brought to the Odéon a fashionable and most cultivated audience. I am invited to pay a return visit to this city. I shall look forward to the pleasure of lecturing here again in April.
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March 9.
Spent a most agreeable Sunday in the hospitable house of M. Fredin, the French consular agent, and his amiable and talented wife. M. Fredin was kind enough to call yesterday at the Burnet House.
As a rule, I never call on the representatives of France in my travels abroad. If I traveled as a tourist, I would; but traveling as a lecturer, I should be afraid lest the object of my visits might be misconstrued, and taken as a gentle hint to patronize me.
One day I had a good laugh with a French consul, in an English town where I came to lecture. On arriving at the hall I found a letter from this diplomatic compatriot, in which he expressed his surprise that I had not apprised him of my arrival. The next morning, before leaving the town, I called on him. He welcomed me most gracefully.
“Why did you not let me, your consul, know that you were coming?” he said to me.
“Well, Monsieur le Consul,” I replied, “suppose I wrote to you: ‘Monsieur le Consul, I shall arrive at N. on Friday,’ and suppose, now, just suppose, that you answered me, ‘Sir, I am glad to hear you will arrive here on Friday, but what on earth is that to me?’”
He saw the point at once. A Frenchman always does.