hygiene was far preferable to any number of doctors' prescriptions. One day, however, seeing her more tired than usual, I begged her permission to present her with a few bottles of Vin Mariani, of the restorative virtues of which I had had personal experience.

"If it gives you any satisfaction," she replied, with a smile, "I accept. But you must let me, in return, send you some of our famous Tokay, which is also a restorative and, moreover, very pleasant to take."

A little while after, Count von Wolkenstein-Trosburg handed me, on behalf of the Empress, a beautiful liqueur-case containing six little bottles of Tokay; and I was talking of drinking it after my meals, like an ordinary dessert-wine, when the count said:

"Do you know that this is a very costly gift? The wine comes direct from the Emperor's estates. To give you an idea of what it is worth, I may tell you that, recently, at a sale in Frankfort, six little bottles fetched eleven thousand francs.... It stands quite alone."

I at once ceased to treat it as a common Madeira. The proprietor of the hotel, hearing of the present which I had received, offered me five thousand francs for the six bottles. I need hardly say that I refused.... I have four bottles left and am keeping them.

Towards the end of the same year, 1897, when she was staying for the second time at Biarritz, the Empress, feeling more restless and melancholy than ever, resolved to make a cruise in the Mediterranean on board her yacht Miramar. But she wished first to spend a few days in Paris.

She had engaged a suite of rooms at an hotel in the Rue Castiglione and naturally wanted to preserve the strictest incognito. Still, it was known that she was in Paris; and the protection with which I surrounded her was even more rigorous than before. She was out of doors from morning till evening, went through the streets on foot to visit the churches, monuments and museums and at four o'clock called regularly at a dairy in the Rue de Surène, where she was served with a glass of ass's milk, her favourite beverage, after which she returned to the hotel.

One day, however, we had a great alarm; at seven o'clock she was not yet back. I anxiously sent to her sisters, the Queen of Naples and the Countess of Trani, to whom she occasionally paid surprise visits. She was not there. To crown all, she had succeeded in eluding the vigilance of the inspector who was charged to follow her at a certain distance. We had lost the Empress in the midst of Paris! Picture our mortal anxiety!

I was about to set out myself in search of her, when suddenly we saw her very calmly appearing.

"I have been gazing at Notre Dame by moonlight," she said. "It was lovely. And I came back on foot along the quays. I went among the crowd and nobody took the least notice of me."

I remember that her Greek reader, at that time Mr. Barker, and her secretary, Dr. Kromar, expressed a wish to see something of the picturesque and characteristic side of Paris; and I took them one evening to the central markets. When we had finished our visit, I invited them, in accordance with the traditional habit, to come and have a plate of soupe à l'oignon in one of the little common eating-houses in the neighbourhood. Delighted with this modest banquet, they described their outing to the Empress next day and sang the praises of our famous national broth, which she had never tasted.

"M. Paoli," she said enthusiastically, "I must know what soupe à l'oignon is like. Mr. Barker has given me a most tantalising description."

"Nothing is easier. I will tell the people of the hotel to make you some."

"Never! They will send me up a carefully-prepared soup which won't taste in the least like yours. And I must have it served in the identical crockery. I want all the local colour."

Here I must make a confession: as I had it at heart (it was a question of patriotism, nothing less) that the Empress should not be disappointed, I thought it more prudent to apply to the manager of the hotel, who, kindly lending himself to my innocent fraud, prepared the onion soup and sent to the nearest bazaar for a plate and soup-tureen of the "local colour" in which the imperial traveller took so great an interest. The illusion was perfect. The Empress thought the soup excellent and the crockery delightfully picturesque; true, we had chipped it about a little!

The Empress's only visit to Paris was a short one. As I have said, she had decided that year to air her melancholy on the blue waters of the Mediterranean. The projected cruise embraced a number of calls at different harbours along the Côte d'Azur; and she asked me to accompany her.

We left Paris on the 30th of December for Marseilles, where the imperial yacht lay waiting for us, commanded by a very distinguished officer, Captain Moritz Sacks von Bellenau; and we were at sea, opposite the tragic Château d'If, on the 1st of January of the year 1898, which was to prove so tragic to Elizabeth of Austria. I offered her my wishes for happiness and a long life. The Empress seemed to me sadder and more thoughtful that morning than usual:

"I wish you also," she said, "health and happiness for you and yours." And she added, with an expression of infinite bitterness, "As for myself, I have no confidence left in the future."

Had she already received a presentiment of what the year held in store for her? Who can tell?

She gave us but little of her society during this voyage. She spent her days on deck, and interested herself in the silent activity, in the humble, poetic life of the crew. The sailors entertained a sort of veneration for her. They were constantly feeling the effects of her discreet and delicate kindness. Like ourselves, they respected her melancholy and her love of solitude. And, in the evenings, while the little court collected in the saloon and amused themselves with different games, or else improvised a charming concert; while, at the other end of the ship, the sailors, seated under the poop, sang their Tyrolean or Hungarian songs to an accordion accompaniment, the Empress, all alone on deck, with her eyes staring into the distance, would dream of the stars.

After leaving Marseilles, we went to Villafranca, near Nice, skirting the coast. The Empress also wished to stop at Cannes and to see once more, from the sea, Monaco, Cap Martin and Mentone. She next proposed to revisit Sicily, Greece, and Corfu: it was as though she felt a secret desire to make a sort of pilgrimage to all the ephemeral landmarks which her sad soul had visited in the course of her wandering life.

However enjoyable this cruise might be to me, I had to think of abandoning it. My service with the Empress ended automatically as soon as she had left French waters.

"Stay on, nevertheless," she said kindly. "You shall be my guest; and I will show you my beautiful palace in Corfu."

But my duties, unfortunately, summoned me elsewhere. I had to return to Nice, to receive the King and Queen of Saxony, who were expected there. It was decided, therefore, that I should leave the Miramar at San Remo. When the yacht dropped her anchor outside the little Italian town, I said good-bye to the Empress and my charming travelling-companions.

"It will not be for long, for I shall come back to France," said Elizabeth.

She leant over the bulwarks, as the yacht's launch took me on shore, and I watched her delicate and careworn features, first outlined against the disc of the setting sun and then merging, little by little, in the distance and the darkness.

4.

Seven months