(I) "Tell me a little about the costumes," said Monsignor, as the two set out on foot from their lodgings in Versailles after breakfast next morning, to present their letters of introduction.

"They seem to me rather fantastic, somehow." Their lodgings were situated in one of the great palaces on the vast road that runs straight from the gates of the royal palace itself into Paris.

They had come straight on by car from St.
Germains, had been received with immense respect by the proprietor, who, it appeared, had received very particular instructions from the English Cardinal; and had been conducted straight upstairs to a little suite of rooms, decorated in eighteenth-century fashion, and consisting of a couple of bedrooms for themselves, opening to a central sitting-room and oratory; the two men-servants they had brought with them were lodged immediately across the landing outside.
"Fantastic ?" asked Father Jervis, smiling.

"Don't you think they're attractive ?" "Oh yes; but----" "Remember human nature, Monsignor.

After all, it was only intense self-importance that used to make men say that they were independent of exterior beauty.