Page:Maud, Renée - One year at the Russian court 1904-1905.djvu/187

Rh some of the ladies took it into their heads to ask the Marquis his Christian name, and each of us played at guessing it. The one who teased him the most was a young and pretty Rumanian—Madame Z… Impossible to obtain an answer; very strange, it must have been that name! The most extravagant names of saints flew about. "I know, I know," suddenly cried the young Rumanian lady in her fresh, gay voice. "His name is Joseph." And of course we all yelled out in unison, calling him Joseph. The more he protested, the more we insisted. It seemed to pain him singularly, when suddenly a defender arose. "Joseph, and why?" protested the Dutch Minister from behind his eyeglass. "He has nothing in common with him." None of the ladies dared to continue the subject.

Lord Hardinge, afterwards Viceroy of India, was then British Ambassador at Petrograd. I very much admired Lady Hardinge, who is now no more. His counsellor was Sir Cecil Spring Rice, now our Ambassador at Washington.

The Dutch Minister was a shrewd, distinguished man; he always teased me very much. He had a biting wit and did not lack brains. One day when two of the gentlemen were telling in my hearing a story to which I preferred not to listen, he said to me: "You play the ingénue's part charmingly, you ought to be in the Comédie française. I shall remember that in thirty years'