Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/24

 little paper box made for it, and had it ticketed with the day of the month and my age.

"Just before the French revolution broke out, the ambassador from Paris to the English Court was the Comte d’Adhémar. That nobleman had some influence on my fate as far as regarded my wish to go abroad, which, however, I was not able to gratify until many years afterwards. I was but seven or eight years old when I saw him; and when he came by invitation to pay a visit to my papa at Chevening, there was such a fuss with the fine footmen with feathers, in their hats, and the count’s bows and French manners, and I know not what, that, a short time afterwards, when I was sent to Hastings with the governess and my sisters, nothing would satisfy me but I must go and see what sort of a place France was. So I got into a boat one day unobserved, that was floating close to the beach, let loose the rope myself, and off I went. Yes, doctor, I literally pushed a boat off, and meant to go, as I thought, to France. Did you ever hear of such a mad scheme?

"But I was tired of all those around me, who, to all my questions, invariably answered, 'My dear, that is not proper for you to know,—or, you must not talk about such things until you get older; and the like. So I held my tongue, but I made up for it, by treasuring up everything I heard and saw. Isn’t it extraordinary