Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 1 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/286

 play her cards. She had masters, professors, every educational advantage. They told me she was a little prodigy. She speaks French, Italian, German, better than most natives. She has a wonderful genius for music and might make her fortune as a pianist if it were not made for her otherwise. I travelled all over Europe, every one told me she was a marvel. The director of the opera in Paris saw her dance at a child's party at Spa, and offered me an enormous sum if I would give her up to him and let him have her educated for the ballet. I said 'No, I thank you, sir; she 's meant to be something better than a princesse de théâtre.' I had a passionate belief that she might marry absolutely whom she chose, that she might be a princess of the first water. I 've never given it up, and I can assure you that it has sustained me in many embarrassments. Financial, some of them; I don't mind confessing that. I 've raised money on that girl's face! I 've taken her to the Jews and bidden her put off her veil and let down her hair, show her teeth, her shoulders, her arms, all sorts of things, and asked if the mother of that young lady was n't safe! She of course was too young to understand me. And yet, as a child, you would have said she knew what was in store for her; before she could read she had the manners, the tastes, the instincts of a little queen. She would have nothing to do with shabby things or shabby people; if she stained one of her frocks she was seized with a kind of frenzy—she would tear it to pieces. At Nice, at Baden, at Brighton, wherever we stayed, she used to be sent for by all the great people to play with their children. She has played at 252