him an alien in a land whose denizens differ from him in language,
temperament, dress, food, manners, and customs.

Of a former visit to Versailles we had retained little more than the
usual tourist's recollection of a hurried run through a palace of
fatiguing magnificence, a confusing peep at the Trianons, a glance
around the gorgeous state equipages, an unsatisfactory meal at one of
the open-air _cafés_, and a scamper back to Paris. But our winter
residence in the quaint old town revealed to us the existence of a life
that is all its own--a life widely variant, in its calm repose, from the
bustle and gaiety of the capital, but one that is replete with charm,
and abounding in picturesque-interest.

[Illustration: Automoblesse Oblige]

Versailles is not ancient; it is old, completely old. Since the fall of
the Second Empire it has stood still. Most of the clocks have run down,
as though they realised the futility of trying to keep pace with the
rest of the world. The future merges into the present, the present fades
into the past, and still the clocks of Versailles point to the same long
eventide.

[Illustration: Sable Garb]

The proximity of Paris is evinced only by the vividly tinted automobiles
that make Versailles their goal. Even they rarely tarry in the old town,
but, turning at the Château gates, lose no time in retracing their
impetuous flight towards a city whose usages accord better with their
creed of feverish hurry-scurry than do the conventions of reposeful
Versailles. And these fiery chariots of modernity, with their ghoulish,