will guess the Sphynx's riddle."

"Mine? You were comparing me to a sphynx the other day."

"Yours, perhaps, Madame. Who knows? Are you the typical woman of the
ending century?"

"Why not?" asked Maria Consuelo with a sleepy look.




CHAPTER V.


There is something grand in any great assembly of animals belonging to
the same race. The very idea of an immense number of living creatures
conveys an impression not suggested by anything else. A compact herd of
fifty or sixty thousand lions would be an appalling vision, beside which
a like multitude of human beings would sink into insignificance. A drove
of wild cattle is, I think, a finer sight than a regiment of cavalry in
motion, for the cavalry is composite, half man and half horse, whereas
the cattle have the advantage of unity. But we can never see so many
animals of any species driven together into one limited space as to be
equal to a vast throng of men and women, and we conclude naturally
enough that a crowd consisting solely of our own kind is the most
imposing one conceivable.

It was scarcely light on the morning of New Year's Day when the Princess
Sant' Ilario found herself seated in one of the low tribunes on the