and thought that he might enable me to see things which otherwise
I should not see.

As it chanced he knew about me through some of my Devonshire
neighbours who were friends of his, and did ask me to dinner on
the following night. I accepted and found myself one of a
considerable party, some of them distinguished English people who
wore Orders, as is customary when one dines with the
representative of our Sovereign. Seeing these, and this shows
that in the best of us vanity is only latent, for the first time
in my life I was sorry that I had none and was only plain Mr.
Arbuthnot who, as Sir Alfred explained to me politely, must go in
to dinner last, because all the rest had titles, and without even
a lady as there was not one to spare.

Nor was my lot bettered when I got there, as I found myself
seated between an Italian countess and a Russian prince, neither
of whom could talk English, while, alas, I knew no foreign
language, not even French in which they addressed me, seeming
surprised that I did not understand them. I was humiliated at my
own ignorance, although in fact I was not ignorant, only my
education had been classical. Indeed I was a good classic and had
kept up my knowledge more or less, especially since I became an
idle man. In my confusion it occurred to me that the Italian
countess might know Latin from which her own language was
derived, and addressed her in that tongue. She stared, and Sir
Alfred, who was not far off and overheard me (he also knew
Latin), burst into laughter and proceeded to explain the joke in
a loud voice, first in French and then in English, to the
assembled company, who all became infected with merriment and