reputation in Paris. "The explanation of certain words added from time
to time to your beautiful language would make a magnificent history.
_Organize_, for instance, is the word of the Empire, and sums up
Napoleon completely."

"But all that does not explain what is meant by a lady!" the young
Pole exclaimed, with some impatience.

"Well, I will tell you," said Emile Blondet to Count Adam. "One fine
morning you go for a saunter in Paris. It is past two, but five has
not yet struck. You see a woman coming towards you; your first glance
at her is like the preface to a good book, it leads you to expect a
world of elegance and refinement. Like a botanist over hill and dale
in his pursuit of plants, among the vulgarities of Paris life you have
at last found a rare flower. This woman is attended by two very
distinguished-looking men, of whom one, at any rate, wears an order;
or else a servant out of livery follows her at a distance of ten
yards. She displays no gaudy colors, no open-worked stockings, no
over-elaborate waist-buckle, no embroidered frills to her drawers
fussing round her ankles. You will see that she is shod with prunella
shoes, with sandals crossed over extremely fine cotton stockings, or
plain gray silk stockings; or perhaps she wears boots of the most
exquisite simplicity. You notice that her gown is made of a neat and
inexpensive material, but made in a way that surprises more than one
woman of the middle class; it is almost always a long pelisse, with
bows to fasten it, and neatly bound with fine cord or an imperceptible
braid. The Unknown has a way of her own in wrapping herself in her
shawl or mantilla; she knows how to draw it round her from her hips to
her neck, outlining a carapace, as it were, which would make an
ordinary woman look like a turtle, but which in her sets off the most