weather approached they opened both the wings of their house-door,
it was because they thought it would entertain them and not because
they were conscious of a pressure. Alfred Bonnycastle all winter
indeed chafed a little at the definiteness of some of his wife's
reserves; it struck him that for Washington their society was really
a little too good. Vogelstein still remembered the puzzled feeling-
-it had cleared up somewhat now--with which, more than a year
before, he had heard Mr. Bonnycastle exclaim one evening, after a
dinner in his own house, when every guest but the German secretary
(who often sat late with the pair) had departed Hang it, there's
only a month left; let us be vulgar and have some fun--let us invite
the President."

This was Mrs. Bonnycastle's carnival, and on the occasion to which I
began my chapter by referring the President had not only been
invited but had signified his intention of being present. I hasten
to add that this was not the same august ruler to whom Alfred
Bonnycastle's irreverent allusion had been made. The White House
had received a new tenant--the old one was then just leaving it--and
Count Otto had had the advantage, during the first eighteen months
of his stay in America, of seeing an electoral campaign, a
presidential inauguration and a distribution of spoils. He had been
bewildered during those first weeks by finding that at the national
capital in the houses he supposed to be the best, the head of the
State was not a coveted guest; for this could be the only
explanation of Mr. Bonnycastle's whimsical suggestion of their
inviting him, as it were, in carnival. His successor went out a
good deal for a President.

The legislative session was over, but this made little difference in