My heart beat when I looked at her. She had more real beauty, both
of line and expression, and more dignity than any one I had ever
seen; and I can never forget that first meeting.

These were the days of the great beauties. London worshipped
beauty like the Greeks. Photographs of the Princess of Wales, Mrs.
Langtry, Mrs. Cornwallis West, Mrs. Wheeler and Lady Dudley
[Footnote: Georgiana, Countess of Dudley.] collected crowds in
front of the shop windows. I have seen great and conventional
ladies like old Lady Cadogan and others standing on iron chairs in
the Park to see Mrs. Langtry walk past; and wherever Georgiana
Lady Dudley drove there were crowds round her carriage when it
pulled up, to see this vision of beauty, holding a large holland
umbrella over the head of her lifeless husband.

Groups of beauties like the Moncrieffes, Grahams, Conynghams, de
Moleynses, Lady Mary Mills, Lady Randolph Churchill, Mrs. Arthur
Sassoon, Lady Dalhousie, Lady March, Lady Londonderry and Lady de
Grey were to be seen in the salons of the 'eighties. There is
nothing at all like this in London to-day and I doubt if there is
any one now with enough beauty or temperament to provoke a fight
in Rotten Row between gentlemen in high society: an incident of my
youth which I was privileged to witness and which caused a
profound sensation.

Queen Alexandra had a more perfect face than any of those I have
mentioned; it is visible even now, because the oval is still
there, the frownless brows, the carriage and, above all, the grace
both of movement and of gesture which made her the idol of her
people.