"BEAU COUSIN," she said, laughing, "none of these do I remember
personally, but you must know there has been wonderfully little
change on my natural temper from youth to age. From which it
follows, cousin, that, being even now something too young in
spirit for the years which Time has marked me in his calendar, I
was, when a girl, a little too old for those of my own standing,
and as much inclined at that period to keep the society of elder
persons, as I am now disposed to admit the company of gay young
fellows of fifty or sixty like yourself, rather than collect
about me all the octogenarians. Now, although I do not actually
come from Elfland, and therefore cannot boast any personal
knowledge of the great personages you enquire about, yet I have
seen and heard those who knew them well, and who have given me as
distinct an account of them as I could give you myself of the
Empress Queen, or Frederick of Prussia; and I will frankly add,"
said she, laughing and offering her BONBONNIERE, "that I HAVE
heard so much of the years which immediately succeeded the
Revolution, that I sometimes am apt to confuse the vivid
descriptions fixed on my memory by the frequent and animated
recitation of others, for things which I myself have actually
witnessed.
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