“Lives in chambers!” exclaimed an American lady, during an after-dinner conversation in a pleasant eastern home. “I thought he owned a lovely palace.”
“Indeed; where, madam?” I asked, “in Utopia?”
“No, sir; on the banks of your Thames river. A little English friend of mine told me so, and described the furnishing of it. I understand that it is as splendid as Claude Melnotte’s by the Lake of Como.”
“I don’t know what you mean; but, if what she says is true, it is wickeder, any way. You do not say that it is all false about his banquets to the aristocracy, his royal receptions? What about the Prince of Wales, then, and Lord Beaconsfield and Mr. Gladstone and the Poet Laureate visiting him? And his garden parties and the illuminations at night, parterres of flowers mixed up with colored lamps, his collections of rhododendrons and his military bands?”
“Were you ever at a Botanical _Fête_ in Regent’s Park?” I asked.
“Your little English friend evidently knows the Botanical well.”
“She is acquainted with everything and everybody in London. I wish she were here now. Perhaps she knows a little more than some of Mr. Irving’s friends care to admit.”
“One comes from home to hear news. Will you not tell us all about it, then?”
“No, I will not. I think you are positively rude; but that is like you English. There, I beg your pardon; you made me say it. But, seriously now, is not Mr. Irving as rich as—”
“No; Cr[oe]sus, or Vanderbilt, or Mackay? And does he not live in that palace, and have crowds of servants, and visit with the court and the aristocracy? Why, I read in the papers myself, quite lately, of an estate he had bought near, let me see,—is there such a place as Hammersmith?”
“Well, then, is that true? More or less, I suppose. You are thinking how inquisitive I am. But you started the subject.”
“Ah!” she said, laughing merrily, “now I know my little English friend spoke the truth, because I remember she said there was a mystery about Mr. Irving’s lovely house; that he only receives a certain princely and lordly set there. How could she have described it if she had not seen it? A baronial castle, a park, lovely gardens, great dogs lying about on the lawns, wainscoted chambers, a library full of scarce books and costly _bric-à-brac_, Oriental rugs, baths, stained-glass windows, suits of armor, and a powerful bell in a turret to call the servants in to meals.”