CHAPTER IX.
THE PAINTED BIT.
Baden was at its brightest.

The Victoria, the Badischer Hof, the Stephanie Bauer were crowded.

The Kurliste had a dazzling string of names.

Imperial grandeur sauntered in slippers; chiefs, used to be saluted with "Ave Caesar Imperator," smoked a papelito in peace over "Galignani." Emperors gave a good-day to ministers who made their thrones beds of thorns, and little kings elbowed great capitalists who could have bought them all up in a morning's work in the money market.
Statecraft was in its slippers and diplomacy in its dressing-gown.
Statesmen who had just been outwitting each other at the hazard of European politics laughed good-humoredly as they laid their gold down on the color.

Rivals who had lately been quarreling over the knotty points of national frontiers now only vied for a twenty-franc rosebud from the bouquetiere.