The Vicomte Bornier opened the proceedings by reading his address to the beautiful ladies, with his cocked hat under his arm and his mother-of-pearl sword at his side, and I am afraid it did not appeal to me as a very serious business. It was too suggestive of an afternoon tea. There was too much patting of kid-gloved hands, and too many women altogether. It was a little like Bunthorne and the twenty maidens. If the little theatre had been crowded with men eager to hear what this new light in literature had to say, it might have been impressive, but the sight of forty distinguished men sitting apart and calling themselves fine names, and surrounded by women who believed they were what they called themselves, had its humorous side. I could not make out what the speech was about, because the French was too good; but it was eminently characteristic and interesting to find that both Bornier and D'Haussonville made their most successful points when they paid compliments to the ladies present, or to womenkind in general, or when they called for revenge on Germany. I thought it curious that even in a eulogy on a dead man, and in an address of welcome to a live one, each Frenchman could manage to introduce at least three references of Alsace-Lorraine, and to bow and make pretty speeches to the ladies in the audience.
[Illustration: "THE MAN THAT BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO"]
There is a peculiarity about this second address which is worth noting. It concerns itself with the virtues of the incoming member, and as he is generally puffed up with honor, the address is always put into the hands of one whose duty it is to severely criticise and undervalue him and his words. It is a curious idea to belittle the man whom you have just honored, but it is the custom, and as both speeches are submitted to a committee before they are read, there is no very hard feeling. It is only in the address read after a member's death that he is eulogized, and then it does not do him very much good. On the occasion of Pierre Loti's admission to the Academy he, instead of eulogizing the man whose place he had taken, lauded his own methods and style of composition so greatly that when the second member arose he prefaced his remarks by suggesting that "M. Loti has said so much for himself that he has left me nothing to add."