Over at the Madrid, too, there is picturesque dining--but with a difference. The old château lies on the edge of the Bois, an unimposing building promising little, and, so far as the building itself is concerned, fulfilling its promises. One does not go to the Madrid in winter. The rooms are small and stuffy, and poorly adapted to restaurant purposes, but during the season of al fresco dining, the Madrid is all that there is of the most modish, a gathering place for the most exclusive society folk of Paris. One drives boldly up to the château and into an archway that leads through the building and brings one out upon the edge of a big courtyard picturesquely set with fine old forest trees under which men and women are dining at little tables. Beyond the court are the stables and, though a high, thick hedge intervenes, a muffled stamping of hoofs, the jingle of silver chains, sometimes furnishes a subdued accompaniment to the music of the Tziganes, an element hardly discordant and suggesting vaguely ideas of mettled horses, of luxurious carriages, of all that goes to the self-indulgence of such diners as those beneath the trees.
Things are more tranquil here than at Armenonville--gay, sense-satisfying, artificial, wordly, but of a finer flavour. Here one finds the most aristocratic of Parisian mondaines, the clique of the Polo Club and la Boulié and Puteaux. Many nationalities are represented among the diners, but the French are in the majority and the Parisienne of the best type may be found under the great trees of Madrid. She may be no more perfectly dressed, this mondaine, than her demi-mondaine sister of Armenonville. Their frocks and hats come from the same makers, their jewels were bought at the same shop on the Rue de la Paix, the grande dame of Madrid has perhaps not so liberal a share of good looks as the lionne of Armenonville, and may be made up quite as conscientiously--for artificiality is beloved of the Parisienne, is a part of her creed--but my lady of Madrid has the something which sets her apart, the impress of race, of blood, of class. Even the veriest stranger within Parisian gates who might wander from one café to the other would realize at first impression that the two were separated by more than the green stretches of the Bois. As to which café he would prefer, that depends upon his tastes--and to some extent upon his mood. One who does not "belong" at Madrid may feel himself a lonely outsider. No one is on the outside at Armenonville save the bankrupt.