Note 334 — MEMOIR (continued 8)

Alexis was a clair-voyant who created some sensation in London about fifty years ago. One evening at Lansdowne House he was reading people’s thoughts and describing their houses from the lines in their hands, and a few leading questions. The old Marquess asked my mother to let Alexis read her thoughts, and, I suppose, impressed by her grand air and statuesque beauty, imagining that she would think about some great hero of ancient days, he said, after careful inspection of her hand, ‘Madame vous pensez a Jules Cesar.’ She shook her head and told him to try again. His next guess was Alexander the Great. She smiled and said, ‘Non, Monsieur, je pensais a mon fidèle domestique nègre, Hassan.’ He then described her house as something akin to Lansdowne House—vast rooms, splendid pictures, etc. She laughed and told him she lived in ‘une maison fort modeste et tant soi peu bourgeois,’ which elicited his angry exclamation that she had not faith enough, i.e. that she did not help him.