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* * * * *
OUR PORTFOLIO.
An Exciting Interview with King William.--"Seeing" Thiers and Going him
Better.--The Influence of Monkeys In Diplomacy.
VERSAILLES, EIGHTH WEEK OF THE REPUBLIC, 1870.
"I don't believe a word of it," said the King, with an impatient stamp
of the foot and a deprecatory wave of the hand--"not a word of it."
You see, dear PUNCHINELLO, the situation was thus: I had undertaken, not
indeed without grave misgivings, to propitiate his Majesty, after the
failure of the THIERS-BISMARCK negotiations, and, if possible, procure
such terms as would save Parisians from the galling necessity of
immolating the monkeys of the _Jardin des Plantes_ to the popular demand
for something to eat. I thought, as an American citizen and your
correspondent, my propositions _might_ have some chance of being
favorably entertained, especially as I knew that the English Minister's
presents of Stilton cheese and many dozens of BASS' bottled ale to
BISMARCK had failed to prevent the current of the Chancellor's prejudice
from running strongly in favor of Americans. Thus morally armed, and
bearing in my pocket a _passe-partout_ from Prussian Headquarters, I
approached Versailles on the second evening after the departure of M.
THIERS, and found the King occupying the apartment in the central
pavilion of the palace, which had once been the sleeping-chamber of
Louis XVI.
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