* * * * *

[Illustration:  A HORSE-CAR CONTINGENCY.

Gallant Tar (To horrified lady of uncertain age), “BELAY THERE, OLD
WOMAN!  TAKE THIS SEAT.”]

* * * * *

OUR PORTFOLIO.

PARIS, FOURTH WEEK OF THE REPUBLIC, 1870.

Dear Punchinello:  You may not have heard that BISMARCK has been here, had an interview with FAVRE, and is off again.  I didn’t suppose you would know it, so I hasten to give you and your army of readers a brief synopsis of what took place, as nearly as I can in the exact language used by the distinguished diplomats upon the occasion.

The scene of the consultation was one of the Imperial wine-cellars under that pavilion of the Tuileries palace which overlooks the Seine at the southwestern extremity of the Place du Carrousel.  The spot was selected for two reasons:  it was far removed from the noise and hubbub of the city, and it furnished facilities for “liquoring up” in case of necessity.  I was there and left, as you will see, under circumstances calculated to give me a lasting impression of the event.  We all three of us sat around a pine table, upon which faintly flickered a tallow candle in a soda-water bottle, that shed around a sickly glare (that is to say, the candle did).  BISMARCK looked a little the worse for wear, I thought, and, as he unbuttoned his vest with a grunt of relief, he struck me likewise as being rather short in his wind.

FAVRE was loose and frisky as a four weeks old kitten, and spoke with a quick, decided tone that reminded me of HORACE GREELEY.  He never once swore, however, during the whole interview.  Your readers will observe that even if this momentous meeting was not marked by the usual diplomatic usages, the language is strictly according to the usual diplomatic idiom.  It is important to note this fact, as everything hinges on the “idiom.”

BISMARCK was the first to break silence: 

“The difficulties which embarrass the questions under discussion stand first in the order of elimination.”

FAVRE assented, and BISMARCK continued:  “We must remove the peritoneum to get at the viscera of the issues (I was much struck with the force and originality of this method of putting it), and evict those impressions which are purely matters of national sensibility.”

I snuffed the candle and waited for FAVRE.

FAVRE:  “Your Excellency abounds in subtle diagnoses.”

BISMARCK:  “It is not a question of noses.”

FAVRE:  “Your Excellency mistakes me.  I meant to say that, like the
‘Heathen Chinee,’ your ways are dark.”

I moved the light closer to the Count.  FAVRE only smiled.

BISMARCK:  “Touching ‘rectification,’ then, Germany sticks to her position.”

I regarded this as an insinuation that somebody was “stuck.”

FAVRE:  “France adheres unalterably to her previous resolution.  National traditions, deeply interwoven with the fine fibre of individual natures, forbid the relaxation of tissues logically irresistible.”