CHAPTER IV 



CONCERNING STILL OTHER PEOPLE'S CATS 



THE nearest approach to the real French Salon 

 in America is said to be found in Mrs. Louise 

 Chandler Moulton's Boston drawing-room. In for- 

 mer days, at her weekly Fridays, Sir Richard Coeur 

 de Lion was always present, sitting on the square 

 piano amidst a lot of other celebrities. The auto- 

 graphed photographs of Paderewski, John Drew, and 

 distinguished litterateurs, however, used to lose noth- 

 ing from the proximity of Mrs. Moulton's favorite 

 maltese friend, who was on the most intimate terms 

 with her for twelve years, and hobnobbed familiarly 

 with most of the lions of one sort or another who 

 have visited Boston and who invariably find their 

 way into this room. If there were flowers on the 

 piano, Richard's nose hovered near them in a per- 

 fect abandon of delight. Indeed, his fondness for 

 flowers was a source of constant contention between 

 him and his mistress, who feared lest he knock the 

 souvenirs of foreign countries to the floor in his eager- 

 ness to climb wherever flowers were put. He was as 

 dainty about his eating as in his taste for the beauti- 

 ful, scorning beef and mutton as fit only for coarsei 



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