Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Monday, 29 December 1873

I had no wish to go to Monaco, but having prepared nothing for Hitchcock, I go (brown dress and brown hat, good). I arranged it quite well and am beginning to get accustomed to it. Maman, my aunt, Dina, Paul and I -- there are many people at the station. What I like best about these excursions is the time spent at the station. Lewin has not shot this year, until now. Lambertye is a very likeable little creature, but rather ridiculous when he shoots. We enter the halls as a matter of course, but soon leave for the shoot -- Dina, Paul and I. We shall have no one with us. Without going down at once we spend some time on the various platforms and at last station ourselves rather long on the last step, level with the luncheon room, and at last we are below. Paul brings chairs and we settle ourselves entirely to my liking. I am not stiff as before, and I am at the shoot almost as I like it. I wish so much my animal of a brother would shoot. He is better, for Petit no longer receives him -- Avigdor threatened to stop making her dresses. He is among the American women; that is still the best there is, at a pinch.

^["Spend some time," "platforms," and "luncheon room" in English in the original.]
Saint-Clair, Galve, Lambertye and two others I do not know shot very well. There was not a lady, except two, but far off to the left. Few shooters, but more than last time. Toward the end Galve and Lambertye were left alone and had to continue until one of them missed. Lambertye missed a shot and Galve won the prize -- a very pretty silver bowl in which two pigeons are bathing, very pretty. How happy the Comtesse de Galve is to have a husband good at least for winning prizes.
Then we go back up -- we three in the form of a triumvirate. Above, my aunt meets us, quite pale, and says that a gentleman has just shot himself, in the hall. We run to the hall; the crowd is in commotion -- people going out, coming in, running, talking aloud. In all the rooms one sees groups of four, five, six and more, talking and gesticulating; to pass one had to push as in a church. He shot himself on the sofa at the end of the Turkish room; there was still blood, and the water they had poured over him. They carried him at once to the Hotel de Paris, for he was not dead, and after firing he said: Ah! what a bad shot. -- words he repeated as they carried him to the hotel.
No one knows his nationality; they say he is English, but it is not certain, for they like to honor all madmen with that title. Everyone is in consternation; the steps are flooded with people; they question one another; strangers speak to one another and everyone seems to know everyone. They proposed I stay, but I preferred to dine at home rather than at the table d'hote. Here are two things I shall no longer do: I shall avoid traveling otherwise than in a private compartment -- or indeed a compartment where there is no one; I shall never go by omnibus to the casino, but on foot or by carriage; and I shall no longer dine at the table d'hote.
We go down, but a gentleman says it is too late, for the train is approaching, and truly we would be late if I went with Maman, who was dawdling. So I tell Paul to come with me and we descend at a gallop (I made the supposition that if I arrive in time, I shall have what I love -- not the duke, but in general).
A Russian, Ermolaieff -- whom Maman calls Averianoff -- leaves by the same train; he finds us seats. He is a merchant who speaks only Russian -- simple but not disgusting, without any education. He proposed we go to Florence by sea.
A Russian Ermolaieff, an old woman, ourselves and an old man. I explained the shoot to Averianoff and talked so fast, without stopping.
The landau was waiting for us; Paul goes to fetch I know not what from the London House -- salmon, I believe.