Monday, 15 March 1875

Spring, spring, spring! Society has gone, the Promenade is less crowded, the sun warmer, the mornings lovelier, the nights more fragrant, and the twilight — ah, that is what I love. The departures do not sadden me this year; on the contrary, I should like to be alone sooner — alone, mind you: I want Audiffret or something of that kind, otherwise I should be bored. Spring reminds me of our walks with the princess, our talks about the duke, the Villa Baquis, the croaking of the frogs, Blackprince on his little horse, London House, and then Audiffret all in white, whom I did not see, being wholly taken up with something else.

Truly, our sweetest pleasures lie in our memories, whether good or indifferent.

At two o’clock we set off: Pâris, Sacha and Walitsky in the first carriage; in the second, Olga, Nadinka and Julie; and lastly, in the third, a rather pretty pony-basket drawn by two lively, sweet little white horses, with bells like the duke’s — myself, Marie and Stiopa. It had been arranged yesterday: we are going to visit the Russian frigate Prince Pojarski (grey dress and hat — good).

From my very first step aboard the vessel I armed myself with my loveliest smile and kept it on the whole time. We were received and shown round the frigate by several officers, but everyone knows I do not look at that species.

After seeing everything, even the engine and the blackest and dirtiest corners, we went back up to the dining room, where Walitsky, Sacha and Pâris already were, in the company of Baron Dungen Hern-Berg, also a naval officer, of another one, and of the priest. The priest is a curious character: he started out as a cornet of dragoons, then became a police commissioner, then a monk and finally a priest. A great drunkard, like that sorry excuse for a baron. The latter offered to show us his chronometer, most extraordinary, it seems; a handsome wooden box is brought in, everyone steps forward to look, I too, expecting some curious mechanism — but instead he takes out of it four flasks of different liqueurs. “This is my chronometer,” he says, “and I wind it up every day” — that is to say, every day he empties these four flasks, or decanters, and fills them again. The tone in which it was said, and then his gesture and his face, so enamoured of those liqueurs, made [?] one and all¹. I felt myself turning pale and, fearing I should be seasick, I said we must leave.

We get back into our carriages and set off again. In the port of Nice I see an English steamer; I stop and send to ask whose it is, but the sailors are English and our groom can find out nothing. I get down, take Marie by the arm and go right up to the edge; a sailor saw me and went to the very end of the steamer. To whom belongs this steamer?² I cried. to the duke of...³ — no, not like that — simply to the duke of⁴

Shall I say something very silly? These English sailors seemed far closer to me than the Russian sailors; indifferent aboard the Prince Pojarski, I felt my heart throb at the mere approach of an English steamer, at hearing it answer in an English voice.

— It is not what I thought, I say to Marie as we go back to the carriage.

— What did you think, then?

— I thought it belonged to the Duke of Hamilton or to Prince Wittgenstein.

She asked me some other question, I forget what, and we began to talk about the duke, about Gioia, about the duchess. Horror!

So I had the pleasure of talking about him, of saying all I know about him, without blushing and without being in the least suspected, all through our drive.

There are few people about, as I said, and I like that. We have tea en famille; Pâris and Markevitch are here.

Maman said to me yesterday:

— Ah, if you were really clever, you would go to Russia and bring Grytsaka back here.

— Maman, that is not as easy to do as it is to say.

— I know it, that is why I say it.

— No — if I were sixteen and every road were closed to me, I would take that one.

Markevitch told Maman that someone had written to him from Poltava that the mother has taken her son to Odessa to [get him] out of a new marriage. Ah, what a pity, what a pity, said Maman as I came in.

— What?

— That they are marrying off Miloradovitch.

Good Lord, I felt a pang of vexation at the news. But afterwards they explained to me that he wanted to marry but that his mother had taken him away. There’s one who is eager to take a wife. Poor fool!

He does not know what it means.