had come in touch with
all the principal men in Germany, it was of course much easier for them
to work together. We dined generally with my mother on Sunday
night--particularly at this time of the year, when the official banquets
had not begun and our Sundays were free. The evenings were always
interesting, as we saw so many people, English and Americans always, and
in fact all nationalities. We had lived abroad so much that we knew
people all over the world,--it was a change from the eternal politics
and "shop" talk we heard everywhere else. Some of them, English
particularly (I don't think the Americans cared much about foreign
politics), were most interested and curious over what was going on, and
the probable fall of the cabinet. An English lady said to me: "How
dreadful it will be for you when your husband is no longer minister;
your life will be so dull and you will be of so much less importance."
The last part of the sentence was undoubtedly true--any functionary's
wife has a certain importance in France, and when your husband has been
Foreign Minister and Premier, you fall from a certain height, but I
couldn't accept the first part, that my life would be necessarily dull
because I was no longer what one of my friends said in Italy, speaking
of a minister's wife, a donna publica.
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