I believe the first thing a woman does in Paris is to buy a new bonnet. I did, or rather stood by and let 'my son' do it in the best of French, only whispering when he proposed gorgeous chapeaus full of flowers and feathers, that I could not afford it.
'Ah! we must make our economies, must we? See, then, this modest, pearl-colored one, with the crape rose. Yes, we will have that, and be most elegant for the Sunday promenade.'
I fear I should have bought a pea-green hat with a yellow plume if he had urged it, so wheedlesome and droll were his ways and words. His good taste saved me, however, and the modest one was sent home for the morrow, when we were to meet Joseph and Napoleon and go to the concert in the Tuileries garden.
Then we set off on our day of sight-seeing,
