congratulated himself on escaping the embraces of the fishwives, who had invaded the drawing-room of Montmorin, Minister of Foreign Affairs. When Gower called, "they were at the moment of taking leave of the Minister with the most cordial embraces, having already performed that ceremony on most of the corps diplomatique who had the misfortune of dining there." It is "uncertain whether All Fools' Day, the date of the despatch, was also the date of the kissing. Anyhow, the Paris mob had so little respect for diplomatic privileges, that when they visited the aristocratic houses to slaughter the Swiss employed as porters, they made no exception in Gower's favour. Fortunately his Swiss had been sent off in disguise. Gower declined the offer of a military guard, but deemed it prudent to put in large letters over his door "Hôtel de l'Ambassadeur d'Angleterre." Gouverneur Morris tells us that he found Gower in a towering passion at the delays in delivering his passports, and that he had burnt his papers. His wife, the Countess of Sutherland, who flirted a little with Morris, was the only lady who visited Marie Antoinette the day before the attack on the Tuileries, all the Queen's timorous favourites prudently keeping away. When the royal family were at the Feuillants monastery before being consigned to the Temple, she sent some of her own dresses for the Queen, and her little boy's clothes for the unfortunate Dauphin, sixteen months his senior, but small
