According to one of these young men, he had said to the Duchesse de Guermantes: “I expect everyone to get up when my wife passes,” to which the Duchess had retorted (with as little truth, had she said any such thing, as humour, the grandmother of the young Princess having always been the very pink of propriety): “Get up when your wife passes, do they? Well, that’s a change from her grandmother’s day. She expected the gentlemen to lie down.” Then someone alleged that, having gone down to see his aunt the Princesse de Luxembourg at Balbec, and put up at the Grand Hotel, he had complained to the manager there (my friend) that the royal standard of Luxembourg was not flown in front of the hotel, over the sea. And that this flag being less familiar and less generally in use than the British or Italian, it had taken him several days to procure one, greatly to the young Grand Duke’s annoyance. I did not believe a word of this story, but made up my mind, as soon as I went to Balbec, to inquire of the manager, so as to make certain that it was a pure invention. While waiting for Saint-Loup to return I asked the proprietor to get me some bread. “Certainly, Monsieur le Baron!” “I am not a Baron,” I told him.