de Guermantes, almost as much as that of Saint-Loup’s mother, was purified to an enchanting degree. It is not in the bloodless formulas of the writers of today, who say: au fait (for “in reality”), singulièrement (for “in particular”), étonné (for “struck with amazement”), and the like, that we recapture the old speech and the true pronunciation of words, but in conversing with a Mme. de Guermantes or a Françoise; I had learned from the latter, when I was five years old, that one did not say “the Tarn” but “the Tar”; not “Béarn” but “Béar.” The effect of which was that at twenty, when I began to go into society, I had no need to be taught there that one ought not to say, like Mme. Bontemps: “Madame de Béarn.”