I Cast Round My
Thoughts For The Purpose, And In An Evil Hour They Fell Upon Mrs.
Fantadlin.
No one seemed to me to have a more absolute sway in the
world of fashion.
I had always noticed that her party slammed the box
door the loudest at the theatre; had most beaux attending on them; and
talked and laughed loudest during the performance; and then the Miss
Fantadlins wore always more feathers and flowers than any other ladies;
and used quizzing glasses incessantly. The first evening of my
theatre's reopening, therefore, was announced in flaring capitals on
the play bills, "under the patronage of the Honorable Mrs. Fantadlin,"
Sir, the whole community flew to arms! The banker's wife felt her
Dignity grievously insulted at not having the preference; her husband
being high bailiff, and the richest man in the place. She immediately
issued invitations for a large party, for the night of the performance,
and asked many a lady to it whom she never had noticed before. The
fashionable world had long groaned under the tyranny of the Fantadlins,
and were glad to make a common cause against this new instance of
assumption. - Presume to patronize the theatre! insufferable! Those,
too, who had never before been noticed by the banker's lady, were ready
to enlist in any quarrel, for the honor of her acquaintance. All minor
feuds were therefore forgotten. The doctor's lady and the lawyer's lady
met together; and the manufacturer's lady and the shopkeeper's lady
kissed each other, and all, headed by the banker's lady, voted the
theatre a bore, and determined to encourage nothing but the Indian
Jugglers, and Mr. Walker's Eidonianeon.
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