第9章

THE COURT CIRCULAR, AND ITS INFLUENCE ON SNOBS

Example is the best of precepts; so let us begin with a true and authentic story, showing how young aristocratic snobs are reared, and how early their Snobbishness may be made to bloom.A beautiful and fashionable lady--(pardon, gracious madam, that your story should be made public; but it is so moral that it ought to be known to the universal world)--told me that in her early youth she had a little acquaintance, who is now indeed a beautiful and fashionable lady too.In mentioning Miss Snobky, daughter of Sir Snobby Snobky, whose presentation at Court caused such a sensation, need I say more?

When Miss Snobky was so very young as to be in the nursery regions, and to walk off early mornings in St.

James's Park, protected by a French governess and followed by a huge hirsute flunkey in the canary coloured livery of the Snobkys, she used occasionally in these promenades to meet with young Lord Claude Lollipop, the Marquis of Sillabub's younger son.In the very height of the season, from some unexplained cause, the Snobkys suddenly determined upon leaving town.Miss Snobky spoke to her female friend and confidante.'What will poor Claude Lollipop say when he hears of my absence?' asked the tender-hearted child.

'Oh, perhaps he won't hear of it,' answers the confidante.

'MY DEAR, HE WILL READ IT IN THE PAPERS,' replied the dear little fashionable rogue of seven years old.She knew already her importance, and how all the world of England, how all the would-be-genteel people, how all the silver-fork worshippers, how all the tattle-mongers, how all the grocers' ladies, the tailors' ladies, the attorneys' and merchants' ladies, and the people living at Clapham and Brunswick Square,--who have no more chance of consorting with a Snobky than my beloved reader has of dining with the Emperor of China--yet watched the movements of the Snobkys with interest and were glad to know when they came to London and left it.

Here is the account of Miss Snobky's dress, and that of her mother, Lady Snobky, from the papers:--'MISS SNOBKY.

Habit de Cour, composed of a yellow nankeen illusion dress over a slip of rich pea-green corduroy, trimmed en tablier, with bouquets of Brussels sprouts: the body and sleeves handsomely trimmed with calimanco, and festooned with a pink train and white radishes.Head-dress, carrots and lappets.

'LADY SNOBKY.

'Costume de Cour, composed of a train of the most superb Pekin bandannas, elegantly trimmed with spangles, tinfoil, and red-tape.Bodice and underdress of sky-blue velveteen, trimmed with bouffants and noeuds of bell-pulls.Stomacher a muffin.Head-dress a bird's nest, with a bird of paradise, over a rich brass knocker en ferroniere.This splendid costume, by Madame Crinoline, of Regent Street, was the object of universal admiration.'

This is what you read.Oh, Mrs.Ellis! Oh, mothers, daughters, aunts, grandmothers of England, this is the sort of writing which is put in the newspapers for you!

How can you help being the mothers, daughters, &c.of Snobs, so long as this balderdash is set before you?

You stuff the little rosy foot of a Chinese young lady of fashion into a slipper that is about the size of a salt-cruet, and keep the poor little toes there imprisoned and twisted up so long that the dwarfishness becomes irremediable.Later, the foot would not expand to the natural size were you to give her a washing-tub for a shoe and for all her life she has little feet, and is a cripple.Oh, my dear Miss Wiggins, thank your stars that those beautiful feet of yours--though I declare when you walk they are so small as to be almost invisible--thank your stars that society never so practised upon them; but look around and see how many friends of ours in the highest circles have had their BRAINS so prematurely and hopelessly pinched and distorted.