The American Gentleman's Guide to Politeness and Fashion Part 3

SKETCHES AND ANECDOTES.

MY DEAR NEPHEWS:

In accordance with the promise with which I concluded my last letter, I will give you, in this, narrated in my homely way, some anecdotes, ill.u.s.trative of the opinions I have expressed upon the subject of DRESS.

Liking, sometimes, to amuse myself by a study of the ma.s.ses, in holyday attire and holyday humor,--to see the bone and sinew of our great country, the people who make our laws, and for whose good they are administered by their servants, enjoying a jubilee, and wishing also to meet some old friends who were to be there (among others, Gen. Wool, who, though politicians accused him of going to lay pipe for the presidency, is a right good fellow, and the very soul of old-fashioned hospitality), I went on one occasion to a little city in western New York, to attend a State Fair.

On the night of the _fete_ that concluded the affair, your cousins, Grace and Gerte, to whom you all say I can refuse nothing, however unreasonable, insisted that I should be their escort, and protested warmly against my remonstrances upon the absurdity of an old fellow like me being kept up until after midnight to watch, like a griffin guarding his treasures, while two silly girls danced with some "whiskered Pandoor," or some "fierce huzzar," who would be as much puzzled to tell where he won his epaulettes as was our (militia) Gen. ----, of whom, when he was presented to that sovereign, on the occasion of a court levee, Louis Philippe asked, "where he had served!"

It would not become me to repeat half the flattering things by which their elegant _chaperon_, Mrs. B. seconded the coaxing declarations of your cousins, that they would be "enough more proud to go with Uncle Hal than with all the half-dozen beaux together," whose services had been formally tendered and accepted for the occasion.

"Yes, indeed," cried Gerte, "for Uncle Hal is a _real_ soldier!" And I believe the wheedling rogue actually pressed her velvety lips to the ugly sabre scar that helps to mar my time-worn visage.

"Col. Lunettes is too gallant not to lay down his arms when ladies are his a.s.sailants!" said Mrs. B. with one of her conquering smiles. "Well, ladies," said I, "I cry you mercy--

"'Was ever colonel by such sirens wooed, Was ever colonel by such sirens won!'"

I have no intention to inflict upon you a long description of the festivities of the evening. Suffice it to say upon that point, that the "beauty and fashion," as the newspapers phrase it, not only of the Empire State, but of the Old Dominion, and others of the fair sisterhood of our Union, were brilliantly represented.

When our little party entered the dancing-room, which we did at rather a late hour, for we had been listening to some good speaking in another apartment--the ladies declared that they preferred to do so, as they could dance at any time, but rarely had an opportunity of hearing distinguished men speak in public,--the "observed of all observers,"

among the fairer part of the a.s.sembly, and the envy, of course, of all the male candidates for admiration, was young "General ----," one of the _aids-de-camp_ of the Governor of the State. In attendance upon his superior officer, who was present with the rest of his staff, our juvenile Mars was in full military dress, and made up, as the ladies say, in the most elaborate and accepted style of love-locks (I have no idea what their modern name may be), whiskers and moustaches. The glow that mantled the cheeks of the triumphant Boanerges could not have been deeper dyed had his "_modesty_," like that of Washington, when overpowered by the first public tribute rendered to him by Congress, "been equalled only by his bravery!"

"He above the rest in shape and gesture, Proudly eminent."

but apparently, wholly unconscious of the attention of which he was the subject, was smilingly engrossed by his devotion to the changes of the dance, and to his fair partner; and the last object that attracted my eye, as we retired from the field of his glory, were the well-padded military coat, the curling moustaches and sparkling eyes of "Adjutant-Gen. ----!"

True to my old-fashioned notions of propriety, I went the next morning to pay my respects to Mrs. B., and to look after your cousins,--especially that witch Gerte, whom her father had requested me to "keep an eye upon,"

when placing her under my care for the journey to the Fair.

I found the whole fair bevy a.s.sembled in the drawing-room, and in high spirits.

After the usual inquiries put and answered, Grace cried out, "Oh! Uncle Hal, I must tell you! Gen. ---- has been here this morning! He was wearing such a beautiful coat!--his dress last night was nothing to it!--it fairly took all our hearts by storm!"

At these words, a merry twinkle, as bright and harmless as sheet lightning, darted round the circle.

The master of the house entered at that moment, and before the conversation he had interrupted was fairly renewed, invited me into the adjoining dining-room to "take a mouthful of lunch."

While my host and I sat at a side-table, sipping a little excellent old Cognac, with just a dash of ice water in it (a bad practice, a very bad practice, by the by, my boys, which I would strenuously counsel you not to fall into; but an inveterate habit acquired by an old soldier when no one thought of it being very wrong) the lively chit-chat in the drawing-room occasionally reached my ears.

"It was tissue, I am quite sure!" said Miss ----.

"No matter about the material--the color would have redeemed anything!"

cried Grace.

"Sea-green!" chimed in the flute notes of another of the gay junto, "what can equal the General's _verdancy_?"

"What?" (here I recognized the animated voice of the lady of the mansion); "why, only his _mauvais ton_, in 'congratulating' me upon having 'so many' at my reception for Governor and Mrs. ----, the other evening, and his equally flattering a.s.surance that he had not seen so 'brilliant a military turn-out in a long time'--meaning, of course, his elegant self! You are mistaken, however, Laura, about his coat being of _tissue_, it was _lawn_, and had just come home from his _lawn-dress_, when he put it on. I distinctly saw the mark of the smoothing-iron on the cuff, as well as that his wristband was soiled considerably."

"He had only had time to 'change' his coat since he went 'home with the girls in the morning,'" chimed in some one, "and his hair, I noticed as he rose to make what he called his '_farewell bow of exit_,' was filled with the dust of that dirty ball-room."

"Which couldn't be brushed out without taking out the curl, too, I suppose!" This last sally emanated I believe, from one of the most amiable, usually, of the group.

"Well," said the hostess, with a half-sigh of relief, "he seldom inflicts himself upon me! His grand _entree_ this morning, in the character of a katy-did, gotten up _a la mode naturelle_," (here there was a general clapping of hands, accompanied by _bravos_ that would have rejoiced the heart of a prima donna), "was, no doubt, occasioned by his having heard some one say that, what vulgar people style a '_party call_,' was inc.u.mbent upon him after my reception. What a pity his informant had not also enlightened him on another point of _ettiquetty_, as old Mr. Smith calls it, and so spared me the mortification, my dears, of presenting to you, as a specimen of the beaux of ----, and one of the aids-de-camp of Governor ----, a man making a visit of ceremony in a _bright, pea-green, thin muslin shooting-jacket_!"

Bulwer, the novelist, when I was last in London, some two or three years ago--and for aught I know he still continues the practice--used to appear in his seat in the English House of Commons one day in light-colored hair, eye-brows and whiskers, with an entire suit to correspond; and the next, perhaps, in black hair, etc., accompanied by a black coat, neckcloth, and so on throughout the catalogue. A proof of the admitted _eccentricities of genius_, I suppose.

D----, who is now a very respectable veteran lawyer, and well known in the courts of the Empire State, was originally a Green Mountain Boy--tall, a trifle ungainly, with a laugh that might have shaken his native hills, rather unmanageable hair, each individual member of the fraternity, instead of regarding the true democratic principle, often choosing to keep "Independence" on its own account, and a walk that required the whole breadth of an ordinary side-walk to bring out all its claims to admiration. Though D---- did not sacrifice to the graces, he really wrote very clever "Lines;" but his shrewd native sense taught him that a reputation as a magazine poet would not have a direct tendency to increase the number of his clients. So the sometime devotee of the Muse of Poetry, bravely eschewing the open use of a talent that, together with his ever-ready good-humor and quiet Yankee drollery, had brought him somewhat into favor in society, despite his natural disadvantages, entered into partnership with an old pract.i.tioner in A----, and bent himself to his career with st.u.r.dy energy of purpose.

"New Year" coming round again in the good old Dutch city where D---- had pitched his tent, some of his friends offered to take him with them in their round of calls, and introduce him to such of their fair friends as it was desirable to know; hinting, at the same time, that this would afford a suitable occasion for donning a suit of new and fashionable garments.

On the first of January, therefore, agreeable to appointment, his broad, pock-marked face--luminous as a colored lantern outside an oyster-saloon--and his gait more than usually _diffusive_, D---- was seen coming along from his lodgings, to meet his companions for the day's expedition, and evidently with sails full set. It soon became apparent to all beholders, not only that the grub had been transformed into a full-fledged b.u.t.terfly of fashion, but--that he wore his long, wide, ample-caped, new cloak _wrong side out_!

At the recent Peace Convention in Paris, even those strenuous adherents to _things as they were_, the Turks, wore the usual dress of Europeans and Americans throughout, with the single exception of the _fez_, which, I believe, no adherent of Mahomet will renounce, except with his religion. Young Charles P---- told me that Count Orloff's sable-lined _talma_ was of the most unexceptionable Parisian cut.

An agreeable young friend of mine, the Rev. Mr. H., contrives to support a family (Heaven only knows how!) upon the few hundred dollars a year that make the usual salary of a country clergyman. He indulges himself, at rare intervals, in a visit to his fashionable city relatives, by way of necessary relaxation, and to brush up a little in matters of taste, literature, etc. Perhaps, too, he thinks it well, occasionally, to return, with his wife and children, the long visits made every summer by a pretty fair representation of his numerous family circle at the pleasant little rectory, where refinement, industry, and the ingenuity of a practical housekeeper, create a charm often lacking in more pretentious establishments.

On one of these important occasions, it was decided that the handsome young rector should avail himself of his city jaunt to purchase a new suit of clothes, his best clerical coat, notwithstanding the most careful use and the neatest repairing, being no longer presentable for ceremonious purposes. (I make no doubt that the compatibility of the contemplated journey and the new clothes, both in the same year, was anxiously discussed in family council.)

As soon as possible after his arrival in town, my clerical friend broached the all-important subject of the tailor, to one of his brothers, a youth of unquestionable authority in such matters, and invoked his a.s.sistance.

"With all my heart, Will, we'll drop in at my own place, as we go down this morning; they get everything up there artistically." "And at artistic prices, I fear," soliloquized the new candidate for the honors of the cloth, with a slight quaking at heart, as a long-cherished plan for adding, without her previous knowledge, a shawl to the waning bridal outfit of his self-sacrificing wife, rose before his mental vision.

"But, I say, Will," inquired his modish brother, of our young clergyman, in a tone of good-humored banter, as they sauntered down Broadway together, after breakfast, "where did you buy your new _chapeau_?"

"At A----, before leaving home"----

"Excuse me, my dear fellow, but it's a nondescript! It will never do with your new suit, allow me to say, frankly."

"But the person of whom I bought it had just returned from New York, and he a.s.sured me it was the latest fashion! I gave him eight dollars for it, at any rate."

"Preposterous!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the man of fashion, in a tone portentous as that which ushered in the "prodigious" of Dominie Sampson, when astounded by _his_ discoveries in the mysteries of the toilet. "It first saw the light in the 'rural districts,' depend on't!"

The quizzical glances with which his companion ever and anon scrutinized the crowning glory of his neat morning attire, as he had previously thought it, gradually overpowered the philosophy of my friend,--clergyman though he was--the admitted Adonis of his cla.s.s in college, and the favorite of ladies, old and young. The church's

----"favorites are _but men_.

And who e'er felt the stoic when First conscious of"----

wearing a "shocking bad hat!" The result was, that the condemned article was exchanged at a fashionable establishment for one fully meeting the approbation of the modish critic.