I went.
Early in the morning the empty carriage came down to my boarding-house, with those two regimental chaps on the out seat.
I was all ready, with my pink silk dress on, and my front hair all in one lovely friz; but I just let the carriage wait that the boarders and people, with their faces against the window opposite, might have a good chance to look at it. Then I walked down the stairs with queenly slowness; the long skirt of my dress came a-rustling after, with a rich sound that must have penetrated to the boarding-house parlor, for the door was just a trifle open as I went by, and three faces, I could swear to, were peeping out as if they had never seen a long-trailed, pink silk dress before. Then I heard a scuttling toward the window, and, while I stood on the upper step, gathering up the back cataract of my dress, those same faces flattened themselves plump against the glass.
Of course I did not hurry myself on that account, but took an observation up and down the street while I tightened the buttons of my glove, though one of the regimental chaps was a-standing there and holding the door wide open.
"Why shouldn't I give the poor things just this one glimpse of the fashionable life to which genius has lifted me," says I to myself.
Influenced by this idea, I paused, perhaps, half a minute, with my foot on the iron step, and asked the regimental chap, with the air of a queen giving directions, if it was very cold? and if Mrs. Dempster was quite well, that morning?
He bowed when he answered both these questions, with the greatest respect; which was satisfactory, as the people on both sides must have seen him do it.
Then I stepped gracefully into the carriage and sat down, buried to my knees in billows of pink silk. Over that I drew the robe of white fur, and waved my hand, as much as to say: I am seated; you can close the door. Which he did.
One thing is curious about the streets of New York on New Year's Day. Not a woman or girl is to be seen on the sidewalks.
The garden of Eden, before Adam went into the spare-rib business, wouldn't have been more completely given up to the desolation of manhood, unrefined by sweet female influence.