"He's a wretched little beast!" cried one of these ladies.
"You mustn't say that," rejoined another, a tall woman with gray hair; "you know he's my corespondent." And at this stroke of wit the rest of the party laughed repeatedly.
But few of those on exhibition were as common as the members of this group. Indeed, Morton was struck with the fact that the most of the men and women who were being stared out of countenance were apparently people of breeding, and he wondered that they were willing to place themselves in what seemed to him so false a position. Many of the girls, for example, who wore striking costumes and extravagant hats, were themselves refined in face and retiring in bearing; they were stylish, no doubt, but they were well bred also. It seemed to Morton that style was perhaps the chief characteristic of these New York girls—style rather than beauty.
The average of good looks was high, and yet, as it happened, he was able to walk half around the huge building without seeing half a dozen women whom he was prepared to declare handsome. The girls appeared to be strong, healthy, lively, quick-witted, and charming, but rarely beautiful. They seemed to him, moreover, to be emphatically superior to the men who accompanied them, superior not only in looks, but in manners and intelligence.
Morton noted, to his surprise, that some of these men were quite as conscious of their clothes as any of the women were; and he caught also more than one remark showing that the appreciation of the women's clothes was not confined to the women themselves.
As he was nearing the Fourth Avenue end of the edifice he saw in a box just above him—for he found himself staring like the rest—a lady of striking beauty, with a look of sadness on her face, that gave place to a factitious smile when she spoke to one or another of the three or four young men who stood on the steps at the side of her chair. The face interested Morton, and it was recognized by two young men just behind him.
"Hello!" said one of them, "there's Mrs. Cyrus Poole. Smart gown, hasn't she?"
"Always has," answered the other. "Best-groomed woman in New York."
"She is pretty well turned out generally, for a fact," the first speaker responded. "But Cyrus Poole's made money enough out of the widow and the orphan this summer to pay for all the gowns his wife can wear this winter, at any rate."
It was only when Merrymount Morton had threaded his way half around the horse-show that he first saw a horse there. As he came to the Fourth Avenue end the crowd before him fell away, and a gate in the railing swung back across the promenade, while grooms led out of the arena five or six beautiful stallions. The New England college professor had a healthy liking for a fine horse, and his eyes followed these superb creatures till they were out of sight. Then in the clear space at the far end of the building he saw three coaches, one of them already equipped with its four-in-hand, while the horses were being harnessed to the others.