Dear Molly, I'll try and finish this, since, maybe, it's the last lines you 'll ever receive from your attached friend. Three days have elapsed since I put my hand to paper, and three such days, I 'll be bound, no human creature ever passed. Out of one fit of hysterics into another, and taking the strongest stimulants, with no more effect than if they were water! My screeches, I am told, were dreadful, and there 's scarcely one of the family can't show the mark of my nails; and this is what K. I. has brought me to. You know well what I used to suffer from him at Dodsborough, and the terrible scenes we always had when the Christmas bills came in; but it's all nothing, Molly, to what has happened here. But as my Uncle Joe said, no good ever came out of a "mess-alliance."
My moments are few so I 'll be brief. The ball was beautiful, Molly; there never was the like of it for elegance and splendor! For great names, rank, fashion, beauty, and jewels, it was, they tell me, far beyond the Court, because we had a great many people who, from political reasons, refuse to go to Leopold, but who had no prejudices against your humble servant; for, strange enough, they have Orangemen here as well as in Ireland! Princes, dukes, counts, and generals came pouring in, all shining with stars and crosses, blue and red ribbons, and keys worked on their coat-tails, till nearly twelve o'clock. There were, then, nigh seven hundred souls in the house, eating, dancing, drinking, and enjoying themselves; and a beautiful sight it was: everybody happy, and thinking only of pleasure. Mary Anne looked elegant, and many remarked that we must be sisters. Oh dear, if they only saw me now!
There was a mazurka that lasted till half-past one, for it's a dance that everybody must take out each in turn, and you 'd fancy there was no end to it, for, indeed, they never do seem tired of embracing and holding each other round the waist; but Lord George came to say that the Margravine had finished her whist and wanted her supper, so down we must go at once.
James was to take her Supreme Highness, and the Prince of Dammiseisen—a name that always made me laugh—was to take me; but he is a great man in Germany, and had a kingdom of his own till he was "modified" by Bonaparte, which means, as Lord George says, that "he took it out in money." But why do I dwell on these things? Down we went, Molly,—down the narrow stairs,—for the supper was laid out below; and a terrible crush it was, for, strange as it may seem, your grand people are just as anxious to get good places as any; and I saw a duke fighting his way in, just like old Ted Davis at Dodsborough!
When we came to the last flight of stairs, the crowd was awful, and the banisters creaked, and the wood-work groaned, so that I thought it was going to give way; and instead of James moving on in front, he pressed back upon us, and increased the confusion, for we were forced forward by hundreds behind us.
"What's the matter, James?" said I. "Why don't you goon?"
"I 'd rather be excused," said he. "It 's like Donnybrook Fair, down there,—a regular shindy!"
It was no less, Molly; for although the hall was filled with servants, there were two men armed with sticks, laying about them like mad, and fighting their way towards the supper-room.
"Who are those wretches?" cried I; "why don't they turn them out?"
The words weren't well out, my dear Molly, when the door gave way, and the two, trampling down all before them, passed into the room. From that moment it was crash after crash! Lamps, lustres, china, glass, plates, dishes, fruit, and confectionery flying on all sides! In less time than I 'm writing it, the table was cleared, and of the elegant temple there wasn't a bit standing. I just got inside the door to see the McCarthy arms in smithereens! and K. I.—for it was him!—dancing over them, with that little blackguard Paddy Byrne smashing everything round him! I went off into fits, Molly, and never saw more; and, indeed, I wish with all my heart that I never came to again, if what they tell me be only true. K. I., it seems, no sooner demolished the supper than he set to work on the company. He snatched off the Margravine's wig, and beat her with it, kicking Dammiseisen and two other princes into the street. They say that many of the nobility leaped out of the first-pair windows, and one fat old gentleman, a chamberlain to the King of Bavaria, was caught by a lamp iron, and hung there for twenty minutes, with a mob shouting round him!