“Oh, excuse me; it is always a point with us benighted males, all eyes and no eyes.”
“Well, then, the lady in white, with cherry-velvet bands, and a white tunic looped with crimson, and headdress of white illusion, a la vierge, I think they call it.”
“It was very refreshing; and adapted to that awful atmosphere. It was the nearest approach to nudity I ever saw, even amongst fashionable people.”
“It was lovely; and then that superb figure in white illusion and gold, with all those narrow flounces over her slip of white silk glacee, and a wreath of white flowers, with gold wheat ears amongst them, in her hair; and oh! oh! oh! her pearls, oriental, and as big as almonds!”
“And oh! oh! oh! her nose! reddish, and as long as a woodcock's.”
“Noses! noses! stupid! That is not what strikes you first in a woman dressed like an angel.”
“Well, if you were to run up against that one, as I nearly did, her nose WOULD be the thing that would strike you first. Nose! it was a rostrum! the spear-head of Goliah.”
“Now, don't, Christopher. This is no laughing matter. Do you mean you were not ashamed of your wife? I was.”
“No, I was not; you had but one rival; a very young lady, wise before her age; a blonde, with violet eyes. She was dressed in light mauve-colored silk, without a single flounce, or any other tomfoolery to fritter away the sheen and color of an exquisite material; her sunny hair was another wave of color, wreathed with a thin line of white jessamine flowers closely woven, that scented the air. This girl was the moon of that assembly, and you were the sun.”
“I never even saw her.”