The Avenue des Acacias is thronged with carriages and motors at the driving hours, and now and then women descend from their carriage to promenade, to chat with friends, to display their toilettes.
The Avenue des Acacias is the drive of drives for the mixed crowd of smart folk, but the old nobility of France prefers to drive in stately hauteur along the Avenue de la Reine Marguerite. One must make some protest against the levelling of class barriers.
The two most fashionable bridle-paths run along beside these two favourite driving avenues, but the whole Bois is a paradise of bridle-paths, and near its centre is a spot which has been chosen as the favourite meeting-place of chic riders at certain hours. The Parisians are riding more since things English became the fashion, and many of them ride very well, though the men affect English horsemanship to the point of caricature; but, on the whole, the French are better at haute école riding than at park riding. They make the best circus riders in the world, but the horsemanship of the average rider on the bridle-paths of the Bois leaves much to be desired.
As for driving, there are many good whips, but the accomplishment is not general, and few Parisiennes of social prominence drive. It is not "convenable," and though several of the greatest ladies of France hold the reins over their own fine horses in the Bois, driving alone with a groom is generally ranked in the same category as walking alone with a dog. The woman who does either must expect uncomplimentary classification, unless she stands high enough to be a law unto herself.
And apropos of dogs, the pet dog show is always one of the events of the spring season, an occasion that calls for artistic effect in mistress as well as dog, produces scores of effective tableaux, offers testimony concerning feminine folly. There are good dogs shown, dog aristocrats of unimpeachable birth and breeding, but their exhibition is enveloped in such a flurry of chiffons, such a hysteria of pride, ambition, emotion. Nowhere in the world has the dog endured such insults to his sturdy, canine simplicity as in Paris. Nowhere else has he been so dandified, so coddled, so spoiled. The pet dog of the Parisienne of high degree is likely to be a sybarite, and the pet dog of the famous cocotte leads a luxurious existence that demands prodigal expenditure.
One Parisian dog tailor has a most flourishing and successful business. He is the Paquin of dogdom, and let no one think that he is not an artist. When Madame brings her little angel to him for a spring outfit, there is an impressive paraphrase of Madame's own sessions with her couturier,—a serious conference concerning materials, colours, trimmings, models. In New York a dog blanket is a dog blanket. It may be cheap or expensive, but it is probably bought ready made and approximately fitted. The Parisian dog tailor considers his client's figure, complexion, air.
"But no, Madame. I find that he has not the breadth of chest to wear that model—and the colour! He is not of a type for the blue and silver. A warm violet, now, with the embroidery in more tender shades, and a touch of gold? Bon! And the curving line on the shoulder? It gives an air of slenderness, that shoulder seam. Madame has samples of the other costumes she wishes to match?"
Absurd? Of course it is all ineffably absurd, but the mania for dress extends even to the lapdog in Paris.
The little angel has also his boots—of fur for the cold, of oilskin for the dampness. He has his tiny kerchiefs of cobweb fineness, embroidered with his name or monogram, and tucked into the pockets of his handsome coats. He wears jewelry, more or less costly, collars, bangles, even bracelets. One notorious Parisienne has a collection of jewelry for her dog that is worth a fortune, collars of cabuchon emeralds and diamonds, of pink pearls, of cunningly wrought gold and lucky jade. It is a hobby of the mistress, this dog jewelry, and when one's specialty is the speedy bankrupting of Grand Dukes and wealthy American fledglings and rich Portuguese Jews, one has the money for one's hobbies.
The pet dog show is not a dog clothes exhibit. The entries are judged upon their canine merits, but it is amusing all the same, this event, and the mistresses pose most charmingly with their pets. Nothing that happens in Paris lacks its theatrical note.