Front elevation of Mr. and Mrs. H. at the head of the grand stairway leading to the gold organ room in their palace. Mr. and Mrs. H. are expecting forty more or less strangers to dine with them. Gold favors will be found under the napkins. Twenty pairs of footmen’s calves, in wood, have just been successfully adjusted by the H’s footmen, in the magenta and gold dining room, brought, at some expense, from Verocchio’s palace in Venice.
THE ATTACK ON BOHEMIA
The Higgingbothams have not, on the whole, been very successful in their attacks on the smart set, so they are at present engaged in entertaining Bohemia. Here you see a section of it let loose in the Verocchio dining-room. Reading from left to right: Mr. H., somewhat at a loss to know how to manage the bright young thing on his left; Miss Tessie Truefitt, artists’ model, understudy to a barefoot dancer, poses for Jo Davidson; Le Roy Eastman, socialist, drawing room anarchist, author of “The Red Flag in Spain,” lectures on Government Ownership of Women; Theda B. Small, film vampire, the worst woman in the city, rolls her own cigarettes, never wears stockings; Archibald Witherspoon Troutt, fashion artist, introduced the hoop in men’s evening coats, is suing Lady Duff Gordon for stealing his ideas (note the Byron collar and the Hero tie); Polly Pym, keeps a restaurant in the Apache region—paper napkins, waiters in red shirts, pipe smoking allowed, eau de quinine served from straw bottles, choral singing and recitations; Aristede Le Blanc, French Impressionist, paints with a palette knife; and, finally, poor Mrs. H., speechless at the wild and wanton scene around.
SUCCESS AT LAST
The Higgingbothams have had bad luck with their dinners and have now decided to try nothing but little suppers after the opera. Here we behold them with Mr. and Mrs. Lestranges, who compose the thickest part of the social cream. The Higgingbothams have at last arrived. They have a loge at the opera and know so many great people that they can perfectly well afford to discard all their intellectuals, social secretaries and Bohemians—all of them now unnecessary and de trop. The Lestranges have already refused three courses at supper and are now engaged in inspecting the little Escargots, à la Melba.
HE’S A JOLLY GOOD FELLOW
Mr. Higgingbotham has at last been permitted to join an ancient social club. He is here enjoying a bottle or two of his famous private stock, Veuve Clicquot, 1883, gray label, silver foil: only two cases in the world—and Mr. Higgingbotham owns them both.