SIR ASINUS GOES TO THE BALL.
Upon the most moderate calculation, Sir Asinus must have tied his lace cravat a dozen times before he finally coaxed his smoothly shaven chin to rest in quiet grace upon its white folds. Having accomplished this important matter, and donned his coat of Mecklenburg silk, the knight took a last survey of himself in the mirror, carefully reconnoitred the street below for lurking proctors, and then brushing the nap of his cocked hat and humming his favorite Latin song, stepped daintily into the street and bent his way toward the Raleigh.
Sir Asinus thought he had never seen a finer ball; for, to say nothing of the chariots and coachmen and pawing horses and liveries at the door—of the splendid gentlemen dismounting from their cobs and entering gay and free the spacious ball-room—there was the great and overwhelming array of fatal beauty raining splendor on the noisy air, and turning every thing into delight.
The great room—the Apollo famed in history for ever—blazed from end to end with lights; the noble minstrels of the festival sat high above and stunned the ears with fiddles, hautboys, flutes and fifes and bugles; the crowd swayed back and forth, and buzzed and hummed and rustled with a well-bred laughter;—and from all this fairy spectacle of brilliant lights and fair and graceful forms arose a perfume which made the ascetic Sir Asinus once more happy, causing his lips to smile, his eyes to dance, his very pointed nose to grow more sharp as it inhaled the fragrance showering down in shivering clouds.
Make way for his Excellency!—here he comes, the gallant gay Fauquier, with a polite word for every lady, and a smile for the old planters who have won and lost with him their thousands of pounds. And the smiling Excellency has a word for the students too, and among the rest for Sir Asinus, his prime favorite.
"Ah, Tom!" he says, "give you good evening."
"Good evening, your Excellency," said Sir Asinus, bowing.
"From your exile?"
"Yes, sir."
"Ah, well, carpe diem! be happy while you may—that has been my principle in life. A fine assembly; and if I am not mistaken, I hear the shuffle of cards yonder in the side room."