"You like caps, then?" asked the Bird of Paradise, with a sparkling eye.
"Oh! if there be anything more than other that I know most, it is the cap. Here, voici!" said he, rather oddly unbuttoning his waistcoat, "you see what lace I have got. Voici! voici!"
"Ah! me! what lace! what lace!" exclaimed the Bird in rapture. "St. James, look at his lace. Come here, come here, sit next me. Let me look at that lace." She examined it with great attention, then turned up her beautiful eyes with a fascinating smile. "Ah! c'est jolie, n'est-ce pas? But you like caps. I tell you what, you shall see my caps. Spiridion, go, mon cher, and tell ma'amselle to bring my caps--all my caps, one of each set."
In due time entered the Swiss, with the caps--all the caps--one of each set. As she handed them in turn to her mistress, the Bird chirped a panegyric upon each.
"That is pretty, is it not--and this also? but this is my favorite. What do you think of this border? c'est belle, cette garniture? et ce jabot, c'est tres séduisant, n'est-ce pas? Mais voici,
the cap of Princess Lichtenstein. C'est superb, c'est mon favori. But I also love very much this of the Duchesse de Berri. She gave me the pattern herself. And after all, this cornette à petite santé of Lady Blaze is a dear little thing; then, again, this coiffe à dentelle of Lady Macaroni is quite a pet."
"Pass them down," said Lord Squib, "we want to look at them." Accordingly they were passed down. Lord Squib put one on.
"Do I look superb, sentimental, or only pretty?" asked his lordship. The example was contagious, and most of the caps were appropriated. No one laughed more than their mistress, who, not having the slightest idea of the value of money, would have given them all away on the spot; not from any good-natured feeling, but from the remembrance that to-morrow she might amuse half an hour buying others.
While some were stealing, and she remonstrating, the duke clapped his hands like a caliph. The curtain at the end of the apartment was immediately withdrawn and the ball-room stood revealed.
It was of the same size as the banqueting-hall. Its walls exhibited a long perspective of gilt pilasters, the frequent piers of which were entirely of plate looking-glass, save where occasionally a picture had been, as it were, inlaid in its rich frame. Here was the Titian Venus of the Tribune, deliciously copied by a French artist; there, the Roman Fornarina, with her delicate grace, beamed like the personification of Raphael's genius. Here Zuleikha, living in the light and shade of that magician Guercino, in vain summoned the passions of the blooming Hebrew; and there Cleopatra, preparing for her last immortal hour, proved by what we saw that Guido had been a lover.
The ceiling of this apartment was richly painted and richly gilt; from it were suspended three lustres by golden cords, which threw a softened light upon the floor of polished and curiously inlaid woods. At the end of the apartment was an orchestra, and here the pages, under the direction of Carlstein, offered a very efficient domestic band.