In one of these temporary structures a large party of young ladies and gentlemen were assembled eating ices and drinking tea. Lady Coxe was presiding in her magenta dress, nodding from the heat, and fanning with magenta fan her magenta countenance. Florence was talking merrily with a young guardsman; but the conversation generally assumed that tone which, as Mr Whiting describes it, smacks less of the lady than of the reduplicate Φ.
“Let us take up our position here,” said one young lady to her partner; “I hate being with the swells.”
Lady Coxe heard this; her face more magenta than ever. She ranked herself with the nobility.
“Did you see Croquet in the park yesterday,” asked another, “with the prettiest pony?”
“Yes; but not such a habit as Julia Fitzwiggins,” burst in a third. “What a waist she has!”
“Quite like an hour-glass,” illustrates a guardsman, aloud.
“I doubt if it be all real,” interposed another young lady.
“What are you talking of?” asked the guardsman.
“Of course the rest must be filled with sand,” retorts the first.
“A sand-glass in every respect,” murmured Whiting.