BY EMMA J. GRAY.
Why not give one, girls, on your next birthday night?
The entire house, including the halls, should be trimmed with asparagus and Japanese lanterns. From the drawing-room ceilings suspend inverted cones of asparagus, and as pendants from these fasten Japanese lanterns. String evergreen around the stair bannisters and halls. Indeed, make of your house, including the dining-room, a sort of fairy bower, on which the Japanese lanterns at happy intervals cast light and color.
The orchestra should be hidden in a tiny forest, and their music should be jolly, light, and pretty. Among the numbers have the "Dance of the Flowers" by Tschaikowsky. Follow this with several flower dances. Example, "The Sweet-Pease Waltz." The girls' costumes should be white tarlatan, effectively trimmed with sweet-pease. The boys should have sweet-pea boutonnières.
The Pansy Cotillion.—For this dance wear crêpe lissè, tarlatan—indeed, any flimsy material you choose, but it must be one of the pansy colors; and as the pansy has so many shades of brown, yellow, purple, deep rose, etc., the variety which would mingle as the several figures are given would result in a kaleidoscopic effect of color and beauty.
Perhaps a few solo dances could be arranged. If so, have a Cowslip dance, when the little maiden should be frocked in pale yellow, or the Heliotrope, with a frock of lilacs. Another might dance the Forget-Me-Not, and wear a gown of blue. While still another dance might be termed the Water-Lily, which would necessitate a frock of white and gold, and the blue and pink water-lilies are comparatively rare. Whichever flower is represented should be worn either on the hair or on the dress.
Then should come the Wild-Flower Minuet, when daisies, buttercups, clover, chiccory, violets, honeysuckle, and other wild flowers could vie with each other in the stately, graceful movements. Follow the minuet with the Butterfly promenade and dance. In this a large number should engage, as it is quite proper there should be butterflies flitting from flower to flower. Whatever dance is decided to appropriate to the butterflies, they should select their own partners from any of the flowers they please. The butterflies will wear almost as many colors as the pansies, and silver, gold, or other butterflies should be fastened on their shoulders or on other parts of their costume.