University of Virginia Library

THE RETURN TO TOWN.

Now that your swamps have taken on the first
sprinkle of their maple scarlet, and the first frosts
have crowned the broad leaflets of your maize, the
town-world is shrinking back to its city covert.

Already the streets are thronging with much the
same crowd, and the same equipages are astir,
which, eight months ago, tempted me into the dignity
of print.

All the summer conquests have been made; the
muslin and the barége are giving place to the silk
and the worsted; and bare arms, whether blue
with the breakfast hour, or crimsoned with ball-room
fatigue, will have to bide their time in sleevy
retirement, until the promenade shall yield to the
soirée and the opera.

The fancy balls have, I fear, been without much
efficacy the present season; and from no little observation,—for
you know, Fritz, that I have played
the debardeur, if not the man-of-war's man, in
my time,—I am disposed to think that only the
most moderate éclat attaches to the heroines either
of the Newport or the Saratoga display.

And between the advent of the Swedish songstress,
and of California, Utah, and New Mexico,
our heroes of the watering-place season, who had
brushed up their steps at Saraccos, and who were
counting on a large figure in the two-penny journals,
have been sadly out of sight. They are deserving
fellows in their way, and, with a propriety
and prudence worthy of the poets, they have chosen
that sphere of indulgence which they are best fitted

to adorn. But when matters of State, or a
popular singer, engrosses the town, they must even
yield up their vanities to the humor of the public,
and be content with that native inferiority which
some accident of marriage or scandal may, in time,
providentially relieve.

The accredited watering-place families, too, who
at this season are usually blooming on their honors,
and who resort with the chills of autumn to the
town, in the expectancy of much street commendation,
are now sadly behind the wake of the popular
taste; and from their carriage, and sour demeanor,
feel the neglect, in a way little credible to their
prudence, or to their philosophy. Even the eminent
town-livers, who, by their houses, equipage, or
scandal, were the lions of the winter past, are now,
in the overflowing plethora of the streets, roaming
about like tame jackals, who cannot call a shout,
or be anything but inoffensive, with the boldest of
their clamor.

My heart is warm, Fritz; and it is peculiarly
alive to the curtailment of honors in those quarters
where honors are the only basis of character. There
is indeed a class of steady, honest, thriving, modest
people, who never feel loss of attention, because it
is not their habitual nourishment; they do not
court, nor shall they enjoy, my sympathy. But

what, as a Christian man, shall I say of those,
who, if they cannot bewilder the town into a gaze,
or astonish the humble, are the most unhappy
creatures imaginable?

I cannot help, too, entertaining great sympathies
for those who, by a little pardonable bravado at
springs, maintain quite a position, but who, on
their return to the town, are entirely swallowed
up and lost in the throng.

There exists a considerable class of hoydenish,
watering-place belles, who will cut a very gay
figure, either in the parlor of the United States,
or of the Ocean House; but once returned to the
city, where there are no public corridors for
promenade, and no very promiscuous dancing,
their honors are suddenly shorn. My friend,
Tophanes, has the class entered upon his list, and
by reference to his schedule, I find them entered
as,—moderately rich,—passably young, ranging
in good season, from twenty to thirty-five,—good
dancers,—busy talkers, sometimes given to pluns,—
blooming (naturally),—good riders, but of uncertain
position, and of only moderate education.

In short, he makes them out, of admirable
qualities for summer amusements, and for public
places; but he adds this significant note against
their names—`shy of housewifery;' and thereupon,

by his peculiar system of classification, he drags
in their whole coterie, under his general head of—
`forlorn hopes.'

The finer accomplishments, and any of the
graces of even lady learning, are sadly wasted at
our summer places; indeed they are in little
demand in any quarter (always excepting Boston)
during the hot months. With the approach of
cold, however, cultivation gains repute. The
musical and literary soirées divide supremacy with
the street and the ball. Sonnetteers who have
lived on whey and Festus during September,
regain position at the town tea-boards; and starveling
authors rejoice again in invitations to dine.
New books are cut open with the cast-away fruit
knives or exhausted corset bones, and critiques
upon the drama or the new novels are as plentiful
and gregarious as the Jersey reed birds.

The Home Journal is furbishing up again its easy,
hot-weather columns; and we may expect to find
the sprightly de Trobriand giving us, instead of
long Paris feuilletons, a new taste of the town
suppers, and of the town ladies—served up with
his French sauce piquante.

It might be pleasant, Fritz, to pursue to some
length an inquiry about such literary elements
as belong to the town socialities, and to trace, if

possible, their reciprocal action. I am afraid,
however, that it would take me upon delicate
ground; it is certain that a little affectation of
literature is beginning to be employed as a burnisher
for vulgarities; and our most worshipful
grocer or broker can in no better way take off
the edge from his ignorance, than by a studious
patronage of the crack-brained poets. Our adventurous
bachelor lawyer, too, will foist himself
into the graces of showy companionship, far better
by his hap-hazard critiques upon Punch, or the
Berber, than by his Clientelle, or his Chitty.

Aspiring ladies, moreover, who are zealous for
something more than the notoriety which equipage
or magnificent rooms will furnish, would do well
to take a morning hour with the Enyclopædia, in
lieu of the upholsterer, and in a week's time they
will be able to astonish their vulgar and rich
acquaintances, with the extent and variety of their
erudition. I would further specially commend to
them an enterprising young artist of the town,
who has succeeded in producing such an imitation
of book-backs as would escape detection in any
classically shaded alcove. He should, however,
be instructed to confine his labors to the standard
works, which are rarely read; and any counterfeit

of Tupper, Boyer's Dictionary, or the Complete
Letter Writer, would be hazardous.

Thanks ought to be given, in this connection, to
those philanthropic gentlemen, who, while they
collect large libraries, show such a scrupulous nicety
in guarding their treasure from the profanation of
either public or private scrutiny. Like the old monks
that Curzon tells us of, they brood among their
books, and hatch out their ideas by incubation.

As for our young ladies, literary accomplishments
vary strangely with taste and circle. We
have our Italian speaking, and loving ladies,—
adoring Manzoni, whom they read, and Dante
whom they do not read,—who are profound lovers
of the opera, and of moonlight,—sentimental and
passionate, and uncommon admirers of moustache
and oysters.

We have our ladies of French suavity, by far the
most numerous class,—practising on a patient
femme de chambre, and a dog's-eared Raphael,—in
love with the Home Journal, and passionately fond
of waltzing,—making their talk crisp and full of
equivoque, and partial to bare shoulders, and to
young men of fortune. There are beside, our
young ladies of English habit, the friends of some
`first families' either in Boston or Virginia, who
can repeat you long passages from Romeo, or the

Bride of Abydos,—who are prim, and critical,—
much given to letter-writing, and very knowing
about the habits of the town poets,—firm believers
in the Literary World, and prone to long sighs.
Nor ought I to forget the odd and eccentric
coteries, who are ravished with German arias and
Faust, and talk incontinently in German twang;
nor yet those humbler literary victims, who read
Mrs. More's voluminous biographies, and who, if
you give them only moderate occasion, will overwhelm
you with a gush of dogmatism, that is as
woful to withstand as the French of boarding
school girls, or the moralities of the Herald.

Of musical accomplishments, and of their position
upon the opening boards of the winter, it would be
indiscreet to speak, in view of that splendid northern
comet of song, which is just now sweeping
over our sky, and trailing from its golden hair
fever and delirium. And, Fritz, I should be very
recreant to my intent of keeping you even with the
rush and current of the town life, if I did not give
you some further picture of the prevailing mania;
alas, the picture is only too ready; your philosophic
Timon has yielded to the infection; and this,
notwithstanding all ordinary means of prevention.
My only appeal now to your charity, must be
couched in the words of the old play:—