MRS. PARTINGTON AT THE BALLET.
“When is the bally troop coming on?” said Mrs. Partington,
after watching the dancers at the Boston Theatre
about half an hour. — “That is the ballet troupe,” said
Augustus, with a smile, pointing at the beautiful sylphs
that were fluttering like butterflies about the stage. She
looked at him incredulously for a little while, and said:
“Well, I believe in calling things by their true names;
and what they call them a troop for, I don't see. I
thought it was a troop of horse, such as they had in the
Contract of the Ganges.” She levelled her new opera-glass
at the stage, and looked long and earnestly.
“Well,” said she, “if there ever was anybody that
needed sympathy, it 's them! Worn their dresses way up
to their knees by dancing, poor creaturs! and by and
by, at this rate, they won't have nothing to wear.” She
stood beating time as the waves of gauze moved hither
and thither in illustration of the poetry of motion,
while Ike amused himself by tearing up his theatre-bill,
and putting it into a lady's silk hood, which hung over
the back of the front seat.
