Her Royal Lover: A Novel — page 242: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

234 HER ROYAL LOVER. CHAPTER XXXIITI. THE ROYAL PROCESSION. At last! it is a quarter to five! The whole court is already assembled in the grand saloon, in which the roval procession is going to be formed. Each guest has considered himself in honor bound to respond to the invitation of the king; everybody is present in full dress. The royal family of Thessaly and the Empress of Hindostan with the Princess Corysande alone are wanting. The grandmistress, active as a horse-fly, goes and comes with much ado, much embarrassment; she hastily flings a word here, makes a new suggestion there, reprimands the ladies of honor who, with their heads adorned with feathers like perambulat- ing canopies, rudely and ungraciously endeavor to erush each other. There was nothing so. ludicrous as the rivalry of these gowns, whose long and flimsy trains proclaimed like their proprietors a rude and laborious service. To what lengths will not vanity go! more simplicity had been better taste, better policy, for it would have better dissimulated the penury which reigned like a mistress at the Thes- salian court. The chief chamberlain, Count Leerkoff, gives a last glance at the organization of this memorable fete. The aides-de-camp in full uniform, their breast decorated with orders, are standing behind the. ladies of honor. Gods! great gods! what gold! what decorations! what tinsel! It is marvelous, dazzling, ruinous, frightful! But is it possible that m Gomicbooks.¢o