Moths by Ouida — page 157: what you’re looking at

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

: ane ee og Me) , ee * 4a : a Oy ph , 2h eth? & 5 ivy + ud eee te LE ths «*- fe ; WAde alt Aug’ A ‘ J Ve" my 3 WD AL Sie TIDUS PO hdr VAT meh Bat ten: a. 5 £\ Ta 8 a 2 Pr esthe NN Sart ON a Se ee Sg : ?* y *3 - : Lyra Ate ¢ e : 4 he 1 i ‘ r < * he MOTHS 158 her day aristocracy to be popular must pretend to be democratic, — she did not*relish any more than any other member of that great family the connection of its head with the pig-killing brothers out West. | | Yet, on the whole, she made herself pleasant to the new duch- e288, discerning that the lovely Fuschia possessed in reserve an im- sense retaliating power of being ‘‘ nasty ” were she displeased, so. that sensible Lady Dolly even went the length of doing what all she rest of the Mull family flatly refused to do; she presented her wiece ‘‘on her marriage.” And Her Grace, who, on her first girlish presentation, when she had first come over ‘‘ the pickle field,” had confesséd herself ‘* flustered,” was on this second occasion perfectly equal to it, carrying her feathers as if she had been born with them on her head, and bending her bright cheeks over a bouquet in such a manner thatall London dropped at her feet. ‘‘If Sam and Saul could see me,” thought the American beauty, hiding a grin with her roses, her memory reverting to the big brothers, at that ~ moment standing above a great tank of pig’s blood, counting the ‘‘ dead ’uns” as they were cast in the caldrons. ‘‘it is so very extraordinary. I suppose it is because she is so dreadfully odd,” said Lady Dolly of her daughter to Lady Stoat that spring, on her return from spending Easter in Paris. ‘* But. when we think she has everything she can possibly wish. for, that when she goes down the Bois really nobody else is looked at, © that he has actually bought the Roc’s egg for her—really, really, if is flying in the face of Providence for her not to be happier than she is. Lam sure if at her age I might have spent ten ~ thousand pounds a season on my gowns, I should have been in ~ heaven if they had married me to a Caffre.” . ‘‘{ think you never did your dear child justice,” said Lady Stoat, gently. ‘‘No, I must say you neverdid. She is very steadfast, you know, and quite out of the common, and not in . the least vulgar. Now, if you won't mind my saying it—be- cause I am sure you do enjoy yourself, but then you are such a dear, enjouee good-natured little creature that you accommodate © yourself to anything,—to enjoy the present generation one must. be a little vulgar. Iam an old woman, you know, and lock on or) Vind Wome fs ae + tae VISE Aly ? val 4 ‘ 1M BY ne Og Ks a? ite , ; Pee ad : ite £ -. ff fs a 2 ‘ v A, . * a“ and see things, and the whole note of this thing is vulgar even — when it is at its very best. It has been so ever since the Second Empire.” ) i ANS ‘The dear Second Empire; you never were just to it!” said Lady Dolly, with the tears almost rising to. her eyes at the thought of all she had used to enjoy init. — ‘‘It was the apotheosis of the vulgar—of the sort of blague and shamelessness which made De Morny put an Hortensia on his carriage panels,” said Lady Stoat, calmly. ‘‘To have that sort of epoch in an age is like having skunk fur on ‘your clothes; the — taint never goes away, and it even gets on to your lace and your cachemires. I am afraid our grandchildren will smell the Second Empire far away into the twentieth century, and be the : worse forit.” | ‘7 dare say there will have been a fourth and a fifth by then.” aime A+ - Pa , - ” . ; ; >, @ ° yal as 4 oF An Se * a foes, a* oe » if Be 7 Zz ri J ¢ .«¢ a 7 i &, wh. The ¥ *. MITE ee Ae p n~ * al