The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 147: what you’re looking at

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

— 134 THE MYETERIES OF THE COURT. very handsome circular staircase, with bronze the appearance and the general reputation of balustrades, and carpeted all over, leads up into ; being one of the moet respectable, as it is assuredly the show-rooms, which occapy the whole of the first floor. These are sumptuously furnished : lustres, vases, and or-molu clocks embellish the marble mantel-pieces, and are reflected in the immense mirrore with their massive gilt frames. | Splendid chandeliers, all of the finest cut giass, hang to the ceiling; and these at dusk are lighted one of the most fashionable and best frequented, Magasine des Modee to be found at the Weet End of London. Before we pass away to a description of her neighbour’s, we must day a few words of Madame Angeliqae herself. She is about fifty years of age —of a comely and matronly appearance. She is with wax-candles, which flood the apartments /a French woman—as her name, her manners, and with as brilliant a lustre as that which indicate. Somewhat stout, she is speech im a West-end saloon when a banquet or ball is | nevertheless bustling and active; and she thinks given. The carpets in the show-rooms are .so/| no trouble too great to bestow upon a customer. thick that the delicate feet of lady-visitresses are completely lost in them: the patterns are of the richest description, and match well with the deep crimson paper of the walls and the general style of the furniture. The costliest as well as the most elegant dresees are to be seen in these apart- ments; and whichever way a visitress may turn, she finds her form reflected either in a mirror against the wall, or in an immense oval psyche. There are few chairs in these rooms—but num- bers of sumptuous ottomans, covered with velvet, are ranged around. These ottomans are so many large chests or boxes, the lids of which are made to lift up, cushion and all; and from the mys- terious depths of the interior Madame Angelique or the show-women produce the newest clegancies The show-women themselves are mi persons, but dressed with the utmost taste and bearing the stamp of unquestionable respectability. Neither in the shop down stairs, nor in the show- rooms, are any of the females very young or very fpood-lookmg: so that if a somewhat particular lady, or an uxorious husband accompanying his Wife, pay a visit to Madame Angelhique’s establish- ment, nothing meets the eye to induce a suspicion as to its perfect propriety. We should add that the young women themselves in the work-room, seemed to have been chosen a8 mach for their absence of personal charnas as, we may suppose, for their skilfulness with the needle ; and perhaps the door of cofhmunisation between that room and the shop is mtentionally left open, to convince such straight-laced lady or particular husband accom- panying his wife, as those whom we have alladed to, that in every posible department of Madame Angelique’s business the fefnales employed are of modest detpeanour, as well as of an age and ap- pearance which may defy the breath of scandal. But then, Madame Angelique’s house is a very large one; and there are floors higher than the show-rooms. Most of Madame Angehque’s cus- tomers know that she is a widow, ahd that only two or three of her principal dependants live on the premises; What, then, does she do with all the upper part of her spacious house? If occasionally some curious old dowager or ingenuous young lady happens to put the question, Madame An- gelique, with one of her most amiable smiles, speaks of the immense stock of goods which she is constantly compelled to keep on hand—and thus promptly attributes a use and a purpose to all the up-stairs rooms which are not occupied by hereelf, her principal women, and her domestics. In short, Indeed, her bearing is as urbane, her smile as complacent, and the expressions of her gratitude as great, towards a lady who merely drops in to bay a three-and-sixpenny riband or a half-guinea cap, as they are to another customer who leaves behind an order for a twenty-guinea dress. There is nothing obtrusive in her politeness: it is mea- sured to the utmost nicety.. She will only pres her goods to a certain point—and no farther : she will expatiate upon how much this or that article is sure to become the complexion of the particular customer with whom she is treating at the time— but she will not too persuasively force the said articles upon such customer. Thus she gives uni- versal satisfaction; and as for her bills, she only sends them in once a-year—about three months after Ohristmas—remaming perfectly satisfied if they be liquidated any time before the Christmas. It were almost needless to add that she herself dresses with the most unexceptionable taste,—in a manner becoming her years, with the slightest dash of a Parisian coquetry—but yet so far removed from being ontré that it is impossible to make her took ridiculous. She uses rouge and pearl-powder with eo much akill, that only those ladies who are equally skilful in the mysteries of the toilet, could discern how much her complexion is indebted to those avcessories; and her smile reveals so admirable a set of teeth, that even the wearers of false ones themselves would find it diffi- cult to attribute Madame Angelique’s to the suc- cedanecus art of a renowned dentist in the same street. The tailor’s shop next door is as handsome in its own way as the Magasin of Madame An- gelique. It is the establishment of no cheap clothier: none of the exquisitely fashioned articles of raiment displayed in the window, are by ticketed prices. M. Bertin—for the tailor is a Frenchman, as Madame Angelique is a French- woman—would scorn the idea of selling at sixteen shillings, surtouts at two guiness, and paletots at twoten. No suit of clothes is sent out from his establishment under seven guincas. His name is in gilt letters over the shop-front—in brass letters ingeniously stuck on to the middle pane of plate-glass—and repeated on a brass-plate on the shop-door. Everything looks business-like and e—yes, and wealthy also, at M. Bertin’s; and if a passer-by glances up at the windows on the drawing-room or higher floors, he | beholds rich draperies and the tops of gilt back chairs, all indicative of the sumptuous interior of M. Bertin’s habitation. As for M. Bertin himself, he is a short, middis-aged man—very active and very obsequious—tolerably good-looking for his , the establishment of which we are speaking, has | years—exquisitely dressed—making a large display | (COLL (C DOO (GO)