Page:In a winter city, by Ouida.djvu/27

20, who came at the same time, but she brought no horses; she hired her coupé from, a livery-stable, and her star, notwithstanding its royalty, paled in proportion. Besides, the Grand Duchess was a very little, shabby, insignificant person, who wore black stuff dresses, and a wig without any art in it. She was music-mad, and Wagner was her prophet. The Club took no account of her.

There is a club in Floralia, nay, it is the Club;—all other clubs being for purposes gymnastic, patriotic, theatric, or political, and out of society altogether.

The Club is very fond of black-balling, and gives very odd reasons for doing so, instead of the simple and true one, that it wants to keep itself to itself. It has been known to object to one man because his hair curled, and to another because he was the son of a king, and to another because his boots were not made in Paris. Be its reasons, however, good, bad, or indifferent, it pleases itself; by its fiat newly-arrived women are exalted to the empyrean, or perish in obscurity, and its members are the cream of masculine Floralia, and spend all fine afternoons on the