“That is pretty, is it not—­and this also? but this is my favorite.  What do you think of this border? c’est belle, cette garniture? et ce jabot, c’est tres seduisant, n’est-ce pas?  Mais voici, the cap of Princess Lichtenstein. C’est superb, c’est mon favori. But I also love very much this of the Duchesse de Berri.  She gave me the pattern herself.  And after all, this cornette a petite sante of Lady Blaze is a dear little thing; then, again, this coiffe a dentelle of Lady Macaroni is quite a pet.”

“Pass them down,” said Lord Squib, “we want to look at them.”  Accordingly they were passed down.  Lord Squib put one on.

“Do I look superb, sentimental, or only pretty?” asked his lordship.  The example was contagious, and most of the caps were appropriated.  No one laughed more than their mistress, who, not having the slightest idea of the value of money, would have given them all away on the spot; not from any good-natured feeling, but from the remembrance that to-morrow she might amuse half an hour buying others.

While some were stealing, and she remonstrating, the duke clapped his hands like a caliph.  The curtain at the end of the apartment was immediately withdrawn and the ball-room stood revealed.

It was of the same size as the banqueting-hall.  Its walls exhibited a long perspective of gilt pilasters, the frequent piers of which were entirely of plate looking-glass, save where occasionally a picture had been, as it were, inlaid in its rich frame.  Here was the Titian Venus of the Tribune, deliciously copied by a French artist; there, the Roman Fornarina, with her delicate grace, beamed like the personification of Raphael’s genius.  Here Zuleikha, living in the light and shade of that magician Guercino, in vain summoned the passions of the blooming Hebrew; and there Cleopatra, preparing for her last immortal hour, proved by what we saw that Guido had been a lover.

The ceiling of this apartment was richly painted and richly gilt; from it were suspended three lustres by golden cords, which threw a softened light upon the floor of polished and curiously inlaid woods.  At the end of the apartment was an orchestra, and here the pages, under the direction of Carlstein, offered a very efficient domestic band.

Round the room waltzed the elegant revelers.  Softly and slowly, led by their host, they glided along like spirits of air; but each time that the duke passed the musicians, the music became livelier, and the motion more brisk, till at length you might have mistaken them for a college of spinning dervishes.  One by one, an exhausted couple slunk away.  Some threw themselves on a sofa, some monopolized an easy-chair; but in twenty minutes all the dancers had disappeared.  At length Peacock Piggott gave a groan, which denoted returning energy, and raised a stretching leg in air, bringing up, though most unwittingly, on his foot one of the Bird’s sublime and beautiful caps.