  [A ball-room mishap of crinoline days, founded on fact.] “When we have shuffled off this mortal coil.”—Hamlet. “Know ye the land where the cypress and myrtle Are emblems of deeds that are done in their clime”? Where the girls live on partridges, oysters and turtle, And their days fly as swift as a musical rhyme? If you don’t it’s a pity—I think you had better Now listen, my story is true to the letter. O Lulu! dear Lulu! most beautiful one, Whose dark locks sweep over thy exquisite face, As the wings of the tempest o’ershadow the sun, Fair fawn of the forest, thy bright dwelling place, Where the partridges, oysters and turtle were swallowed, With catsups and pickles, and fixin’s more solid, Was graced by no damsel so charming as thou Or so hapless, the night I am writing of now. Dear Lulu, sweet angel, was just coming out, As they say, had just let the tucks out of her dresses, Had such a sly ogle, and the prettiest pout, And a coiffeur de Paris did up her tresses, So her Ma, Mrs. Browne, to give her a start, she Determined, one summer, to give her a party, The rout of the season, where her darling Lulu Might capture the town by her brilliant debut. (They rig up blood-horses with ribbons, you know, To make them sell quicker, when brought to the show.) So she sent a darky round the town, with cards to the elite, With “Mrs. Browne’s regards and she’ll be at home to-night.” The clock struck ten, the carriages drew up before the gate, The ton display their quality by coming rather late. A crowd it was, you may be sure, of opulence and fashion, For Mrs. Browne had for high life what one would call a passion. There were satins, muslin, taffetas and laces, and illusion Like all the rainbows since the flood crushed in one grand confusion, Felt just a notch or two above all rival Mas in town. O feminine, O masculine embarrassment of riches! For those who wore and those who longed for bifurcated breeches! There was flouncing Miss Barege, and grass-widow, Madame Clack, Miss Creame-Cocaine, the dreamer, whey-faced, of morals slack, Miss Polly Prude, the finical, fastidious and precise, Miss Reverie, a tall bas bleu with sentimental eyes, Miss Twitchell, always twitching, Miss Giggle with her twitter, Miss Dumb-Bell of the wallflower set, a most accomplished sitter, All planets of the Milky Way; as for the herd of beaux, Know one, know all—mustachios, gloves, smirks, bows and faultless clothes. But for laughing and screaming and ogling and dancing, Coquetting and ogling and sighing and glancing, Madame Mazourka that night made her mark, As a punk that took fire at the flash of each spark, So high in her waltzing, so low in her dress, that She really left gazers very little to guess at. For each time that she bounded or gracefully fell— For where her grace bounded, sin much more abounded— Each curve was so plumply and gracefully rounded— The dullest of eyes could discern the fine swell Of her dress, and much more than is proper to tell. I’ve a hearty contempt—I hope nobody’s hurt For that pitiful nuisance, a married flirt, Whether it wears a chemise or shirt, For when the green season of myrtles is o’er This wrinkled-faced courtship is rather a bore, And the musk and the paint on an old married lover Don’t smell quite as sweetly as newly mown clover. O you who are wedded, take care how you walk! For the world is suspicious and people will talk, And spectators may say—no accounting for taste— No arm but a husband’s should encircle the waist Of a lady that’s married, in the waltz’s mad whirls, And no finger but his should disport with her curls; It’s really becoming my crying transgression, But your feelings will hurry you sometimes away, And genius, kind reader, you know must have play. You pardon? Well, then, to take up the thread Of my story—the old folks were snoring in bed; In the western horizon the moon kept her course, The talkers were drowsy, the singers were hoarse, When Lulu was strolling the cool walks among While her beau held her ear as she didn’t her tongue. Sweet Venus and Cupid o’er the wide earth held reign And the pennons streamed gay o’er their Castles in Spain. O Lulu, dear Lulu! magnificent belle— Whose name is a charm and whose presence a spell, Bright star ever shining in Memory’s stream, You were gowned on that night in the very extreme Of fashion, indeed quite a crinoline belle, You spread yourself so, and you made such a swell, Your dress circle being made after the pattern Of the rings that the telescope shows around Saturn, Not whalebone or cordage, but Carnegie’s best steel, As when you dance with her next time you can feel. Now, I do not blame Lulu for her fondness for dress It’s a passion some people find hard to repress, And take this excuse, dear reader, I beg; Her grandma had left her a very fine leg- Acy, so having abundance of means, And being quite young—indeed still in her teens— She dressed herself up in the climax of style, “A miss”—in circumference—“as good as a mile.” Well, Lulu was chatting away with her beau Of dances and courtships, and quarrels and so, When all of a sudden she made a full stop In her gay tÊte-a-tÊte, and screamed at the top Of her voice, till each sleepy-eyed maid in the hall Sprang quick to her feet at the terrible squall, There pale as the Greek Slave of Powers she stood, Her white lips unstained by a vestige of blood, As she shrieked in her anguish, “O Lord, I am lost!” While footsteps fell round her as quick as the clatter Of a cavalcade’s hoofs, each one bawling at her “O Lulu, my darling, pray what is the matter?” “A serpent is biting me under my dress!” “Lord help us!” burst forth in a wail of distress, “It’s coiling around my—It’s big as a rail, And a great bunch of rattles tied on to its tail,” Ne’er toper saw snake from his jag or his jug Like this which clasped Lulu in terrible hug. There were sobbings and swooning away on the floor, Of disordered lingerie over a score, “Unions,” “Merodes,” and garters galore, Indeed ’twas a contretemps all might deplore! “A snake at a dance!” “How dare poke its face Into such an exceedingly improper place?” So the old snake in Paradise brought us to grief; He skulked behind Eve; Eve behind her fig leaf, And this great world, which it took a whole week to make, Went into bankruptcy, all for one snake. O Fashion, what follies your votaries make, What frauds to your bosom with rapture you take, ’Twixt the gay masquerade and the sorrowful wake, One tenth is for fashion and nine tenths for mere fake, And maidens adorn their fair forms with a snake; For earrings, for bracelets, for necklace and jewel, Diamonds and rubies for eyes cold and cruel. Sparkling and dazzling at reception and mass, On debutante’s fingers or on widow of grass, O! feminine dragon!—how else depict her, When the girl of my dreams turns boa-constrictor? Why pineth fair woman’s heart for a snake? Man would perish a million times o’er for her sake. At last one golden youth, more bold than the rest, Walked up, bowed and spoke as he pulled down his vest “Well! crying won’t help it, so pray now be still, They say there’s a way whene’er there’s a will, And jerk him from under his quarters, I think,” Dread silence fell like a spell on the air, Sobs hardly suppressed, inarticulate prayer, When cautiously groping lest he might mistake, And grab a—suspender instead of the snake, He at last found the dragon and fastened his hold, It was scaly and squirming, and quivering and cold, Like a huge anaconda writhing its fold, And then with a clutch that was steady and bold, He twisted it up in a sort of a loop, And jerked out—at least forty feet of steel hoop! |
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