nly oriental in the
room; there were four other Turks, and a great many Moguls, so that he
only made up the half dozen, but he consoled himself with the reflection
that his turban was the biggest, and that the toes of his slippers
turned up higher than any of the rest.

[Illustration]

But beside the "malignant and the turbaned Turks," there was a great
variety of other unexpected characters on exhibition in Mrs. Daylight's
apartments--kings, queens, gipsies, and highwaymen, milkmaids, who not
only couldn't milk, but probably couldn't tell a cow from a cod-fish,
peasant-girls with jewelry enough on for princesses, and princesses with
red faces and feet big enough for peasants, tambourine girls begging for
pennies which they couldn't get, and bouquet girls trying to sell
flowers from a large assortment, consisting of two geranium leaves and a
rose-bud, French grisettes, who couldn't speak French, and Spanish
noblemen, who talked most unmistakable down-east Yankee, Highlanders
with pasteboard shields and bare knees, army officers who didn't know
how to shoulder arms, sailors who couldn't tell the keel from the
jib-boom, or swear positively that the tiller wasn't the long-boat, the
Queen of Sheba in gold spectacles, robbers, brigands, freebooters,
corsairs, bandits, pirates, buccaneers, highwaymen, fillibusters, and
smugglers in such quantities, that it might be supposed that our best
society is two-thirds made up of these amiable persons. There were three
Paul Prys, four Irishmen, and thirteen Yankees, equipped with jackknives
and shingles, seven Hamlets, and fourteen Ophelias, one Lear, two
Richards, and five Shylocks, eight Macbeths, three Fitz James, and half
a dozen Rob Roys, who made a very respectable assortment of Scotchmen;
there were also twenty-one monks, quite a regiment; this _was_
considered strange, but the next day, when most of the silver was
missing, it was immediately surmised that these reverend gentlemen were
thieves, who had obtained surreptitious admission, and carried off the
valuables under their priestly robes.

There were also a few ladies, particular friends of the hostess, who
appeared, by permission, in no costume more ridiculous than that which
they were accustomed to wear daily, but who displayed the usual amount
of whalebone developments.

After the band arrived and was stationed in the conservatory out of
sight, an attempt was made to get up a dance. Spout introduced Dropper
to a prin