As for the rest of society--how the people had drums and routs and balls; how they angled for husbands; how they were hollow and unnatural, and so forth--you may read about it in the pages of Thackeray. And I, for one, have never been able to understand how Thackeray got his knowledge of these exclusive circles. Instead of dancing at Almack’s he was taking his chop and stout at the Cock; instead of gambling at Crockford’s he was writing ‘copy’ for any paper which would take it. When and where did he meet Miss Newcome and Lady Kew and Lord Steyne? Perhaps he wrote of them by intuition, as Disraeli wrote the ‘Young Duke.’ ‘My son, sir,’ said the elder Disraeli proudly, ‘has never, I believe, even seen a Duke.’ One touch more. There is before me a beautiful, solemn work, one in which the writer feels his responsibilities almost too profoundly. It is on no less important a subject than Etiquette, containing Rules for the Conduct of Life on the most grave and serious occasions. I permit myself one or two extracts:-- ‘Familiarity is the greatest vice of Society. When an acquaintance says “My dear fellow,” cut him immediately.’ ‘Never enter your own house without bowing to every one you may meet there.’ ‘Never ask a lady any questions about anything whatever.’ ‘If you have drunk wine with every one at the table and wish for more’--Heavens! More! And after drinking with every one at the table!--‘wait till the cloth is removed.’ ‘Never permit the sanctity of the drawing-room to be violated by a Boot.’ CHAPTER VIII. AT THE PLAY AND THE SHOW. Fifty years ago the Theatre was, far more than at present, the favourite amusement of the Londoners. It was a passion with them. They did not go only to laugh and be pleased as we go now; they went as critics; the pit preserves to this day a reputation, long since lost, for critical power. A large number of the audience went to every new performance of a stock piece in order to criticise. After the theatre they repaired to the Albion or the Cock for supper, and to talk over the performance. Fifty years ago there were about eighteen theatres, for a London of two millions.[2] [2] The following were the London theatres in the year 1837: Her Majesty’s, formerly the King’s; Drury Lane, Covent Garden, the ‘Summer House,’ or Haymarket; the Lyceum, the Prince’s (now St. James’s), the Adelphi, the City of London (Norton Folgate), the Surrey, Astley’s, the Queen’s (afterwards the Prince of Wales’s), the Olympic, and the Strand, the Coburg (originally opened as the Victoria in 1833), Sadler’s Wells, the Royal Pavilion, the Garrick, and the Clarence (now the King’s Cross).