A great many other members of the aristocracy shared Her Grace’s feelings, and many of them were delighted by the novelty, and all of them gazed at the young ladies and gentlemen of the establishment as if they were animals of some unknown description. I don’t think the gentlemen and the young ladies were at all offended. They gazed too with a kindred feeling, and made notes of the dresses, and watched the manners and habits of “the swells” with equal curiosity and admiration. The young ladies in the linen and in the cloak and mantle department were naturally more excited about the appearance of the fine ladies from a book-of-fashion point of view than were the dressmakers and milliners, who sat, as it were, on the permanent committee of the “Mode,” and knew “what was to be worn.” But even they were excited to find themselves in the same room with so many dresses from Paris, with robes which Wörth had once tried on, and ribbons which Elise had touched. I fear all these influences were rather adverse to the due enjoyment of the trial scene from Pickwick, with Miss Robinson in the part of Serjeant Buzfuz. The fine people shrugged their shoulders, and lifted their eyebrows at each other, and cheered ironically now and then with twitters of laughter; and the small people were too intent upon the study of their betters to do justice to the performance. Phil, indeed, shrieked with laughter, knowing all the points, with the exactitude of a showman, and led his _claque_ vigorously; but I think, on the whole, the _employés_ of Tottenham’s would have enjoyed this part of the entertainment more had their attention been undisturbed. After the first part of the performances was over, there was an interval for “social enjoyment;” and it was now that the gorgeous footmen appeared with the ices, about whom Mr. Tottenham had informed his children. Lady Mary, perhaps, required a little prompting from her husband before she withdrew herself from the knot of friends who had collected round her, and addressed herself instead to the young ladies of the shop. “Must we go and talk to them, Mr. Tottenham? Will they like it? or shall we only bore them?” asked the fine ladies. The Duchess of Middlemarch was, as became her rank, the first to set them the example. She went up with her double eyeglass in her hand to a group of the natives who were standing timorously together--two young ladies and a gentleman. “It has been very nice, has it not,” said Her Grace; “_quite_ clever. Will you get me an ice, please? and tell me who was the young woman--the young lady who acted so well? I wonder if I have seen her when I have been here before.” “Yes, Your Grace,” said one of the young ladies. “She is in the fancy department, Miss Robinson. Her father is at the head of the cloaks and mantles, Your Grace.”