There may be diverse opinions as to Thomas Moore's greatness, but there can scarcely be two as to his lyric gift. He could write charming love-songs, simple and yet full of colour, and, given the Oriental theme, it is no wonder that youths and maidens of his day sighed and smiled over "Lalla Rookh" as over nothing that had yet been written for them. It is a delightful tale, half-prose and half-poetry, written entirely and whole-heartedly for lovers, and Burgwyne and Matilda found it easy to put themselves in the places of the romantic characters in the drama--Lalla Rookh, the incomparably beautiful Eastern Princess and Feramorz, the young Prince in disguise, "graceful as that idol of women, Crishna." [Illustration: GROVE STREET. Looking toward St. Luke's Church.] They secretly agreed to go to the masked ball at the Brevoorts' as their romantic favourites and prototypes. The detailed descriptions in the book gave them sufficient inspiration. She wore floating gauzes, bracelets, "a small coronet of jewels" and "a rose-coloured, bridal veil." His dress was "simple, yet not without marks of costliness," with a "high Tartarian cap.... Here and there, too, over his vest, which was confined by a flowered girdle of Kaskan, hung strings of fine pearls, disposed with an air of studied negligence." So they met at the ball and danced together, and I suppose he quoted: _"Fly to the desert, fly with me, Our Arab tents are rude for thee; But, oh! the choice what heart can doubt, Of tents with love, or thrones without?"_ Obviously she chose the tents with love, for as the clock struck four they slipped away together and were married! As Lossing puts it: "They left the festive scene together at four o'clock in the morning, and were married before breakfast." They did not change their costumes, dear things! They wanted the romantic trappings for their love poem--a love poem which was to them more enchanting--more miraculous--than that of Lalla Rookh and the King of Bucharia. I hope they lived happily ever after, like the brave, young romanticists they were! In 1835 a hotel was opened on the corner of Eighth Street and Fifth Avenue, and it was appropriately named for the illustrious family over the way. The Brevoort House is certainly as historic a pile, socially speaking, as lower New York has to offer. Arthur Bartlett Maurice says of it: "In the old-time novels of New York life visiting Englishmen invariably stopped at the Brevoort." Of this hotel more anon, since it has recently become knit into the fabric of the modern Village.