He induced every newspaper as its special New Year supplement to give away an attractive card on which practicable good resolutions could be written. The cards, inscribed, would be preserved until this New Year was old and out. It was the Mansion House procedure of last May-time repeated, spread over a very far wider area, destined to be similarly successful. A change came over casual converse. Instead of using such old phrases and time-worn tags as "How d’ye do?" or "Cold day, isn’t it?" people greeting each other asked, "Resolutions going strong?" It was surprising how much more interesting meetings became, and how invariably the answer was "Yes." Self-respect struggled to attain the affirmative answer. So there was progress in all ways, splendid progress. June’s company was growing so rapidly--every hour of the night and day bringing at least one recruit--that her mighty mimic ladyship was able to concentrate attention on the so-called Smart Set. She remembered the New Year’s party to be held at Liberty Hall and went to it, taking a regiment of elf-folk with her--Bim the only gnome. The fairies clustered about the door and stairways, and made fun of the white-headed footmen. "Why did these voluminous mortals wear that mess?" The night was bright with their satire. Regularly and rapidly the company of guests arrived. They came with their usual boisterousness, and then--and then---- The influence of the elves had a curious effect on hosts and on guests. It proved strangely restraining. Barnett Q. felt like a Sunday-school superintendent at a too-French French play, a humid pink of uncomfortable propriety. Mrs. Moss was, as usual, nervously fluttered with a new anxiety frightening her heart--how would her guests, destined to bask in ducal radiance, behave? Liberty Hall was metamorphosed. The noise, display, and wildness which heretofore had made its functions famous were rapidly replaced by a superfine straightness--a Bowdlerized bonhomie, self-conscious and constrained. The rabble of Comus was muzzled. Hoary sinners and flaxen-headed _mondaines_ were prim, simpering, moralizing, painfully on their goodily-good behaviour. They were nerve-fettered, with spirits weighed down. They knew it, they felt it, and could not comprehend or complain. The fairies held them in thrall. From the elves’ point of view it was supremely funny. Those spirit-masters of the revels laughed till many of them became bright scarlet. The Duke and Duchess of Armingham, accompanied by Geoffrey--who had done his best to induce his mother not to go--arrived at ten. Mrs. Moss breathed a sigh of relief. Now, come what might, her party was justified. Whatever the ultimate verdict might be, Vanity Fair must approve something. She had got the Duchess! The new guests, followed by the fairies, trooped into the ballroom. The band struck up a barn-dance, which was footed with decorum. Everybody was surprised, the Duchess agreeably so.