The history of Teresa Cornelys is very singular, showing how a nobody--for no one knows even from what part of Germany she came--could come here, and, by her business qualities, and tact, become a person absolutely indispensable to Society. All we know of her is that she was supposed to be a German, who had been a public singer, both in France, and Germany, and that she came over here about 1756 or 1757. Whether there was a Herr Cornelys alive, we have no knowledge--but she had a son, and daughter. That she was not bad looking, is evidenced by her portrait, which must have been taken in her declining years: that she must have been shrewd, business-like, and possessed of much _savoir faire_, is undeniable--for she held "Society" in her grasp, and, for a time, made it do just what she wanted. What she did for the first five, or six years, after her coming to England is not known, but she must have been possessed of some Capital, or she could not have taken, as she did, Carlisle House--a mansion in Soho Square. Here she started a sort of fashionable Social Club, called "The Society," either in 1762, or 1763, and this was its programme. "The subscription is seven guineas for twelve nights, one ticket each, which introduces only one person, whether gentleman, or lady; but there are frequent subscriptions in the year, and two ladies may be admitted six nights on one subscription. No person can be admitted a Subscriber to this Society, but through the recommendation of a subscriber. Four ladies of quality, having each of them a book, have the joint management, direction, and choice, of the subscribers; every one's name must be entered in one of those ladies' books. "A non-subscriber can only be admitted by a subscriber's ticket, writing his, or her name on the back; in consequence of which rule, and to avoid the possibility of improper company, their names are, immediately after the night is over, printed, and hung up in the outer room. "The doors are opened, at 9 o'clock, of the lower rooms, which consist of six, each superior to the other; few people, however, assemble before 10, and those who profess themselves of the genteelest order, not till eleven, when they walk about, and amuse themselves with accosting their acquaintance, and forming themselves into select parties for the evening; then regaling with jellies, syllabubs, cakes, orgeat, lemonade, fruits, &c., prepared in a kind of arched shelving all round the hangings of the tea room. "At ten, the upper flight of rooms open, which consist of two large rooms, besides a very large ball room, furnished, and hung, in the most superb taste, with an exceeding good band of music in an orchestra erected at the upper end, and rows of benches, down the sides, placed one above the other. In this room they dance country dances, but no minuets at all. "At half-past eleven, the company in general repair to tea, and have small round tables for their separate parties.