The five children were ranged in front, each of the three girls wearing a rose-bud on one side of her closely trimmed head, which rose-bud, as Mrs. Jones afterwards averred to her husband, must have been stuck there and held in its place by some hocus pocus, which no one but a play-house barber could contrive or execute. During the progress of the play, which was a melo-drama of what is called "thrilling interest," Peter Jones, who always himself paid the most exemplary attention to the scene before him, was annoyed to find that his wife was continually drawn in to talk, by the example of Mrs. Dodcomb and Miss Flimbrey, one of whom sat on each side of her, and who both kept up a running fire of questions, answers, and remarks during the whole of the performance--plays, as they said, being mere drugs to them. "How do you like that scarlet and gold dress?" said Mrs. Dodcomb. "Oh! it's beautiful!" replied Mrs. Jones, "and he's a beautiful man that wears it! What handsome legs he has?--and what a white neck for a man!--and such fine curly hair--" "You would not say so," said Mrs. Dodcomb, "if you were to see him in daylight without his paint, and without his chestnut wig (they have all sorts of wigs, even flax, tow, and yarn). His natural face and hair are both of the same clay-colour. As to his neck, it's nothing when it is not coated all over with whitening--and then his stage legs are always padded." "Mr. Jones, you are a judge of those things--what do you suppose that man's dress is made of?" asked Mr. Dodcomb. "Scarlet cloth and gold lace." "Fudge! it's only red flannel, trimmed with copper binding." "I'm sorry to hear that," observed Mrs. Jones--and during the remainder of the piece she designated him as "the man in the flannel jacket." "That's a pretty hat of his sweetheart's," she remarked, "that gauze hat with the long white feathers--how light and airy it looks!" Miss Flimbrey now giggled. "I made it myself, this morning," said she, "it's only thin catgut, with nothing at all outside--but at a distance, it certainly may be taken for transparent gauze." From this time Mrs. Jones distinguished the actress as "the woman with the catgut hat." The hero of the piece appeared in a new and magnificent dress, which was very much applauded, as new and showy dresses frequently are. It was a purple velvet, decorated profusely with gold ornaments, somewhat resembling rows of very large buttons; each button being raised or relieved in the centre, and having a flat rim round the edge. They went up all the seams of the back, and down the front of the jacket, and round the cuffs; and, being very bright and very close together, the effect was rich and unique. Also, one of them fastened the plume and looped up the hat, and two others glittered in the rosettes of the shoes. "Oh! how grand!--how very grand!" exclaimed Mrs. Jones. "This dress beats all the others!" "Upon my word, that trimming is fine," said Peter.