living again in “good old times”! I’ve heard--though I don’t answer for it--that two or three of ’em were so carried away by the thought, that, to keep up the happiness as long as they could, they went to bed in their clothes, high-heeled shoes and all. At this very moment, they _do_ say Lord ---- is still in his embroidered coat and smalls, with a wig like a white cloud upon him. He declares 1715 is such a “good old time” that nothing shall make him go on again to 1845. He has ordered flambeaux for his servants, and now and then talks about going to Ranelagh. Moreover, by people quite worthy of belief, it is feared his delusion, as they call it, is spreading, as they call it, amongst certain high folks; many of ’em thinking themselves a hundred years back, and wanting to make Acts of Parliament in the spirit of that good old time. See, Kitty, how a Powdered Ball may turn the highest heads--even the nobs of the country! The ladies were, of course, all jewelled, and very fine. Oh, what a fortune some of ’em would have been to a poor man--with their stomachers! But, Kitty, there is one odd thing at these masks and balls: how is it that young ladies--with names as white as snow--sometimes take the character, fly-spotted and damaged as they are, of sinful love-birds? You, Kitty, being a woman, can explain this; but to me, one of the ignorant rough sex, it does seem odd that a pure young lady should dress herself as Nelly Gwynne, or any other person of the sort, when the aforesaid pure lady would squeak--and, no doubt, very proper--at the living creature as if it was a toad. Can you explain this, Kitty? Do they take such characters, just as they put black patches on their cheeks, to bring out their own white all the stronger? Or is it that there’s a sort of idle daring in it, just as children play with fire, though they never mean to burn themselves? I can’t make it out; but how should I expect it--I, a poor, weak, ignorant man--how should I unriddle a creature that’s puzzled Solomon? Of course there was an account of the dresses. Well, when I opened the _Morning Post_, and saw whole columns built o’ nothing but velvets and satins, and all that, if I didn’t grin--like a clown through a collar for a new hat--at the vanity of life.