Her gown to-night is of orchard green, trimmed with apple-blossoms, a single pink spray of them caught in her hair. The rounding, satin grace of her slender arms, sloping to the opal-tipped fingers, the exquisite line from ear to shoulder strap, the melting ripeness of her chin and throat, the tender pink and white of her fine skin, the capricious, inciting tilt of her small head, the dainty lift of her short nose,--these allurements she has inventoried with a calculating and satisfied eye. She is glad to believe that there is every reason why it will soon be over. And, since the whole loaf is notoriously better than a half, here is the engaging son of the house, also firmly bent upon the high emprise of matrimony; handsome, with the chin, it may be, slightly receding; but an unexcelled leader of cotillions, a surpassing polo-player, clever, winning, and dressed with an effect that has long made him remarked in polite circles, which no mere money can achieve. Money, indeed, if certain ill-natured gossip of tradesmen be true, has been an inconsiderable factor in the encompassment of this sartorial distinction. He waits now, eager for a first glimpse of the young woman whose charms, even by report, have already won the best devotion he has to give. A grievous error it is to suppose that Cupid's artillery is limited to bow and arrows. And now, instead of the rude commercial horde that laughed loudly and ate uncouthly at the board of the Barbarian, we shall sit at table with people born to the only manner said to be worth possessing;--if we except, indeed, the visiting tribe of Bines, who may be relied upon, however, to behave at least unobtrusively. As a contrast to the oppressively Western matron from Kansas City, here is Mistress Fidelia Oldaker on the arm of her attentive son. She would be very old but for the circumstance that she began early in life to be a belle, and age cannot stale such women. Brought up with board at her back, books on her head, to guard her complexion as if it were her fair name, to be diligent at harp practice and conscientious with the dancing-master, she is almost the last of a school that nursed but the single aim of subjugating man. To-night, at seventy-something, she is a bit of pink bisque fragility, bubbling tirelessly with reminiscence, her vivacity unimpaired, her energy amazing, and her coquetry faultless. From which we should learn, and be grateful therefor, that when a girl is brought up in the way she ought to go she will never be able to depart from it.