Part 5

And here is the last portrait in our gallery--the rich or MONEYED wife. We would like entirely to discontinue the manufacture of this model and substitute for it, on all future occasions, the old-fashioned, penniless, demure, rosy-cheeked, Oh Alfred, all-for-love, type of wife, but, alas, business is business, and rents, and club dues, and golf balls, and servants wages, are all going up, so why not recognize the fact that a rich wife is a good thing to _begin_ on; something to hang on to until you get up a little free action in the direction of True Love? The only trouble with marrying a rich wife is that, when you sign up for life, you are handed a leather leash along with the wedding certificate. Put a metal collar on your neck and a little red velvet blanket around your middle and you might just as well be Yami, or Sing Hi, or Chihuahua, the only three things in the world that your female meal-ticket really seems to love. Observe the prisoner’s heart-breaking, backward glance! The cry of anguish: the caged spirit, sending out an S.O.S. to two lovely nymphs.

Opening of the Opera Season

_The opera opened--to crowded boxes--with the usual performance of “Aïda.” Such of the fashionable people who came an act late, left an act early, slept during the second act, and talked in between times, passed an unusually pleasant evening._

THE POOR, INNOCENT VICTIM

What type of bridge player is the most spirit-blighting? Some favor the talking player; some the cheat--but we must vote, on every ballot, for the three girlies mirrored on this page. First, there is the creature shown above, who, after losing five rubbers, suddenly registers horror with the orbs, and exclaims in dismay: “Heavens! are we playing for _money_? I never dreamed of such a thing! I _never_ play for anything!” Note the indifference of the other participants--intensified by financial anguish.

Blighters at Bridge

_A Terrifying Triumvirate of Familiar Lady Auction Pests_

THE BLIGHTER, _PAR EXCELLENCE_

The supreme Blighter is undoubtedly that moon-faced Medusa who, after each and every hand, lays it out, and delivers herself of a lengthy post-mortem, the object of which is to prove that there must be something mentally wrong with her partner and that he ought to be put under observation, at once, by a first class alienist. She usually passes for a lady, so that violent reprisals, however desirable, are not always possible.

THE HOODOO-ED DOWAGER

Explain, if you can, why luck always seems to run the wrong way with Certain Sensitive Dowagers, just as the game is at its tensest? It does, you know,--with the result that the poor Persecuted One insists upon holding up the rubber while she does a majestic Marathon round and round her little gilt chair. Such childish overtures to Chance may be employed by ladies in many trifling matters, such as Love, Marriage, and Divorce, but, Georgiana, dear! try to remember, this is BRIDGE!

A Way to Succeed on the Stage

_A Lady, Once a Creature of Fashion, and Now a Famous Actress, Tells of Her Success_

CONSIDER YOUR AUDIENCE

“So many heartbroken girls have asked my advice on how to achieve an artistic destiny on the stage, that a frank word or two, on such a theme, may not be amiss. To begin with, girls should remember that the wishes and tastes of their audience have to be considered--before everything. An artistic standard that does not meet with popular approval must, of necessity, be a false standard to work by. Take my little bit, for instance, in the third act of ‘Houp-La.’ I tried to interest my audience in my wonderful imitations of the Allied statesmen. But, try as I would, I left them cold. Then, my manager, one of the best dramatic critics I have ever met, drew my attention to what he deemed a radical defect in my performance. The subjects of my imitations, he said, were all too _restful_! Not one of them was associated, in the public mind, with movement--especially with the movement which we know as Kicking. So I changed my repertoire to include impersonations of Nijinski, and Miassine, with the result that my act has been a veritable _riot_.

“So, remember, girls, consider your audience.”

REMEMBER YOUR MOTHER

“I want to insist upon the importance--in an artiste--of listening to the counsel of a good manager. Only last night, for instance, after the ring-down in my triumphal screen scene in ‘A Woman at Bay,’ (the one in which the screen, behind which I am dressing, is knocked over by the maid), my manager joined me, in the Ritz grill, and gave me the most wonderful advice in the world. He showed me how I could kill the star’s act by laughing in the middle of it; how I could steal the leading man’s entrance; how I could get the spot for a whole act--by giving the spotlight operator a Tecla pearl pin; how I could centre the publicity man’s interest in little me (merely by kindness) and how I could get my name up, in gas, merely by asking a dear friend of mine--(who is the President of a steel company) to invest some money in a musical comedy which my manager is going to put on. He has also given me advice about my dear mother. He thinks that the city air is disagreeing with her, and he suggests that, in the country, he could engage a single room for her--with the use of a bath--where she could pass the winter very comfortably. So there is _another_ thing to remember, girls: ‘Always be good to your mother!’”

TRY TO BE KIND TO THE CRITICS

“And now, girls, here is one more point. Remember that critics are Human. They never seem so, of course, when you read their stuff, but my experience has been that they are susceptible to little kindnesses. Martha, my maid,--she has been with me since I left the convent--always asks Izzy Stern--he is my personal press representative--to invite the critics back to my little dressing-room, after every first performance. I have a few bon-bons, or cigarettes, or new stories, or orchids there, which I distribute among them, along with a smile, a laughing word, and--on rare occasions--a little kiss, on the tips of their funny old noses. So, girls, there’s _another_ lesson! Always be kind to the critics.”

THE BEAUTY OF MODERATION

“And now, I have only one more word to say. Try always to be regular in your habits. Half of the failures on the stage--among feminine artistes, at least--are due to the fact that actresses do not observe a _regular_ mode of living. I have only one rule! Be Regular! For instance, I never dream of taking a pint of champagne for supper on Monday, and then three pints on Tuesday. No, I always take two pints every night in the week, including Sunday. I keep my cigarettes down, in the same way, to two boxes a day. One headache powder in the morning! One trional powder at night! One bouquet from each admirer, every evening. Never any more: never any less! So girls this is my parting word to you all: Be Moderate; be Regular; be Good. Moderation always pays--in the long run.”

Sports for the Summer

_The Increasingly Feminine Tone of Outdoor Diversions_

MOTORING

It has been a busy Summer for our lusty young athletes. Golf tournaments, tennis championships; polo, sparring, sea bathing, (see opposite page). Then there was also motoring, canoodling, dancing, and working at the office in order to pay income taxes. This picture shows the most dangerous of all the smart Summer sports--motoring. Indeed it may be said that a lad is never safe in a motor--when there is a lady about. Oh, and gentle Reader,--do you believe in signs?

CANOODLING

Canoeing is practically the safest of all our Summer sports. Safest because little _attachments_ are virtually impossible while indulging in it. A sentimental chap, when canoeing, may drown, to be sure, but he is safe from the menace of having a lady drape herself around his neck like a constrictor, an occurrence which is quite possible in motoring. When you propose in a canoe, don’t be afraid of shocking the silly birds--they are used to it.

SLAVING

What with the eighteen different kinds of taxes which the late Emperor William is causing us to pay into the Treasury, a chap had to slave away at the office last Summer, or else force his wife and children to go without the luxuries of life, that is, motor cars, sugar, diamonds, and eggs.

DANCING

Dancing, this past Summer, was just about as enlivening as taking a cup of camomile tea with two titled women in a cathedral close. This is a little scene at a fashionable house-party. Note that the only youthful cavalier in sight is just home from school, and has been dancing with Lady Muriel Pitt Powyss (his mother’s distinguished guest) until he is fed up with it to the point of the tonsils.

SEA BATHING HAS BECOME THE KING OF ALL THE DRY SPORTS

Fashionable Débutantes may sometimes safely sojourn by the sea, but it is a good rule never actually to immerse one’s body in the fluid.

The Strategy and Finesse of Proposing

_Advance Leaves from 1921 Handbook of Courtship_

THE PROPOSAL BY LETTER

A faint-hearted method--not at all recommended. Letters are all very well in their way, but, if a wooer wishes to get absolutely sure results, he ought, in person, to be on hand when the terrible moment arrives. Letters of proposal have any number of drawbacks. For instance: (1) They may miscarry and be delivered to the wrong candidate--some lady who leaves you cold. Or (2) the dear girl may accept you--by a somewhat precipitate telegram--before you have had time to think the thing over, in which case you will find yourself in the cart. (3) Letters sound so deucedly silly when the attorneys get up to read them in the courtroom for the benefit of the press. Finally (4), a letter never has the force of a good face-to-face recitation. The pen, though mighty, is hardly to be compared in efficacy with the three great aids to wooing: the capacious sofa, the soft-shaded lamp, and the smouldering fire. So, dismiss the page-boy and step around to Irene’s yourself.

THE PROPOSAL TERPSICHOREAN

There is only one certain way of making the modern débutante--like Muriel, for instance--capitulate, and that is to dance her into complete submission. Just accept every single engraved invitation that comes to you at your club--so long as it mentions dancing--and then go and dedicate yourself to the job of keeping Muriel turning. Remember, that, nowadays, hearts and thrones are oftenest won by revolutions. Remember that it is only in dancing, that a man inspires in a woman that close feeling of confidence so essential to bliss and felicity in the married state. So, if a maiden is even a little wary of your advances, or in any way disposed to fight you off, just get some willing friend to strafe the piano for you, then lift the diffident child out of her chair, give her position A, and launch out with her upon the whirlpools of the dance.

THE PROPOSAL, A LA PASHA

If you think it demeaning and ignoble to be loved for your pelf alone, try to remember that no girl accustomed to the sort of things which she is forever seeing advertised, is going to marry a man who never gives her anything but roses, and, here and there, a chocolate or two. In giving presents to the little dear, try always to stick to jewels. True love thrives best in a young lady’s bosom, on a diet of pearls, rubies, emeralds, sapphires and diamonds. Oh, and another thing! If she marries you, you have a half equity in the stones. If she _doesn’t_ marry you, you can force her mother to return them. Flowers fade! Bonbons vanish. But good diamonds _shine on forever_.

THE PROPOSAL BY TELEPHONE

In a great progressive city like ours, especially with stocks jumping up about five points a day--you can’t very well expect a chap to leave the stock-ticker in his club or in his café, trot up to the social zone and loaf round a girl’s house all day. And that merely to propose to her as soon as she has--at the end of an hour or so--consented to dress and give her hair and complexion the careful treatment which she always has to give them when she receives visitors. This is a very busy little world and a proposal over the wire often saves an immense amount of time--and sometimes two or three points margin at your brokers’. So, wherever she is, telephone! Don’t waste time. Call her up anywhere, even in her bedroom. This little sketch shows the delightfully intimate relationship which is sometimes established between the dining-room at a man’s Club and the bathing pavilion contiguous to a lady’s sleeping room. It was a scene such as this that inspired the composer who in a moment of supreme inspiration, wrote that lyrical gem entitled “Hullo, Central, Give Me Heaven.” In proposing by telephone, it is of course just as well to get the right girl on the wire. A friend of ours recently became a trifle confused--after being accepted by a female voice, to learn that the houri at the other end of the telephone was no less a dignitary than his lady-love’s maiden aunt.

THE PROPOSAL BY PHONOGRAPH

Our new, exclusive, patented, and correct model for diffident bachelors. No more plucking of marguerites (she loves me, she loves my car, etc.). No more tortured proposals on the knees (ruining the fit of the new trousers). If she accepts, she writes to you. If she refuses, she files the record along with her latest Hawaiian Aloha song. In buying your proposal records, insist on having the phonograph people insert your name and hers on the discs,--_without charge_. The names can be added in less than ten minutes’ time. If you are a busy man, you can of course order your records by the dozen--merely cautioning the makers to use the names of as many girls as you happen to be wooing at the time. You can then distribute the records to the girls and await developments. In case you should happen to receive two or more acceptances, the simplest method is to toss a coin.

LANDED AT LAST

The artist has mercifully drawn a veil over the hero in this scene. This is always the way you finish. You try out your proposals on different girls and find yourself landed at last with a big, masterful sort of sparring partner, a girl who grabbed you when you weren’t looking and marched you up the aisle with the Lohengrin record turned on at third speed. And, behind you and your big masterful girl, there stalks that dreadful mother of hers, and her soul-blighting Uncle Cyril, and her dreadful little twin brothers, and then--walking with a man whom you happen to hate--the bride’s sister Gertie, the bright little girl whom you _really meant to marry_.

THE NEWLY RICH ELEMENT

Heroic little bands like this annually advance upon the fashionable resorts, to make an overt attack upon society. These invaders come from the heart of the wilds, where the head of the family (merely a courtesy title) is known locally as the Gravel Roof King. Little family groups of this sort are not considered complete without four daughters, at least, each more painfully unmarried than the rest.

Palmy Days at the Seaside

_Sights at the Bathing Resorts When the Season for Salt Water is Declared On_

FOND MEMORIES

There is, alas, but little of this sort of thing, these days. The spectacle of a venerable waiter, working himself into a healthy glow over the wholesome indoor exercise of bottle-opening is becoming rarer every day. A corkscrew, once the national emblem, will soon be but a relic for a civic museum.

ON THE SIDE LINES

It is such little groups as these that lend a really homelike air to the seaside resorts. These pillars of society know the entire history of the resort by heart; they are specialists on dates, social standing, if any, and previous conditions of matrimony. They are a complete Guide to the closet skeletons of all the married and unmarried guests in the hotel.

THE CINEMA VAMP

This year the movie vampire is on the promenade resting from the outdoor scenes of her new picture, “The Super-Sin,” which will barely get by the national board of censorship. The cinema vampire is highly unpopular with the débutantes at the seaside resort. They seem always to resent professional competition.

THE TENNIS HOUNDS

Any day you may see the tennis hounds assembling at the court for a set of mixed--hopelessly mixed--doubles. The curious thing about most of these strange creatures is that no living-eye has ever beheld them actually playing; they appear on the court with much ceremony, carrying all the properties, and wearing the most technically correct costumes, but that is as far as most of these sartorial creatures ever seem to go.

MIXED FOURSOMES

There is always a liberal assortment of these foursomes scattered over the seaside golf course. They are the slowest-moving bodies known to science; there is a wait of twenty minutes on every tee, while an argument rages as to whether it took Ethel fifteen or seventeen to get out of the rough, every argument, for and against, being carefully considered. Any other players who happen to be golfing on the course at the time, have just about as much chance of passing as the Germans had at Verdun.

THE RECENTLY RICH

The little gatherings of those to whom wealth has all the refreshing charm of novelty are a familiar and well-loved sight in the seaside resorts. They have done nicely for themselves in munitions stocks, and expect to devote the years of peace to well-earned spending.

THE LURE OF THE STAGE

It is simply wonderful how the drama has helped our resorts along. It’s surprising how much a pair of friendly young actresses can add to the charm of a place. The male half of the visitors are unanimous in declaring that the drama is the greatest institution of the age.

SEASIDE PANORAMA

Ask any experienced traveler what impressed him most about the seaside, and he will immediately answer that the welcome committee, which met him at the portals of the hotel, and which bade him a tender farewell, is the memory which he will cherish longest,--even to his dying day.

GLIMPSES WITHIN

How little we know of the “vie intime” of the fashionable stage idols, twinkling stars in the dramatic firmament, far-removed from the orchestra astronomers. It has been our recent privilege to interview, at close range, lovely Angeline Etoille, the famous dancer of two continents, whose throbbing reactions to the simple things of life are indeed a revelation. Her enthusiasm for her art is inspiring. Her whole life, for that matter, may be said to be a lesson in adorable enthusiasms.

An Interview with A Great Dancer

_Privileged Peeps into the Soul of Mlle. Angeline, of Paris_

BARKING BLOSSOMS

“Animals! I adore them,” cried la Belle Etoille. “I could not exist without them. Only see my three canine graces, Rose, Violet, and Lily. My maid sprays each one of them with its name-perfume every morning.”

ALONG THE BEACH

“There is only one word,” said Mlle. A., “which describes the ocean in all its moods of calm and storm, fickle as a lover, rising and falling like the stock-market, as changeable in color as the fashion in hair. It is ‘adorable.’”

THE MOTHER INSTINCT

When we spoke of children, the lovely dancer’s face took on a madonna-like expression. “I adore them,” she faltered. “I often borrow my sister’s twins, for photographic purposes. It is my crown of sorrow that I have none of my own, but, as I am young and unmarried; what would you?”

BUCOLIC BEAUTIES

“One of the most adorable things in an adorable world,” said the dainty danseuse, “is the country. The lowing kine, the bleating lambs, the bosky dells, all within season-ticket distance. It is my dream. I constantly see myself as a shepherdess, strolling through the meadows, whispering my little secrets to the bees and birds.”

THE FLORAL TRIBUTE

“How can I express my love of flowers except by saying that I adore them?” questioned the exquisite Angeline. “They are, with me, a passion, and, do you know, I can gauge a man’s devotion by the way he sends me flowers. If he spends more than his salary--he loves me. If he spends _only_ his salary, I know that he is cold.”

ANGELINE’S ADORABLE ADIEU

It was with real regret that our interviewer rose to take his leave of the dancing idol. The great diva, reclining on the great divan, had given us such a charming close-up of her soul that, for a moment, we felt specially privileged. And then, a fatal moment! we noted, behind the arras, and protruding beyond the lower right-hand cushion, a smartly shod male foot--a well-rounded male knee, and we realized instinctively that others beside ourselves had found Mlle. Etoille--adorable.

Transcriber’s Notes

The chapter titles do not always occur at the top of the respective chapters.

Inconsistencies in spelling, lay-out, use of accents, etc. have been retained; only some minor obvious typographical errors have been corrected silently. Errors in non-English words have not been corrected.