This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
By George Meredith
My father stood in the lobby of the Opera, holding a sort of open court,it appeared to me, for a cluster of gentlemen hung round him; and I hadpresently to bow to greetings which were rather of a kind to flatter me,leading me to presume that he was respected as well as marvelled at.The names of Mr. Serjeant Wedderburn, Mr. Jennings, Lord Alton,Sir Weeton Slater, Mr. Monterez Williams, Admiral Loftus, the Earl ofWitlington, were among those which struck my ear, and struck me as goodones. I could not perceive anything of the air of cynical satellites inthese gentlemen—on the contrary, they were cordially deferential. Ifelt that he was encompassed by undoubted gentlemen, and my warmerfeelings to my father returned when I became sensible of the pleasantsway he held over the circle, both in speaking and listening. Hissympathetic smile and semi-droop of attention; his readiness, whenoccasion demanded it, to hit the key of the subject and help it on withthe right word; his air of unobtrusive appreciation; his sensibility tothe moment when the run of conversation depended upon him—showedinimitable art coming of natural genius; and he did not lose a shade ofhis superior manner the while. Mr. Serjeant Wedderburn, professionallyvoluble, a lively talker, brimming with anecdote, but too sparkling,too prompt, too full of personal relish of his point, threw my father'surbane supremacy into marked relief; and so in another fashion did theEarl of Witlington, 'a youth in the season of guffaws,' as Jorian DeWittdescribed him, whom a jest would seize by the throat, shaking his saplingframe. Jorian strolled up to us goutily. No efforts of my father'swould induce him to illustrate his fame for repartee, so it remainedestablished. 'Very pretty waxwork,' he said to me of our Englishbeauties swimming by. 'Now, those women, young Richmond, if they wereinflammable to the fiftieth degree, that is, if they had the fiftiethpart of a Frenchwoman in them, would have canvassed society on the greatman's account long before this, and sent him to the top like a bubble.He wastes his time on them. That fat woman he's bowing to is ViscountessSedley, a porcine empress, widow of three, with a soupcon of bigamy toflavour them. She mounted from a grocer's shop, I am told. Constitutionhas done everything for that woman. So it will everywhere—it beats theworld! Now he's on all-fours to Lady Rachel Stokes, our purearistocracy; she walks as if she were going through a doorway, andcouldn't risk an eyelid. I 'd like to see her tempting St. Anthony.That's little Wreckham's wife: she's had as many adventures as Gil Blasbefore he entered the Duke of Lerma's service.' He reviewed severalladies, certainly not very witty when malignant, as I remembered myfather to have said of him. 'The style of your Englishwoman is to keepthe nose exactly at one elevation, to show you're born to it. Theydaren't run a gamut, these women. These Englishwomen are a fiction! Themodel of them is the nursery-miss, but they're like the names of truelovers cut on the bark of a t