The London season! How often had the words fallen on the ears of the Australian family! What a world of meaning it conveyed to the juvenile section! Vast, mysterious, splendid—the acme of enjoyment—the _ne plus ultra_ of fashion. The pinnacle of perfection in all things desirable, with boundless riches as a substratum, solid, unquestioned, supreme among the nations, what power was like England? And here they were, actually living and breathing in her metropolis—the world’s metropolis, as they had often heard it called. After London there was nothing more to see—nothing more to learn. There were orders of nobility on the continent of Europe—Counts and Princes, Barons and Grafs, in profusion—but what were they to the nobility of England, where only the eldest son was heir to the ancestral title? Not cheapened, as abroad, by the law which gave the rank to every child of the house and to every child of _their_ children—thus multiplying titles, which having little or no means upon which to support the dignity, brought contempt upon the order and the race. Day by day as they rode or strolled in the parks they saw magnificent equipages, unsurpassed for beauty and uniformity—such as no other capital could supply—such horses, such carriages!—such equipages generally—as struck them with surprise and admiration. And the number and quality of them! As the sands of the sea—innumerable. They never seemed to come to an end. The private carriages were overpowering enough in all conscience, but by the Four-in-Hand Club—the Coaching Club—on the days of the annual processions, were they wonder-stricken, speechless! Such teams, with such action—in such condition! such coachmen—such footmen—beyond all conception of matching, all imagination of fashion and completeness!
Of course they had not been long in town before they were taken to the theatres and opera houses, where certain performances were in full vogue and acceptation. Here they were entranced by the perfection of the impersonations, the splendour of the staging, the pathos and the majesty of the finest vocal talent of the world, supported by the grandest instrumental harmony. Of this last consummation an Australian compatriot, born and reared to womanhood in a southern metropolis, was a _prima donna assoluta_ during that memorable season.