The foot-boxing was followed by dancing and gymnastic exercises; nor was music wanting, for a band had been provided, which executed some pieces skillfully enough. I was not so well pleased with the songs of a number of native girls, who had been taught by a missionary residing with Mr. Laborde. They knew a number of songs by heart, and did not scream in such shrill fashion as those whom we had before heard; on the contrary, their performance was tolerably correct; but it was a dreary entertainment, and I was devoutly thankful when they came to the last bar.
A little before six o’clock came the prince, accompanied by his little son, his beloved Mary, and a female friend of hers. Mary made even a less favorable impression upon me than when I first saw her. The fault was in her dress, for she was attired completely in the European style. Whatever other people may say, the stiff, exaggerated fashions diffused by Paris over the world do not charm me, even when worn by our own countrywomen, and only look well on those whom nothing can disfigure; but where there is a complete lack of natural beauty and grace, they become whimsical and ridiculous, and particularly so in conjunction with clumsy figures and monkey faces. Madame Mary may be a very good creature, and I should not like to offend her in any way; but that did not prevent me from being obliged to bite my lips till the blood almost came in the effort to avoid laughing aloud at her appearance. Over half a dozen stiff-hooped petticoats she wore a woolen dress with a number of great flounces, and great bows of ribbon, the latter fastened, not in front, but at the back. She had thrown a French shawl over her shoulders, and could never arrange it to her satisfaction; and on the top of her head, woolly as a curled poodle’s, was perched a quizzical little bonnet of reeds.
Her friend wore a muslin dress, and a cap of such antiquated form that, sexagenarian as I am, I could never remember having seen one of similar fashion; but afterward I remembered having seen a similar one on a portrait of my grandmother, who lived about the middle of the last century. This woman, who was of a more clumsy figure and had uglier features than Mary, positively frightened me every time I looked at her; she always gave me the idea of a cannibal chief in disguise.