Before the dancing commenced one could walk about and breathe without any extraordinary discomfort, but after that the _bouquet d’Afrique_ really became quite too, too. I have always held very much the same opinion about dancing as that expressed by the pacha in Salmagundi, and I should have liked then to have been seated afar off on some eminence with a good telescope. It was pitiful to observe the struggles of the _belles_ to appear cool (these poor creatures cannot, of course, like their European sisters, use powder, unless indeed, they used gunpowder or coal-dust), and how at last they gave it up as hopeless, and used their handkerchiefs energetically. A new Administrator had arrived at Lagos a few days previously, and he had to open the ball with the leading Lagos lady. Poor man, he did not seem at all at home, and was evidently unaccustomed to move in such high society. After the ceremony was over he kept going about like one dazed, rubbing his hands together, and bowing and asking what would be the next article. Some people said that the infliction had been too much for his brain, and that he was thinking of his earlier days, but I don’t know.
I noticed that the negro gentlemen were scrupulously polite and dignified, and talked, so to speak, on conversational stilts; the ladies tried hard to do the same, but the high pressure was too much for them. One sable beau went up to a charming creature in pink and yellow, and, bowing by a succession of jerks, said:--
“May I, Miss, enjoy the unparalleled gratification of your hand for the next polka?”
“Oh I yes, Mr. Smith--I’m orful fond of polking--Good Lard! what a fine coat you’ve got. I ’spect that cloth cost quite two dollars a yard now, didn’t it?”
Later on, when the fumes of the gooseberry wine, brandy, and rum began to mount to the heads of the assembly, a good deal of the veneering came off the manners and morals, and violent embracings took place in the more retired spots. Then one or two personal encounters occurred between jealous swains, while others, under the influence of ardent spirits, came and tried to pick quarrels with the few Europeans who were present, so I went away just as the orgie was beginning.