WELLINGTON SOCIAL GOSSIP.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1106, 12 May 1893, Page 19

WELLINGTON SOCIAL GOSSIP.

Wellington, May 11. Dear Aunt Ellen, —'To-day is a glorious day, and ifc is such a change that I feel inclined to celebrate the occasion with a little pas seul, as the ladies of the Gaiety Company do every evening. Their , dancing, especially Miss Lethbridge's, is charming, and the inconsequent manner in which it is introduced ha 3 the advantage of the unexpected. Everybody goes and laughs a great deal and then comes away and can tell you nothing about it, except that the ladies of the chorus wear tights, and that gentlemen of the chorus there are none, which is distinctly a pity I think. In ' Carmen ' there is—it sounds tame to say, even less plot than in the other two—such an absence of plot that you have the impression of a large kaleidoscope, which is shaken up and the scenes come out in any order. ' The Bogie Man' is a good song, and Lonnen's dance at the end was wonderful. He is as light as a piece of thistledown. His other great success in ' Carmen ' is ' The Man That Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo,' which has nothing in it but Lonnen. Carmen walks on and off the stage in the most delightfully inconsequent manner, and the whole thing seems to end satisfactorily to those concerned, though I have not the least idea how.

And now to turn to our own affair.?. Mrs Menteath gave a large afternoon tea as a farewell to her friends. She leaves this week foi? England. It was a wet afternoon, and, though numbers of people went, the rooms were not at all crowded. Mrs Menteath wore black silk with large moire sleeves, a most becoming gown. Mrs Grace, Mrs Pharazyn, Miss Holmes, Mrs Newman, Mrs Samuels, Mrs Johnston, and many others were there, besides a few gentlemen, who arrived very late on the scene, Miss Halse helped to pour out

the tea, and everyone spent a very pleasant afternoon, though the recollection that it was a farewell was sad.

There are several things in store for us, though two of them are got up with the design of extracting money from us as pleasantly as possible. Everyone who is not working for the Convalescent Home Gift Auction is learning a part for the theatricals in aid of the Catholic Infant School. If there is anyone who is not doing either, then they are expected to buy at the auction and to make an audience at the theatricals.

The Gift Auction will be a great success I prophesy. Everyone in town is taking it up enthusiastically, and the side shows and extra attractions will be very superior. The piece de resistance is to be, to put it plainly, a bazaar, but a bazaar of a glorified kind, with a gift auction running through it, and all kinds of other attractions worked in.

Of course, the Birthday Ball is the next bit of dissipation. Let us hope the whole seven hundred will not come. If measles or influenza would only lay half of them low, the other half might thoroughly enjoy themselves. There is a dancing class for tiny children now going on at Government House. The little people range between about three to eight, and are to be instructed in all the mysteries of dancing. It ought to be very pleasant for them during the winter months.

The crinoline scare is dying a natural death. We are to be left in peace with our neat skirts after all. So far it looks as though mackintoshes and galoshes would be most worn this winter, with the addition of a neat umbrella. There is one comfort at least —if we have trains we can't have crinolines, and if we have crinolines we can't have trains. In case our worst fears were realised, what should we do with our crinolines on a wet day. We could never button our mackintoshes round them, ; and, if we could, it would look too funny. The old grey waterproof would have to be revived, with its roomy skirts, long shoulders, and elastic-gathered sleeves. But sufficient for the day, &c, and I will wish you good-bye.

Kittie Clyve