NOT IN THE PAPERS.

Observer, Volume 4, Issue 97, 22 July 1882, Page 294

NOT IN THE PAPERS.

♦ — "Oh dear," said a portly dame of forty summers, as she threw herself into a chair at a recent dance, after going through the intricacies of the quadrille, "What awful weather we're having ; I feel quite rfi's-hausted." Did she mean she was exhausted. — The most simple-minded girl on the Thames is a young lady who is just " coming out" into society, and who is possessed of no inconsiderable share of facial charms. At a social gathering the other evening she flabergasted her partner (to whom, she only had been introduced a couple of hours before)," and who had evidently found favour in his eyes, by whispering m his ear, " You can kiss me if you like." — Two distinguished members of the " Eoorce " threatened to run each other in the other day about that " trifling " affair at the Choral Hall. Each accused the other of being the original of the illustration in the Obsebteb. It is a significant fact that one prominent!guardian of the peace has since been laid up with indigestion, while another has persistently refused his rations. Tlie report that Mr Superintendent Thomson has been ordered to investigate tho affair requires confirmation. — There is a yonng man in this city who broke off an engagement because he discovered that his affianced owed the symmetry of her figure to padding. How he made the discovery is not explicitly explained. It reminds one of what Dr Wallis said in the House about Pox in the debate on the Licensing Bill. Teetotal William was complaining of bush pubs, and he said that when he and Lady Eox went to breakfast at a house near Napier the whole place had an odour of rum, and even the breath of the girl wiio laid the table smelt of that abomination . ' ' He must have been very near to her mouth," remarked the doctor, " and his wife with him too. How shocking !" But to return to our sheop. The swain presented his innmorata with a beautiful gold ring, which he has demanded back since he broke off the match, but the lady threatens an action for breach of promise, and says she will only produce the souvenir in the Divorce Court. The locality is in the neighbourhood of Upper Grey-street. — An esteemed Napier correspondent writes : — " Our winter bread-and-butter dances are fashionable gatherings. If the eatables are stale, and the drinkables undrinkable, the society is select. Wo try to get as near as possible to the form of the County Assembly Balls of our grandfathers' days, without the expense. So, when a hop comes off, and the weather prevents our local sheepfarmers coming into town, we are disappointed, for a ball is unprofitable if we have not been able to rub against the wife or the daughter of broadacres. But with all tiie care ineligibles sometimes get invitations which break into the exclusive character of ' our set.' At one of these balls a lady was noticed as wearing an appearance of smothered alarm. ' What can tlie matter be ?' asked a friend of another. ' Why, don't you see, she is frightened lest Mr will ask her to dance.' ' Well, and suppose he does ?' 'Heis a draper, my dear madam !' ' And so is Mr whom she has just danced with.' ' Ah ! but there is the difference ; one is a direct importer A " — A gentleman who, ten years ago, was flattered and courted in the circles of " our set," but who, during that period, has been absent from amongst us, ancl in tlio interim' got married and lost his fortune, has lately returned and has accepted "the appointment of manager of a large brewery. At the close of a dancehis vis-a-vis was overheard 'to say to her partner, "you have brought me into a pretty sort of thing to dance in the same set with a brewer's assistant !" It would be unkind to say who the lady was, or to criticise her claims to a position in the " hupper suckles." — But the above are trifles compared "to the flutter in the dove-cots that was caused by an . unfortunate mistake, by which an invitation to ' one of these balls, addressed, to one of our set found its way into the hands of a common tradesman bearing the same name, who accepted the invite with his, compliments and duly presented himself with, his wife ancl interesting family. Let me draw, a veil over these frightful contretemps."