River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1877-10-11
A London Society Woman.

Mr.. Smalley writes to the New York
Tribune: "You would not believe, for
example, that lady rich and well known
in some sections of London society,"
say some, for there are many-could tell
Lady Waldegrave TO her face that she
wanted to be asked to one of those Sun
day evening dinners for which Strawber-
nv Hill is famous, in order to secure or
strengthen her own social position. You
can scarcely imagine how painful il
must have been 90 Lady Waldegrave TO
decline, pleading that ell her dinners had
been arranged at the beginning of the
season, and that it was too late to add TO
the number of her guests. Still less can
you conceive this lady, thus rebuffed,
drive down of Sunday afternoon to the
house at Twickenham, under pretence Of
calling; which, indeed, her place on .dy
Waldegrave's visiting list might ius.if
her in doing. She finds the grounds
thronged with the select, who have dined
there before, or are to dine that evening.
She seeks out her unwilling hostess /;
she reminds her of her former request;
she hears once more thai the table is full ;
nay, that more guests are hidden than
there are chairs for in the dining-room.
You think she retires discounted at thisl
That is because you don't know the wom-
an. She is like the British infantry,
which does not know when it is beaten.
She observes placidly to Lady Waldo
grave that possibly some one of her
guests may not stay TO dinner; if not
she suggests, she entreats, she implores,
that she may fill vacant place. Lord
Carlingford's wife is too well-bred to be-
tray disgust; She is, / fear, not wholly
unused TO this sort of thing. She tell
her would-be guest that if such should
be the case she would, of course. be haps
pv to offer her the vacant chair. Armed
with this extorted assurance, off goes this
aspirant for social distinction, makes the
round of the party, puts to each one the
eager inquiry, Are you invited TO stay
to dinnerP and Are you going to stayl
Presently these victims of this new in
QUESTION begin to stray up To their host
ess and inquire, Pray, why is Mis-
so anxious should not stay to dinnerf
The story circulates, the laugh goes
with it, and, alas no guest departs, no
chair is empty, and the woman whose
audacity was perhaps worthy of better
ldtt. Has 10 Ddth dDu illC dADiiC III
London. You think this is mere gossip,
and malicious at that. assure you ii Is
true, and if named the heroine of my
story, which | will not do, you would
neither doubt its truth nor wonder what
interest such story can have for an Am
erican audience. / may add that she is a
woman who, on the whole, may be said to
have succeeded and not failed in her am
bition, that she goes to many fine house
and has crowds of smart people at hers
- smart people meaning, in the dialect
of London society, fashionable people, and
not at all implying the possession of ex-
ceptional menta. powers. | don't know
that this little anecdote is much more re
markable than the shorter one which ac-
counts for the presence of the same lady
at a great party the other night, by her
third petition for card having wearied
out the patience of the giver, who had sent
two refusals to two former requests"