The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-01-22

THE social wickeduess of the French capital,
with its once famous but now defunct Jardin
Mabille. its Bal Butler or Students Ball. its cafes
chantants, and its thousand and one places of
questionable repute devoted to gayety and crime,
has been a perennial theme for strait-laced
Americans to moralize upon. Such of our fell
low ountrymen as had visited that gay city
have come back to US with fabulous tales of
what they witnessed, and, of course, deprecated,
and only visited to see how wicked the wicked
could be. But page from the Yorkville New
York city, court record. the day after the alleged
French ball there reads very much as though
there was some of the real bad social wicked
ness west of the Atlantic. The police had to in
terfere when the fun" grew too boisterous and
the girls began to kick off the hats of the men.
just as they are said to have done in the Mabille
of former days, and as they still do at the Stu
dents Ball there. After giving the names and
residence of the several prisoners. the account
says:
1.-THE prisoners were dressed in fancy cos
TUNES, and presented a novel sight among the
dlrt-begrlmed Migrants on each side OF them.
One OF the young women wore a long pair OF
nand painted kid gloves, blue silk train dress
which she held under one arm, and long pointed
shoes with enormous high heels. Another had a
bright-red camels-hair cloak about her shoulders,
and exceedingly brief balett-dress and checker
board stockings, with low slippers. Still another
was dressed in the style of the Elizabethan age,
with high-frilled lace collar, very low-necked
and short-sleeved dress and powdered hair.
Mabel Rice. the first prisoner examined was
dressed IN green silk tights, in the costume OF a
page. Around her neck and arms and on her
fingers blazed diamonds of all sizes and settings
She was still under the influence of cham
payne, and smiled YEARLY at the court officers
about her.
Justice White cast his eye over the extraor-
binary array of diamonds and silks before him,
and finally, catching the smile upon the face of
the page, said:
"'What does all this meant
French ball, your Honor
"'What were you doing that made the officer
arrest your
ga little fun, your Honor
eyes, know. But what were you doinep
"'Weil, Gertie put chalk-mark on the wall
and said we couldn't reach up to it with our feet
back to the crowd, and weren't doing anything
when we were taken H.
You had been drinking, too, hadn't your
"Of course, we had some champagne
".And you were kicking hats. too, weren't
"'No-we-were-not'
"'Well, will fine you $40 for intoxication,
because the champagne is still in your head. I
uOn KNOW Gnat CneIe ID any law against KICKING
chalk-line The others may co.
mabel tripped gayly down into the cell and
remarked that it was a shame for a poor girl
with $1,000 worth Of diamonds to be held in Jail
because she could not pay a fine of $10 A mes-
senger was sent off and in about an hour a
young man with high silk hat and gold cane
arrived, paid the fine and took the green page
away in his carriage"
All this in America and so iippantly told in
the daily press that the suggestion follows that
it is by no means wickeder than incidents of fire.
quent occurrence there. Americans probably
could not learn much in Paris