The feminine aspirant need not be handsome.
On the contrary, an agreeable plainness is much more acceptable,
serving as a foil. But she must be excellent in all games, from
golf to piquet, and willing to play as often and as long as
required. She must also cheerfully go in to dinner with the blue
ribbon bore of the evening, only asked on account of his pretty
wife (by the bye, why is it that Beauty is so often flanked by the
Beast?), and sit between him and the "second prize" bore. These
two worthies would have been the portion of the hostess fifteen
years ago; she would have considered it her duty to absorb them and
prevent her other guests suffering. MAIS NOUS AVONS CHANGE TOUT
CELA. The lady of the house now thinks first of amusing herself,
and arranges to sit between two favorites.
Society has become much simpler, and especially less expensive, for
unmarried men than it used to be. Even if a hostess asks a favor
in return for weeks of hospitality, the sacrifice she requires of a
man is rarely greater than a cotillion with an unattractive
debutante whom she is trying to launch; or the sitting through a
particularly dull opera in order to see her to the carriage, her
lord and master having slipped off early to his club and a quiet
game of pool. Many people who read these lines are old enough to
remember that prehistoric period when unmarried girls went to the
theatre and parties, alone with the men they knew.
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