The Perennial Bachelor

he was full of fun and the life of the party. Then there was Mr. Baron, a languid young swell whom I had met at some balls in New York, so of course he felt in duty bound to come to life and honor me with his attention when he wasn’t asleep, which was generally. His mother and sister were with him, but Mrs. Baron was too overcome with mal-du-mer to make her appearance, and I did not care for Miss Baron, who was quite a flirt and apparently did not care much for ladies’ society. I think the gentlemen were much nicer than the ladies on the ship; and, by the time the trip was over, we felt as if we had known each other for years, for our vessel was a slow one⁠—as Mr. Thompson said, “An old donkey could go faster.” But the days slipped by like magic, although we were all so idle⁠—indeed, the gentlemen seemed to have left all thoughts of business on shore, and the abandon of the ladies was complete. Sometimes in the evenings we would have jolly games of “Ruth and Jacob” with everybody joining in, and sometimes just sit up in the bow of the boat, looking at the foam and trying to look into the future. I think my companions would have been surprised if they had known where my thoughts were leading me, Victor!

And here we are in very nice, though rather dark, lodgings, in London! Just think! I can hardly believe it. It looks very dirty, and I know I will be terrified on the streets, and I suppose they will be full of those dreadful people Dickens writes about. The floor is going up and down, just like the deck of the good ship “Hiawatha”⁠—I hope it stops before this evening, when Mother and I are going to the theatre with Mr. Thompson to see Geneviéve Ward in a play called, I think, “Forget-me-not.” Mr. Baron has been here too, in lavender kid gloves, with a big bouquet (already!) to ask us to the opera tomorrow night, to hear Patti sing. Aren’t people kind, and ain’t it fun?

This is the longest letter I ever wrote in my life. I put the spray of lilies-of-the-valley you sent me into my prayerbook, and guess where it just happened to fall⁠—in the marriage service, where the woman says “I will”!!!

Your affectionate
Lucy.

Hans Crescent, London, June 20.

Dear Victor:

I love getting your letters, but really you mustn’t write so often⁠—you really, really mustn’t. Mother said I must tell you.

Victor, how can you think that I could forget you? You hurt me so when you say things like that. I think of you all the time, and I only don’t tell you what I think because I don’t want to make you vain.

I like London now, it is full of interesting sights, but still I think it is pretty dirty and old looking. The gold on the Albert Memorial certainly needs rubbing up. We (Mother, Carter Thompson, Percy Baron, and Ethel Baron, whom I like much better now) went to Saint Paul’s, and got through our sightseeing in time to join in the choral service, with a large choir of men and boys. I think it would be better if they were given dusters and sent round to dust off the statues which are in every corner. We also attended choral service at Westminster Abbey, where the boys’ voices were simply angelic but the intoning of the minister almost put us to sleep⁠—much too High Church in my humble opinion. You will think we are very pious, but we have been to other places of interest too, Madame Tussaud’s Wax Works, where Carter simply convulsed us by taking the doorkeeper of the Chamber of Horrors for one of the figures, and the British Museum. We spent this afternoon at the latter place, but it will take fully another day to see all the wonders it contains.

I don’t know what you mean, Victor, by saying you feel as if I had forgotten you and home. I would die if I thought I was going to spend my life over here. I don’t think things here are nearly as nice as at home, and the British public amuses me very much; for while the gentlemen are very handsome, the ladies are dowdy and dress about a year behind our fashions. Mother and I haven’t seen any bustles as big as ours, and as for the “aesthetes” they simply don’t wear any, and look perfectly ridiculous, going around in slinky sage green and brick red. The men aesthetes don’t cut their hair, and the women apparently never comb theirs, and they all sort of gasp at you. I was telling Carter Thompson about a tea in an artist’s studio Mother and I went to, and he said, “Oh, yes, they hug their knees and stick their chins out and yearn towards a sunflower or a blue china pot!” I nearly died laughing, as it really was a perfect description! Carter pretended to be astonished that we had anything to eat (we had heaps of things, and the most heavenly strawberries, and cream so thick you had to take it with a ladle). He said, “I thought they always just lunched on a lily.” He really is a perfect pickle. One afternoon when, needless to say, it rained, we went to an exhibition of Whistler’s paintings that he calls nocturnes; and Carter made us all laugh by saying “In my humble opinion Daubs on Blotting Paper would be a more appropriate name!” I must say they were all Greek to me, including a sort of insect he paints in the corner of each one.

I am longing to ride in a hansom cab, but ladies don’t do it, alas! Promise not to be shocked to death and don’t breathe it to a soul, and I’ll tell you something