[-52-]
THE BAL MASQUE
IN foreign lands, we are told, is something refined and
delicate. I have been to some abroad which certainly were nothing of the kind;
but in England, or rather in London, they are low, blackguard places, whether in
the Holborn Cosino, or Covent Garden, or the Grecian Saloon, or Vauxhall, or at
Drury-lane. In 1723 they were put down by government. Steele wrote of them, that
in his time, "the misfortune of the thing is, that people dress themselves
in what they have a mind to be - and not what they are fit for." I have
seen the French men and women at Vauxhall, and if they do in Paris what they do
there - why, then I doubt somewhat of the superiority even of French Bal
Masques. But in England a public Bal Masque is a disgusting exhibition, to enjoy
which every moral sense must be deadened, and then a man must be drunk and have
his pockets well lined. The rustic flower-girls and simple hay-makers with
[-53-] whom you dance will drink champagne as if it were ginger-beer, and
consume all the delicacies of the season as if they cost no more than bacon and
beans.
The fun, as it is termed, generally commences about 11 P.M.,
by an immense mob of costermongers, tag-rag and bob-tail, forming themselves in
a row under the surveillance of the police, to watch and criticise the
appearance of the maskers, and specially to regale themselves with jokes should
any unfortunate do the economical and arrive on foot. I hear people say they
like London - they can do anything they like without being observed. I doubt
that much. I advise the strong-minded female who tells me that, to walk down
Cheapside in a Bloomer costume, and I will warrant she will have as great a mob
accompanying her as followed Kossuth or any other hero to Guildhall. But to
return to the Bal Masque. I presume the company are arriving and the little boys
are cheering, as only little boys can, right under cab wheels and in between the
horses' legs. Some of the company, to borrow an ancient witticism, go disguised
as gentlemen - some buy a mask at the door for fourpenee - others delight in
monstrous noses [-54-] and fearful
moustache-others, especially those who have fancy dresses, appear as Charles
II.s, Cardinal Wolseys, Shakspeares, Henry VIII.s, Scotch Highlanders,
Australian Diggers, Monks, and look far better when they enter than they do when
they make their exit in the early light of a summer morning. The same remark
holds true of their female companions, who are mostly the same ladies that you
meet in Regent-street in the afternoon, or hanging about the Haymarket all
night, a class at no time remarkable for modesty, but whom we shall see in the
course of the evening becoming bold and brazen-faced with excitement and wine.
But the theatre is full-the guests are met-the band is assembled-the leader
wields the baton-the sparkling chandeliers give a lustre to the scene, and away
they bound to the music, whilst from the boxes and the gallery admiring crowds
look down. Yes, there is a wild excitement in the hour, which stirs even the
pulses of old blood. The women, as debardeurs, flower girls, sailor boys-many of
them with faces fitting them for diviner lives, look beautiful even in their
degradation and shame. Horace tells us, wherever we go black care gets up and
rides behind. Is it so? [-55-] Can there be sad
hearts beneath those gay exteriors? Do those cheeks flushed and radiant eyes
indicate that they belong to those whom all moralists have held infamous, all
religions condemned, and whose existence our modern civilization perpetuates and
deplores? Is man an immortal being, sent here for awhile to triumph over fleshly
lusts and passions, to learn to trample as dross on the vanities of earth, and
to set his affections on things above? Is it true that the most successful
votaries of pleasure, from kingly Solomon to lordly Byron, have borne the same
testimony to them, that they are not worth the gathering, that they are but as
apples gathered by the shore of the Dead Sea, fair to the eye but deadly to the
taste, and that in no way can they answer the need and aspirations of the heart
of man, which is greater and grander than them all? Have we paid ministers of
religion, bishops and archbishops, millions and millions of pounds to teach men
these few self-evident truths, and yet do such orgies as those of which we write
not merely exist but flourish, as if we had accepted. the creed of the Atheist,-
"Let us eat and drink and be merry, for to-morrow we die?" To-morrow!
who around us now thinks [-56-] of to-morrow? Not
the young rake chaffing and dancing before us, whose mirth is the delirium of
forgetfulness and the intoxication of wine, whose to-morrow is Whitecross-street
Prison or the Insolvent Debtors' Court. Not that brazen- faced woman now arrayed
in splendour, and surrounded by her admirers, whose to-morrow is old age,
neglect, and a garret. Not those grey-headed gouty old sinners in the boxes, who
have not the excuse of youth for the follies with which they desecrate old age.
And certainly not that pale clerk, who has most probably embezzled his
employer's money, and who is frantically exclaiming, "Waiter, another
bottle of champagne, as he tells the women of his lot that he feels "a cup
too low." You say he has them to cheer him. Yes, till his money is gone.
When he is at Bow-street, as assuredly he will soon be, I promise you they will
not be the last to give evidence as to his possession of funds, or the manner of
his spending them. There may be honour among thieves, there is none among women
when they have once lost their own.
Still gaily goes on the dancing. Then there is supper and
wine-and more dancing, and more music, and more wine. The reporters for [-57-]
the papers generally leave about supper-time, and state that the gaieties were
prolonged till a late hour; it is well they do this. In the earlier part of the
evening the rioting and chaffing is somewhat of the coarsest, and the wit
somewhat of the poorest; and the later it grows, and the more potent is the
vinous influence, the less select, or rather the more obscene, is the
phraseology. In the wild saturnalia that ensues, all the restraints of decency
and habit are thrown on one side. It is time to close, and the conductor sees
this. Already Henry VIII. is right royally drunk, and Cardinal Wolsey is
uttering flat blasphemy, and one monk has got a black eye, another a bloody
nose. Unless, as in the case of Covent Garden, the theatre is burned down, and
the proceedings are abruptly terminated, there is a final dance, - a patriotic
rendering of the national anthem, - and into the air walk, or rather tumble, the
debauchees, some to go home quietly to bed, others to keep it up in the nearest
coffee-houses and public-houses; and hand-maidens rising early to take in the
milk in various parts of the metropolis are astonished by the exceedingly
unsteady gait and singular cos-[-58-]tumes of
various dismal gents, who have, if they are not absolute fools, sworn that it
will be a long time before they go to another masque bal. Such, I believe, is
the general conclusion, the only exceptions being the costumier who provides the
dresses, generally a Jew, and the bigger Jew who furnishes the wine.