Shopkeeper that she should have been at one time both affluent and
socially distinguished. If to these qualities she can add the supreme
advantage of good looks and a modest demeanour, her career is certain
to be a prosperous and a rapid one. If, finally, she has been mated
to a husband who, having long ago spent his own cash, contrives in
a short time to run a best on record through hers, if he is a good
fellow of a sort, with a capacity for making friends which is as large
as his generosity in staking money, she may be sure that no element
will be wanting to her success. It is of course unnecessary that she
should have served any apprenticeship to the trade that she ultimately
adopts. When, after some glittering seasons of horses and footmen
and brilliant parties, the crash comes upon the little household, her
friends will be called into council. Some will recommend a retired
life in a distant suburb, where it is currently reported that £250 a
year may be made to play the part of £2,000 in the heart of May Fair.
Others will hint that governesses have been known, after years of
painful labour, to lay by a sufficiency for a short old age; others,
again, will dive into the storehouse of their reminiscences, in order
to produce for inspection the well-known example of a colonel and
his wife, who defied both the fates and the rheumatism in the modest
_pension_ of a Continental watering-place. All these suggestions,
however, are eventually put aside in favour of the advice that a
shop should be started, a _nom de commerce_ adopted, and a circle of
friendly customers be acquired by discreet advertisement. After these
matters have been decided, but not till then, it becomes necessary
to determine to what special branch the talents of the prospective
Shopkeeper are to be devoted. At last even this is accomplished,
and in a few months more the world of fashion may learn by private
circular or public paragraph, that a new competitor for its favours
has been launched into commercial activity under a sweetly symbolical