have seen Chaumont in Totot chez Tata was held a solecism. The homely
mesdames and messieurs from the Parisian boards were `lionised' (how
strangely that phrase rings to modern ears!) in ducal drawing-rooms.
In fact, all the old prejudice of rank was being swept away. Even more
significant than the reception of players was a certain effort, made
at this time, to raise the average of aristocratic loveliness--an
effort that, but a few years before, would have been surely scouted as
quite undignified and outrageous. What the term `Professional Beauty'
signified, how any lady gained a right to it, we do not and may never
know. It is certain, however, that there were many ladies of tone,
upon whom it was bestowed. They received special attention from the
Prince of Wales, and hostesses would move heaven and earth to have
them in their rooms. Their photographs were on sale in the window of
every shop. Crowds assembled every morning to see them start from
Rotten Row. Pree"minent among Professional Beauties were Lady Lonsdale
(afterwards Lady de Grey), Mrs. Wheeler, who always `appeared in
black,' and Mrs. Corowallis West, who was Amy Robsart in the tableaux
at Cromwell House, when Mrs. Langtry, cette Cle'opatre de son sie`cle
appeared also, stepping across an artificial brook, in the pink kirtle
of Effie Deans. We may doubt whether the movement, represented by
these ladies, was quite in accord with the dignity and elegance that
always should mark the best society. Any effort to make Beauty
compulsory robs Beauty of its chief charm. But, at the same time, I do
believe that this movement, so far as it was informed by a real wish
to raise a practical standard of feminine charm for all classes, does
not deserve the strictures that have been passed upon it by posterity.
One of its immediate sequels was the incursion of American ladies into
London. Then it was that these pretty creatures, `clad in Worth's most
elegant confections,' drawled their way through our greater portals.
Fanned, as they were, by the feathers of the Prince of Wales, they had