'No feathers!' cries the lady, as if on wings of black feathers
dead people fly to Heaven, and, lacking them, they must of
necessity go elsewhere. Her husband shakes his head; and further
adds, that they had seed-cake instead of plum-cake, and that it was
all white wine. 'All white wine!' exclaims his wife. 'Nothing but
sherry and madeira,' says the husband. 'What! no port?' 'Not a
drop.' No port, no plums, and no feathers! 'You will recollect,
my dear,' says the formal lady, in a voice of stately reproof,
'that when we first met this poor man who is now dead and gone, and
he took that very strange course of addressing me at dinner without
being previously introduced, I ventured to express my opinion that
the family were quite ignorant of etiquette, and very imperfectly
acquainted with the decencies of life. You have now had a good
opportunity of judging for yourself, and all I have to say is, that
I trust you will never go to a funeral THERE again.' 'My dear,'
replies the formal gentleman, 'I never will.' So the informal
deceased is cut in his grave; and the formal couple, when they tell
the story of the funeral, shake their heads, and wonder what some
people's feelings ARE made of, and what their notions of propriety
CAN be!

If the formal couple have a family (which they sometimes have),
they are not children, but little, pale, sour, sharp-nosed men and
women; and so exquisitely brought up, that they might be very old
dwarfs for anything that appeareth to the contrary. Indeed, they
are so acquainted with forms and conventionalities, and conduct
themselves with such strict decorum, that to see the little girl
break a looking-glass in some wild outbreak, or the little boy kick
his parents, would be to any visitor an unspeakable relief and
consolation.