BEAUTY'S HUSBAND.

Thames Star, Volume IX, Issue 3074, 21 December 1878, Page 4

BEAUTY'S HUSBAND.

The Queen Bays :—We hare heard, of: * Beauty and the Beast,' but if the; fictures in the World given of ' Beauty's tnsband' and his position are authentic, 1 it is time that ' Beauty' returned to her duty, and that this mania for married loveliness was put a stop to. Here is an extract from a paper which baß done its part towards bringing about the condition of things which it describes:—" Beauty's": spouse is generally nonentity, of whose existence the world would be unaware were it not for the fame of the wife. He is, in fact, Mrs Bawdon Crawley herself —a kind of appendage to Mrs.Eawdon Crawley herself; but an exceedingly in-; convenient one. Lord and master in the; eye of the law, he finds that he has degenerated in practice ; to the level; of a junior partner in a going concern. He is never asked to accompany his wife, save on occasions of great ceremony, because aociety does not exactly see how it can; decently do otherwise. But he enters as little into the atmosphere which she; breathes during the evening as the maid who has dressed her, or the coachman who has left them when the hall door opened. The end of the entertainment will come in time, and with it the broug*j ham and the husband. Meanwhile he catches but fitful* glimpses of her at a respectful distance. At dinner she is seated on tbe right hand of her host, and in the immediate neighborhood of the guest and lion of the evening. It is the feast of Juvenal's parasite, with all the ad-, ditions and improvements of thenineteenth century. Beauty's husband may have the satisfaction of beholding, while be is a great way off. tbe effect which Beauty is creating at the favoured end of the table: but as for himself, he feels that he is a kind of poor relation, a tolerated intruder, whose proper place is below tbe salt, and whom it is necessary to remind' of his inferiority by placing him between the dummy young lady, the friend of the family, who is staying in the house, and the lout from Aldershotor Oxford. Nor,| when the dinner is over, is the night's; ordeal at an end. There are many weary hours of glittering dissipation still; to be gone through. There is the reception, at which the pair separate as soon as the entrance-hall is passed, to meet again, by preconcerted arrange-; ment, at a definite spot. There is the. ball, at which he will have further onpor--tunities for practically learning the virtue humility, and for pursuing upon a noticeable scale the policy of self-effacement. To his tired eyes the beauty is intermittently—a dream of loveliness in mazy; involutions of soft creamy costume,' whirled round in the arms of princes, and grasd transparencies. He has, indeed, the satisfaction, as he stands wearily rubbing his shoulders against the wall, of knowing that he is not alone.' Better be the 'Beast,' surely, than 'Beauty's husband.'"