: William Makepeace Thackeray
: Christmas Books
: Seltzer Books
: 9781455363599
: 1
: CHF 0.70
:
: Erzählende Literatur
: English
: 753
: DRM
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB
Collection of short novels published under the pen name of Titmarsh, including: Mrs. Perkins's Ball, Our Street, Dr. Birch and his Young Friends, The Kickleburys on the Rhine, and The Rose and the Ring; or, The History of Prince Giglio and Prince Bulbo.According to Wikipedia: 'Thackeray is most often compared to one other great novelist of Victorian literature, Charles Dickens. During the Victorian era, he was ranked second only to Dickens, but he is now much less read and is known almost exclusively for Vanity Fair. In that novel he was able to satirize whole swaths of humanity while retaining a light touch. It also features his most memorable character, the engagingly roguish Becky Sharp. As a result, unlike Thackeray's other novels, it remains popular with the general reading public; it is a standard fixture in university courses and has been repeatedly adapted for movies and television. In Thackeray's own day, some commentators, such as Anthony Trollope, ranked his History of Henry Esmond as his greatest work, perhaps because it expressed Victorian values of duty and earnestness, as did some of his other later novels. It is perhaps for this reason that they have not survived as well as Vanity Fair, which satirizes those values.'

 

THE BALL-ROOM DOOR.


 

 A hundred of knocks follow Frederick Minchin's: in half an hour Messrs. Spoff, Pinch, and Clapperton have begun their music, and Mulligan, with one of the Miss Bacons, is dancing majestically in the first quadrille.  My young friends Giles and Tom prefer the landing-place to the drawing-rooms, where they stop all night, robbing the refreshment-trays as they come up or down.  Giles has eaten fourteen ices: he will have a dreadful stomach-ache to- morrow.  Tom has eaten twelve, but he has had four more glasses of negus than Giles.  Grundsell, the occasional waiter, from whom Master Tom buys quantities of ginger-beer, can of course deny him nothing.  That is Grundsell, in the tights, with the tray. Meanwhile direct your attention to the three gentlemen at the door: they are conversing.

 

1st Gent.--Who's the man of the house--the bald man?

 

2nd Gent.--Of course.  The man of the house is always bald.  He's a stockbroker, I believe.  Snooks brought me.

 

1st Gent.--Have you been to the tea-room?  There's a pretty girl in the tea-room; blue eyes, pink ribbons, that kind of thing.

 

2nd Gent.--Who the deuce is that girl with those tremendous shoulders?  Gad! I do wish somebody would smack 'em.

 

3rd Gent.--Sir--that young lady is my niece, sir,--my niece--my name is Blades, sir.

 

2nd Gent.--Well, Blades! smack your niece's shoulders: she deserves it, begad! she does.  Come in, Jinks, present me to the Perkinses.-- Hullo! here's an old country acquaintance--Lady Bacon, as I live! with all the piglings; she never goes out without the whole litter. (Exeunt 1st and 2nd Gents.)

 

 LADY BACON, THE MISS BACONS, MR. FLAM.

 

 Lady B.--Leonora!  Maria!  Amelia! here is the gentleman we met at Sir John Porkington's.

 

[The MISSES BACON, expecting to be asked to dance, smile simultaneously, and begin to smooth their tuckers.]

 

Mr. Flam.--Lady Bacon!  I couldn't be mistaken in YOU!  Won't you dance, Lady Bacon?

 

Lady B.--Go away, you droll creature!

 

Mr. Flam.--And these are your ladyship's seven lovely sisters, to judge from their likenesses to the charming Lady Bacon?

 

Lady B.--My sisters, he! he! my DAUGHTERS, Mr. Flam, and THEY dance, don't you, girls?

 

The Misses Bacon.--O yes!

 

Mr. Flam.--Gad! how I wish I was a dancing man!

 

[Exit FLAM.

 

 MR. LARKINS.

 

 I have not been able to do justice (only a Lawrence could do that) to my respected friend Mrs. Perkins, in this picture; but Larkins's portrait is c