There was no attempt on the part of the men to assume
imposing or elegant disguises. The cheapest dominoes, and generally
nothing more than a mask, afforded them all they wanted--the opportunity
to carry on a bravado and promiscuous flirtation with these women. That
part of the family circle tier which faces the stage was given up to the
musicians. The rest of the gallery was crowded with spectators. The
boxes below were all taken up, the occupants being mainly maskers
overlooking the dance. But the proscenium boxes, and notably the two
lower ones on either side, were filled with a crew of coarse-featured,
semi-officious looking roughs, who might be politicians, or gamblers, or
deputy-sheriffs, or cut-throats, or all, but who, at all events, had no
intention of dancing, and had hired these boxes with the one view of
having a good time at the expense of the women, the managers, and, if
necessary, the public peace itself. They were crowded in; some of them
stood up and smoked cigars; all of them kept their hats on; one or two
were burly beasts, who glared upon the half-exposed women on the floor
with a stolid interest that could only be heightened and intensified by
some outrageous departure from the seemliness of simple enjoyment. They
have their fellows on the floor, to whom they shout and telegraph. They
have liquor in the boxes, and they use it with a show of conviviality to
increase their recklessness.

"At twelve o'clock there is a jam; most of the crowd outside has got in
by some means; the floor is a mass of people. Suddenly there is a fight
in the boxes. Exultant cries issue from the proscenium. At once turn up
all the masked faces in the whirling mass. It is a Frenchman beset by
two, aye three, Americans. Blows are given and taken; then they all go
down out of sight--only to appear again; the three are on him; they are
screeching with that fierce animal sound that comes through set teeth,
and in men and bull-dogs is pitched upon the same note. The maskers
rather like it; they applaud and cheer on--not the parties, but the
fight--and when the police get into the boxes and drag out the assaulted
man, and leave the assailants behind, the proscenium bellows a moment
with ironical laughter, the music breaks out afresh, and the dancers
resume their antics as though nothing had happened.

"Enough liquor has now been swallowed to float recklessness up to the
high-water mark. There is another fight going o