me silk: from
the cornice hang curtains, also all to match; and these remain drawn
when the family to whom the box belongs is in mourning. With very few
exceptions, and those only at Milan, there is no light inside the box;
they are illuminated only from the stage, and from a not very brilliant
hanging lustre which, in spite of protests, has been introduced into
the house in some towns; still, screened by the curtains, they are never
very light, and their arrangement leaves the back of the box so dark
that it is very difficult to see what is going on.

The boxes, large enough to accommodate eight or ten persons, are
decorated with handsome silks, the ceilings are painted and ornamented
in light and pleasing colors; the woodwork is gilt. Ices and sorbets are
served there, and sweetmeats; for only the plebeian classes ever have a
serious meal. Each box is freehold property, and of considerable value;
some are estimated at as much as thirty thousand lire; the Litta family
at Milan own three adjoining. These facts sufficiently indicate the
importance attributed to this incident of fashionable life.

Conversation reigns supreme in this little apartment, which Stendhal,
one of the most ingenious of modern writers, and a keen student of
Italian manners, has called a boudoir with a window opening on to a
pit. The music and the spectacle are in fact purely accessory; the
real interest of the evening is in the social meeting there, the
all-important trivialities of love that are discussed, the assignations
held, the anecdotes and gossip that creep in. The theatre is an
inexpensive meeting-place for a whole society which is content and
amused with studying itself.

The men who are admitted take their seats on one of the sofas, in
the order of their arrival. The first comer naturally is next to the
mistress of the box, but when both seats are full, if another visitor
comes in, the one who has sat longest rises, takes his leave and
departs. All move up one place, and so each in turn is next the
sovereign.

This futile gossip, or serious colloquy, these elegant trivialities of
Italian life, inevitably imply some general intimacy. The lady may be in
full dress or not, as she pleases. She is so completely at home that a
stranger who has been received in her box may call on her next day at
her residence. The foreign visitor cannot at first understand this life
of idle wit, this _dolce far niente_ on a background of music. Only long