scriptions were like seeing a set
of historical caricatures pass before one.

_Monday, June 6th._--The house was very full at the theater this
evening, and Miss C---- sent me round a delicious fresh bouquet. I
acted well, I think; the play was "Romeo and Juliet." It is so very
pleasant to return to Shakespeare, after _reciting_ Bianca and
Isabella, etc. I reveled in the glorious poetry and the bright,
throbbing _reality_ of that Italian girl's existence; and yet
Juliet is nothing like as nice as Portia--_nobody_ is as nice as
Portia. But the oftener I act Juliet the oftener I think it ought
never to be acted at all, and the more absurd it seems to me to try
to act it. After the play my mother sent a note with the carriage
to say she would not go to the ball, so I dressed myself and drove
off with my father from the theater to the Countess de S----'s. At
half-past eleven the ball had not begun. Mrs. Norton was there in
splendid beauty; at about half-past twelve the dancing began, and
it was what is called a very fine ball. While I was dancing with
Mr. C----, I saw my father talking to a handsome and very
magnificent lady, who my partner told me was the Duchess of B----;
after our quadrille, when I rejoined my father, he said to me,
"Fanny, let me present you to ----" here he mumbled something
perfectly inaudible, and I made a courtesy, and the lady smiled
sweetly and said some civil things and went away. "Whose name did
you mention," said I to my father, with some wickedness, "just now
when you introduced me to that lady?" "Nobody's, my dear, nobody's;
I haven't the remotest idea who she is." "The Duchess of B----,"
said I, glibly, strong in the knowledge I had just acquired from my
partner. "Bless my soul!" cried the poor man, with a face of the
most ludicrous dismay, "so it was! I had quite forgotten her,
though she was good enough to remember me, and here I have been
talking cross-questions and crooked answers to her for the last
half-hour!"

Was ever any thing so terrible! I feared my poor father would go
home and remain awake all night, sobbing softly to himself, like
the eldest of the nine Miss Simmonses in the ridiculous novel,
because in her nervous flurry at a great dinner party she had
refused instead of accepting a gentleman's offer