once got me into a country-dance. No prude could come, or if she came, could be a prude, there.
Sir Ch. Were you not pleased, Miss Byron, with the first coup d'oeil of that gay apartment?

A momentary pleasure: but when I came to reflect, the bright light, striking on my tinsel dress, made me seem to myself the more conspicuous fool. Let me be kept in countenance as I might, by scores of still more ridiculous figures, what, thought I, are other people's follies to me? Am I to make an appearance that shall want the countenance of the vainest, if not the silliest part of the creation? What would my good grandfather have thought, could he have seen his Harriet, the girl whose mind he took pains to form and enlarge, mingling in a habit so preposterously rich and gaudy, with a croud of Satyrs, Harlequins, Scaramouches, Fauns, and Dryads; nay, of Witches and Devils; the graver habits striving which should most disgrace the characters they assumed, and every one endeavouring to be thought the direct contrary of what they appeared to be.
Miss Gr. Well, then, the Devils, at least, must have been charming creatures!
Lady L. But, Sir Charles, might not a masquerade, if decorum were observed, and every one would support with wit and spirit the assumed character—
Mr. Gr. Devils and all, Lady L.?
Lady L. It is contrary to decorum for such shocking characters to be assumed at all: But might it not, Sir Charles, so regulated, be a rational and an almost instructive entertainment?
Sir Ch. You would scarcely be able, my dear sister, to collect eight or nine hundred people, all wits, and all observant of decorum. And if you could, does not the example reach down to those who are capable of taking only the bad and dangerous part of a diversion; which you may see by every common news-paper is become dreadfully general?
Mr. Gr. Well, Sir Charles, and why should not the poor devils in low life divert themselves as well as their betters? For my part, I rejoice when I see advertised

an eighteen-penny masquerade, for all the pretty 'prentice souls, who will that evening be Arcadian Shepherdesses, Goddesses, and Queens.
I blushed at the word Arcadian; yet Mr. Grandison did not seem to have my masquerade dress in his thoughts.
Miss Gr. What low profligate scenes couldst thou expatiate upon, good man! if