effected among the dandies present through the
agency of his shears and French chalk. Many
middle-class milliners might have been driven
mad with envy to see the modes displayed in
that brilliant crowd. I am not learned in
haberdashery myself. I scarcely know a ruche from
a bouillonne, a gore from a gusset, and I am
certain that I can't discern the difference
between a silk glacé and a silk chiné. My
acquaintance with bonnets is limited to an
impression that they cost from forty-five to fifty-
five shillings apiece, and that they last, on an
average, and with great care and caution, ten
days. Ignorant, however, as I may be of such
fripperies, I was compelled to render homage to
the dazzling and parterre-like prettiness of the
toilettes I saw around me. There were pretty
faces, too, in abundance, and many of the
younger ladies had dressed their hair Alexandra
fashion — which was most delectable to view :
only the sharp, clear, spring morning light, in
combination with the immutable laws of refraction,
made the violet powder, applied with so
liberal a hand to the cheek of beauty, rather too
apparent. Modern ladies, like the works of the
old masters, need a particular, subdued, and
chastened light. I was pleased also to remark
that a good number of the gentlemen had
adopted the Danish colours in their cravats —
which had a genial lobster salad-like appearance.
Beshrew that Hansom cabman who
drove away so deftly with my black bag ! I too
had provided a waistcoat, a scarf of many
colours, gloves of the lightest lavender, and
here I was in a tail-coat and continuations of
rusty black. I was glad when the southern
door began to creak on its portals, and at last
groaned on one side, and I could quit the
butterfly throng and join my brother jackdaws.

The policeman to whom I showed my blue
ticket bestowed on me a confidential wink, and
pointed his left hand Berlin-wool-gloved thumb
over his corresponding shoulder. I knew my
goal well enough. I had been down to Windsor
on the preceding Thursday, and tramped about
the chapel, and peered into the knights' stalls,
and clambered up into the rookery which I
knew had been provided for us. So I left
the gilded butterflies settling down on their red
benches in the nave, and crossed its pavement
into the shadow of a chapel, and so found a
narrow door open, guarded by another policeman,
and climbed up the steep old stairs into
the loft to the left of the organ. On an exact
level with this gallery, at the opposite extremity
of the chapel, was the antique pew or closet
which was to be occupied, during the wedding,
by the Queen. In the loft answering to ours on
the other side of the organ were some choristers,
male and female, amongst whom we jackdaws
were not long in recognising Jenny Lind and
Louisa Pyne.

Has it ever struck you, at a great criminal
trial, that the person who has the very best, and
most comfortable view of the entire proceedings,
is the prisoner in the dock? The judge is
crowded and jostled by high sheriffs and county
magnates, who claim a right to sit on the bench.
The barristers' table overflows with briefless
ones. The floor of the court is packed. The
gallery is inconveniently thronged with ladies,
with their double-barrelled lorgnettes, anxious
to scrutinise the fashionable murderer ; but the
gentleman behind the spikes, and with the rue
before him, has ample scope and verge enough.
He and the turnkey and the governor of the
jail have a comfortable boarded area all to
themselves. No overcrowding them. Analogically,
we poor despised jackdaws had the most
commodious reserved seats in the whole chapel.
We were out of the pale and yet we sat in the
high places. None were so poor as to do us
reverence, yet we could look down at our leisure
upon the seething, fluttering mass of robes and
trains, plumes and diamonds, lace and embroidery.
We paced tranquilly up and down our eyrie.
One of my brethren, who knows the Peerage by
heart, regaled me with choice anecdotes of the
private lives of the aristocracy. Another, who
is learned in ecclesiology, descanted upon the
alabaster sculptures of the reredos, and
explained the differences between the decorations
worn by the Prelate, the Chancellor, and the
Registrar of the Garter. A third, who had
been ailing lately, came and talked to me about
his complaint, and we compared symptoms, and
defended various modes of regimen, and
criticised our respective doctors. One jackdaw,
the wisest one in the group, had brought a
sandwich-box and a flask of sherry with him,
and proceeded to invite himself to an early
lunch. Another began to read No Name.
Another went to sleep till the grand doings should
begin; but, being troubled in his slumbers,
speedily woke up with a yelp which somewhat
frightened the decorous echoes of the old chapel
from their propriety.

High perched as we were, however, our
sanctum was once or twice menaced with
invasion. There came straying towards us, from
the choristers' loft, and across the isthmus
occupied by the organ itself, the longest and most
disconsolate clergyman and the shortest and
cheerfullest lady I have seen for a long time.
They had been unceremoniously ejected from
among the singing men and women, as having
no right there. Then they turned up among
her Majesty's private band, and her Majesty's
private band would have nothing to do with
them. After that they had been pounced upon
by an elderly gentleman, who I conjecture to
have been in some way attached to the Royal
Household. " You cannot possibly remain here,"
cried the elderly gentleman. "My orders are
imperative to suffer none unprovided with tickets
to remain in this compartment." We heard the
long clergyman disconsolately pleading, and the
short lady cheerfully expostulating, against
expulsion. But in vain. The elderly gentleman
grew so angry, and the sense of the imperative
nature of his orders assumed such alarming
dimensions, that I feared he would swiftly cut
all further discussion short by hurling the
intruders over the gallery into the nave. At last