However--our guests came Friday afternoon in time for tea in the senior
corridor, and then dashed down to the hotel for dinner. The hotel was
so full that they slept in rows on the billiard tables, they say.
Jimmie McBride says that the next time he is bidden to a social event
in this college, he is going to bring one of their Adirondack tents and
pitch it on the campus.
At seven-thirty they came back for the President's reception and dance.
Our functions commence early! We had the men's cards all made out
ahead of time, and after every dance, we'd leave them in groups, under
the letter that stood for their names, so that they could be readily
found by their next partners. Jimmie McBride, for example, would stand
patiently under 'M' until he was claimed. (At least, he ought to have
stood patiently, but he kept wandering off and getting mixed with 'R's'
and 'S's' and all sorts of letters.) I found him a very difficult
guest; he was sulky because he had only three dances with me. He said
he was bashful about dancing with girls he didn't know!
The next morning we had a glee club concert--and who do you think wrote
the funny new song composed for the occasion? It's the truth. She
did. Oh, I tell you, Daddy, your little foundling is getting to be
quite a prominent person!
Anyway, our gay two days were great fun, and I think the men enjoyed
it. Some of them were awfully perturbed at first at the prospect of
facing one thousand girls; but they got acclimated very quickly. Our
two Princeton men had a beautiful time--at least they politely said
they had, and they've invited us to their dance next spring. We've
accepted, so please don't object, Daddy dear.
Julia and Sallie and I all had new dresses. Do you want to hear about
them? Julia's was cream satin and gold embroidery and she wore purple
orchids. It was a DREAM and came from Paris, and cost a million
dollars.
Sallie's was pale blue trimmed with Persian embroidery, and went
beautifully with red hair. It didn't cost quite a million, but was
just as effective as Julia's.
Mine was pale pink crepe de chine trimmed with ecru lace and rose
satin. And I carried crimson roses which J. McB. sent (Sallie having
told him what colour to get). And we all had satin slippers and silk
stockings and chiffon scarfs to match.
You must be deeply impressed by these millinery details.
One can't help thinking, Daddy, what a colourless life a man is forced
to lead, when one reflects that chiffon and Venetian point and hand
embroidery and Irish crochet are to him mere empty words. Whereas a
woman--whether she is interested in babies or microbes or husbands or
poetry or servants or parallelograms or gardens or Plato or bridge--is
fundamentally and always interested in clothes.