Identifier: newnewyorkcomme00vand (find matches)
Title: The new New York : a commentary on the place and the people
Year: 1909 (1900s)
Authors: Van Dyke, John Charles, 1856-1932 Pennell, Joseph, 1857-1926
Subjects: New York (N.Y.) -- Description and travel
Publisher: New York : Macmillan Co.
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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er, it means only noise, and a dis-agreeable kind at that. The real interest begins, possibly,at the entrance to the opera and the theater, when thecarriages draw up and people step down and out. Theymake quite an animated throng as they enter the vestibulesor crowd the staircases, or the foyer, bowing and chattingto each other, all smiling, all newly garbed, all on pleasurebent. The fflling up of a theater with people, the driftingin and the taking of seats, the buzz of conversation, therecognition of acquaintances, the visiting between theacts, are sometimes more amusing to the onlookers thanthe play itself. Another interesting sight, especially at the opera, isthe row of boxes containing people of more or lessprominence socially. When Society shops, it does notanticipate an audience, though it may be very handsomelygarbed for all that; when it drives, its fine feathers maybe muffled by wraps or shut in by the carriage cover;but when it goes to the opera, it does so in full regalia,
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Pl. 46. — Upper Broadway — Night NEW YORK BY NIGHT 215 with all its war paint on, to be seen by friend and foe alike.The costumes are of the finest fabric and the most artisticdesign, the jewels are the rarest and the most brilliant,the coiffure (including the toque or tiara) the most fetching,the fan the most dazzling. Seated in its boxes against abackground of gold and red silk, Society looks very impos-ing, very magnificent. And it seems to be very happy, forit wears a beatific smile and sheds an extra beam of pleasurewhen its members bend to speak to each other. Theslightest contact produces the smile, though people beforethem have smiled and smiled and smiled and still beenvillainously unhappy. But if any sorrow is behind themask, you do not see it. They may grow sad-faced whenat home and undressing for the night, but not publiclywill they show a rueful countenance. After the play or the opera is over all the exits arehastily thrown open. People cannot get away fast enoughby

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