But unfortunately we were not
so freshly arrived. We had received other cards, and had perfected our
toilette many times, to meet this same society, so magnificently
described, and had found it the least "best" of all. Who compose it?
Whom shall we meet if we go to this ball? We shall meet three classes of
persons: first, those who are rich, and who have all that money can buy;
second, those who belong to what are technically called "the good old
families," because some ancestor was a man of mark in the state or
country, or was very rich, and has kept the fortune in the family; and,
thirdly, a swarm of youths who can dance dexterously, and who are
invited for that purpose. Now these are all arbitrary and factitious
distinctions upon which to found so profound a social difference as that
which exists in American, or, at least in New York, society. First, as a
general rule, the rich men of every community, who make their own money,
are not the most generally intelligent and cultivated. They have a
shrewd talent which secures a fortune, and which keeps them closely at
the work of amassing from their youngest years until they are old.
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