Her mind
intoxicated itself with the thought of his wealth. She went one day to
the Public Library to read the articles on Rothschild and Astor in the
encyclopedias. She even tried to read the editorial articles on gold
and silver in the Ohio papers.
She delighted in the New York society journals. She would pore for
hours over those wonderful columns which described the weddings and the
receptions of rich tobacconists and stock-brokers, with lists of names
which she read with infinite gusto. At first, all the names were the
same to her, all equally worshipful and happy in being printed, black
on white, in the reports of these upper-worldly banquets. But after a
while her sharp intelligence began to distinguish the grades of our
republican aristocracy, and she would skip the long rolls of obscure
guests who figured at the: "coming-out parties" of thrifty shop-keepers
of fashionable ambition, to revel among the genuine swells whose
fathers were shop-keepers. The reports of the battles of the Polo Club
filled her with a sweet intoxication. She knew the names of the
combatants by heart, and had her own opinion as to the comparative
eligibility of Billy Buglass and Tim Blanket, the young men most in
view at that time in the clubs of the metropolis.
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