Her woman's eye seized another phenomenon--the hands. Not nations only,
but varieties of the animal kingdom were represented. Here were the white
hands of fair women, and the red paws of obese shop-keepers, and the
yellow, bird-like claws of old withered gamesters, all stretched out,
side by side, in strange contrast, to place the stakes or scratch in the
winnings; and often the winners put their palms or paws on their heap of
gold, just as a dog does on a bone when other dogs are nigh.
But what Zoe's eye rested on longest were the costume and deportment of
the ladies. A few were in good taste; others aimed at a greater variety
of beautiful colors than the fair have, up to this date, succeeded in
combining, without inflicting more pain on the beholders than a
beneficent Creator--so far as we can judge by his own system of
color--intended the cultivated eye to suffer. Example--as the old writers
used to say--one lady fired the air in primrose satin, with red-velvet
trimming. This mild mixture re-appeared on her head in a primrose hat
with a red feather. A gold chain, so big that it would have done for a
felon instead of a fool, encircled her neck, and was weighted with
innumerable lockets, which in size and inventive taste resembled a
poached egg, and betrayed the insular goldsmith.
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