Page:The principal girl (IA principalgirl00snai).pdf/54

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But please to remember, when the time arrives, that you have already had the honor of a formal introduction to Arminius Wingrove.

The slave of duty stole back to Box B, and his reappearance with the signal triumph of Messrs. Cadbury went entirely unmarked, his luck being such that he crept in at the moment the Fairy Godmother waved her wand, and the rats and mice, not to mention the lizards, became piebald ponies who bore off Cinderella in her state chariot to the Prince's Ball.

Helen and Lucy Nanna had never seen anything like it—never; the Babe crowed with pleasure; Marge and Timothy and Alice Clara could merely gasp; and Father confided to Uncle Phil in a sombre undertone that it was the best pantomime he had seen for years.

We give Mr. Hollins our grateful and cordial meed for Part I of his noble annual production, what time the fire-proof curtain falls upon salvos of wild applause, in order that the ladies of the ballet may change their clothing, and the orchestra may remove the froth from a pint of bitter, and Mary Caspar, brave girl and true-blue she-Briton, every inch of her, may drink a much-needed cup of tea; while Marge and Timothy and Alice Clara and Dick and the Babe and the rest of 'em obtain first hand information as to what that box is that Uncle Phil has acquired by barter from good Messieurs Cadburyee for the sum of three half-crowns.