The first is denominated _Venus Mendicant_, from her
always pleading poverty to her suitors, and thus artfully increasing
their generosity towards her. Sister Ellen has obtained the appellation
of _Venus Callipyga_, from her elegant form and generally half-draped
appearance in public. Do you perceive the swarthy amazon waddling along
yonder, whom the old Earl of W-----d appears to be eyeing with no little
anticipation of delight? that is a lady with a very ancient and most
fish-like flavor, odoriferous in person as the oily female Esquimaux,
or the more _fragrant_ feminine inhabitants of Russian Tartary and the
Crimea; she has with some of her admirers obtained the name of _Dolly
Drinkwater_, from her known dislike to any ~44~~thing _stronger_ than
pure French Brandy. Her present travelling cognomen is Mrs. Sp**c*r,
otherwise _Black Moll_; and a wag of the day, who is rather notorious
for the variety of his taste, has recently insisted upon re-christening
her by the _attractive nom de guerre_ of _Nux Vomica_. The little
goddess of the golden locks, dancing with a well-known _roue_, is Fanny
My*rs, a very efficient partner in the dance, and if report be true not
less engaging in the sacred mysteries of Cytherea." It would fill the
ample page to relate the varied anecdote with which Crony illustrated,
as he proceeded to describe the Scyllo and Charybdes of the unwary and
the gay; who in their voyage through life are lured by the syrens of
sweet voice, and the Pyrrhas of sweet lip, the Cleopatras of modern
times, the conquerors of hearts, and the voluptuous rioters in
pleasurable excesses, of those of whom Byron has sung,--
"Round all the confines of the yielding waist,
The strangest hand may wander undisplaced.
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