My uncle's earlier motor-car phases work in with these associations,
and there stands out a little bright vignette of the hall of the
Magnificent, Bexhill-on-Sea, and people dressed for dinner and sitting
about amidst the scarlet furniture--satin and white-enameled woodwork
until the gong should gather them; and my aunt is there, very
marvelously wrapped about in a dust cloak and a cage-like veil, and
there are hotel porters and under-porters very alert, and an obsequious
manager; and the tall young lady in black from the office is surprised
into admiration, and in the middle of the picture is my uncle, making
his first appearance in that Esquimaux costume I have already mentioned,
a short figure, compactly immense, hugely goggled, wearing a sort of
brown rubber proboscis, and surmounted by a table-land of motoring cap.
V
So it was we recognised our new needs as fresh invaders of the upper
levels of the social system, and set ourselves quite consciously to
the acquisition of Style and Savoir Faire. We became part of what is
nowadays quite an important element in the confusion of our world, that
multitude of economically ascendant people who are learning how to spend
money.
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