[Illustration: THE THREE MISSES BENEDICT AT YALE.]
When the girls are finally induced by their exhausted matrons to withdraw from the giddy whirl, they leave behind a set of men, wild-eyed, and wilted as to shirt-fronts, cuffs, and collars, but undaunted in spirit. These men, the givers of the ball, then go away to their dormitories to snatch an hour or two of slumber before chapel, which has, not infrequently, been attended by beings in ulsters worn over evening clothes. It was to such tireless devotees rather invigorating than depressing to see snowflakes come trooping down upon the final scenes of their three-days’ gayety. Toward nine o’clock P.M. the streets were encumbered by lumbering old hacks pulling up before doors to receive their loads of hooded and cloaked figures, then driving with them at a furious pace to the door of the armory where the “Prom” is given, and dashing off again to secure new fares. The drivers of these vehicles, known by name to most of the students, extend to the university and its doings an almost parental indulgence. To the guests who are aiding to make the occasion brilliant they are suave beyond imagination; solicitous of comfort, descending from their perches to open the carriage doors, and assisting parlously at the elbow of the lady entering or getting out. Little of the evening’s fun is to be theirs, honest fellows, but they are sustained through the chilly vigils of the night by _esprit de corps_ and a brave desire to keep up the credit of their town.
Quite early in the fray one of these hacks disgorged under the armory’s awning a party consisting of a mother, two daughters, and a girl cousin, all three of the young women marked with the same general characteristics of family, but differing in feature and degree of beauty. The mother, a stout, comely body, with diamond butterflies quivering about the base of a tall, black aigrette that, springing from her hair, swept the carriage top as she sat, emerged with a look denoting resolution to carry on the struggle of spirit against flesh to the bitter end. For was not her only son, her pride and joy, leader of the revels as head of the floor committee of the “Prom”? Not for worlds would she have given up the wearying privilege of sitting out the ball. Never, in her own palmiest days, had she drawn near to a scene of gayety with a more proud sense of identification than to-night, when she shone in the reflected glory of her handsome boy!