Again, "I wore a lovely dress of pink crape spangled in
silver, sent me by Madame Le Clerc." She gives a fuller account of her
dress at the great ball given her to celebrate her recovery after the
birth of her son (Dec. 30, 1802).
"For the benefit of posterity I will describe my dress on this grand
occasion. A crape dress, embroidered in silver spangles, also sent me
by Madame Le Clerc, but much richer than that which I wore at the last
ball. Scarcely any sleeves to my dress, but a broad silver spangled
border to the shoulder-straps. The body made very like a child's
frock, tying behind, and the skirt round, with not much train. On my
head a turban of spangled crape like the dress, looped-up with pearls.
This dress, the admiration of all the world over, will, perhaps, fifty
years hence, be laughed at, and considered as ridiculous as our
grandmothers' hoops and brocades appear to us now."
In fairness it must be stated that General Nugent punctiliously
returned all Madame Le Clerc's presents to his wife with gifts of
English cut-glass, then apparently much appreciated by the French. He
seems to have sent absolute cart-loads of cut-glass to Haiti, but in
days when men habitually drank two bottles of wine apiece after
dinner, there was presumably a fair amount of breakage of decanters
and tumblers.
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