This reception is
the crown of life's struggle, a sort of certificate that the hero or
heroine of it is fit company for anybody in the world. It is, in
fact, a social graduation. When you get somebody who is himself a
graduate to agree to present you, and the Lord Chamberlain, after
examining your card, makes no objection to you, he virtually
furnishes you with a sort of diploma which guarantees you against
what may be called authorized snubs. People may afterward decline
your invitations on the ground that they do not like you, or that
your entertainments bore them, but not on the ground that your
social position is inferior to their own.
That the struggle for this diploma in a wealthy and large society
should be great and increasing is nothing wonderful. The desire for
it among the women especially, to whose charge the creation and
preservation of "position" are mainly committed, is very deep. It
inflames their imagination in a way which makes husbands ready for
anything in order to get it, and in fact makes it indispensable to
their peace of mind and body that they should get it as soon as
their pecuniary fortune seems to put it within their reach.
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