3-082-050 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Children's fancy-dress ball at the Mansion House, 1895. Annual children's entertainment in London. 'Light Refreshment; Babies; Master Oppenheim; Master Frank Mendl - Greek Merchant; Master Yorke Barnaby - Mephistopheles; Master Mendelssohn - French Pierrot; Miss Gladys Master - Gigolette Directoire; Banjo Pierrots...As subjects for a masquerade small people have undoubtedly the prior claim to prettiness, as that annual frolic within the Mansion House walls to which so many citizens in embryo are bidden amply illustrates...Master F. Mendl was in a handsome Greek dress...China and Japan, on amicable terms evidently, were accurately costumed by the Masters J. and H. Lobb; and two other striking dresses were a Medusa in cobwebby grey with armlets and headgear of glittering snakes, and the Puff Ball of Miss Foster, which attracted much admiration. And so eleven o'clock chiming presently from City belfries proclaimed the limit of juvenile merrymaking, and then the fairies went to bed'. From "Illustrated London News", 1895.