Rensselaer Republican, Volume 14, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 January 1882 — MADAM PATTI. [ARTICLE]

MADAM PATTI.

How the Divine Song-Bird Passes the day—Her Bills of Fareand/ Concert Costume. Chicago Herald. Madame rises at 9 o’clock; and during her toilet exercises her voice on the chromatic,, or indulges in bits of favorite arias, with Signor Nicclini running an opposition concert in the adjoining suite.’ A lunch is’ served in their din-' ing room at 10 o’clock, with a menu of eggs, toast, fruit, fish, tea and Wine. (Breakfast follows at 12. Rare portefriiou’se, cut extra thick, chops, fruit, coffee, wine, buckwheat cakes, and lettuce salad make up the bill of fare, Which is served, like all her meals, in courses. For dinner, turtle soup and biscuits, spiced turkey, roafct beef, a couple of salads, fruits and three kinds of wine, sustain life untd 10 o’clock, when a very light supper of entrees and coarse bread is taken With wines. When she sings dinner is taken at 3 instead of 7 p. m., and after the opera, not later than 11:30, bouillon soup, a pair of chickens, baked potatoes, salad with French dressing, claret, Roquefort, cheese and crackers, with French’ prunes. The Spanish beauty is as fastidious as talented, and will suffer nothing but the choisest viands served in first-class style. Solid silver, cut glass, and the finest hand-painted French China furnish her table. A center piece and individual bouquets of fresh flowers are supplied by Allen at every meal. Two private waiters serve het, and, like two sentinels guard her door, are attired in black broadcloth (with swallowtail coats, white vests,and satin ties. ' „ . . Her manners are those of a polished lady. All requests to servants and maids are prefaced (with“if you please,” nor is the cheery “many thanks” ever forgotten. Little coffee is consumed by “the fair diva and her protege, excepting an occasional afternoon cup. Before going to the opera two cups of strong English breakfast tea are taken. She entertains the strongest antipathy to desert (save lemon ice) and elevators. Her hotel expenses amount to $65 per day,which inclue four servant?, wines, and carriages, which the warbler pays without the slightest hesitaricy as the same accommodations were never attained in Europe j/or less than SIOO dollars per day. For an hour preceding the opera last evening the ladies’ promenade rang with the melodies escaping from parlors 5 and 7. At 7:45 Mme. Castellan came tripping down the stairs, wrapped in a charming mantle of white Russian T weed. Her head was covered with a billet of Spanish point lace, and her dress of ivbry-brocaded satin, cut ala Pompadour, had pointed panier drapery garnished with cut crystal and lace. Ten minutes later the cook emerged with a porter, who zealosly eyed the canvas-covered trunk marked “A. P.” that occupied his truck. Signor Nicolini popped his head out of the door, and his valet was seen wildly gesticulating with ' a little Frenchman with" very small pedals engulfed by a pair of yawning unmentionables. The two maids shot across the hall and then shot back again; there was a grating of door knobs, a squeaking of doors, and the lovely songstress emerged, followed by seven faultless evening suits. A pair of the blackest eyes and the pinkest cheeks were relieved by a dainty fascinator of creamy silk lace. A mantilla of black silk velvet, bordered with a strip of Siberian ermine eight inches wide, partially concealed one of the most magnificent dresses that ever came from the studio of Mme. Roder-

igue, of Paris. A long flowing robe of isatin de Lyon of the most lovely turquois blue had a soft shell plaiting running the entire circuit of the court train, and formed a frieze for four overlapping ruffles of Maltese point lace barely perceptible at the toe. The train hung perfectly plain .from the pouf, fitting over a faint tournure of hair cloth. The paniers were embroidered to a semi-tablier. which originated at the shoulder shield, following the pointed bodice, and failing over the petticoat in deeply cleft rosettes. On r eaching the knee, the tablier receded latterally and paneled the entire base of the skirt. This tablier was a piece of Japanese embroidery wrought in gold and silver on a foundation of cloth shot with iridescent passemeterie. Egyptian Jiffies, convolvuli, and magnolia roses were in bas relief, the hand work of a skillful art embroiderer. The union of the front with the panels of the train was covered by cascades of old point lace. Over the left hip an angle of lace formed a most inviting receptacle for an elongated bouquet of crushed pink roses. The Josephine bodice was supplemented by a Roi-de-JEtome ruff, and the acute Corsage,faced with a trio of lace ruffles, was garnished with roses screened with lace. Marguerite sleeves of embroidery lined with satin and lace facings which barely covered the elbow, and a pair of mousquetaire unglazed kids of amethyst tan covered the arms. All her jewels were left in abusive Cincinnati, and the gorgeous embroidery had no radiance with which to divide favors. ■Finally her petticoats were of silkembroidereti French flannell and Irish linen, heavy with thread lace and woven flounces of insertion and em--1 broidery.