I Forbid the Banns! — page 315: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

CHAPTER XLII. ON THE SMILE OF MISS TRAVERS. “T)\ANCING” was in the corner of Mme. Abed Nego’s card, but this graceful exercise was not confined to one corner of her spacious mansion. Everybody knows the Abed Negos—especially every person who has done business with Mr. Abed Nego. It is said that they are of Hebrew origin, and perhaps they are. There are, how- ever, many persons who assert that their earliest pro- genitor was a Persian. Perhaps he was. People in London society have, however, long.ago abandoned asking the question ‘‘ Who were they?” in favor of the question “ Who are they ?”’ and it was generally admitted that, if the Abed Negos had once been Jewish-Persians, they were now the most successful of dance givers, dinner givers, and garden party givers in London. Why the wife of Mr. Abed Nego was called madame, no one knew; but yet everyone alluded to her as madame, though she had not a millinery shop in Bond Street or Regent Street. The purchase of a millinery business in either of these localities carries with it the title of madame, just as some estates in Italy are sold with the title of marchese or barone, as the case may be. No one, however, thought of alluding to Mr. Abed Nego as monsieur. Mr. Abed Nego was a successful financier, and dealt largely in transactions having an intimate association with Greece, Turkey, and the Levant. He had obtained im- mense concessions in many lands in exchange for cash. The Levant and the Levanters—the name is an unhappy one, but it is not deficient in descriptiveness—are usually 305 , Ceonmicloolks.ee)