Arion Society Summer Night’s Festival: 2nd

Mostly focusing on the various goings-on, not music.  Information about fireworks, parades, the decorations, and a strange “transparency” of the moon that upset the locals in shanty-town are included.  “Now it was the dashing galop, again the dreamy waltz, then the exhilarating polka, or mazurka, or the social quadrille.  Sparkling eyes, gleaming tresses, waving muslin, tiny feet, and dainty hats with the inevitable feather.”

“Belvedere Lion Park was all ablaze on Thursday night, and shone with a radiance that Paul Falk never before dreamed of in his philosophy. The long path leading up from the Eighth avenue to this shrine of music and pleasure glittered with a thousand Chinese and Japanese lanterns, while the immense platform was a constellation of light and beauty. The blinding glare of calcium lights, the myriad gas jets springing forth in every part of the grounds, the constant flash of fireworks, thunder of cannon, and the lurid face of the artificial moon rising beyond the Park, all heralded forth to the people of Gotham the glad tidings that the jolly Arions were holding high carnival in the redoubtable Falk’s domain. Passing the enchanted portals, which were guarded by tall Fatherlanders, clad in shining armor, with tinsel greaves and innocuous swords, the visitor was greeted by the name of the society, blazing out in front of the platform, and seemingly suspended in mid air. At ten o’clock the platform was crowded. The last strains of that most charming of waltzes, ‘Die Ersten Curen,’ rose on the night air, and exhausted couples were gradually dropping out of the whirling throng, when the display of fireworks took place. Some of the pieces were very fine, and no Fourth of July display at the City Hall could match the scene and its accessories. The flight of a rocket at Lion Park, the blue and red fire illuminating the picturesque grounds, the wheels, windmills and other paraphernalia of ‘villanous saltpetre’ appear very different there to what they do in the corwded city. The concluding piece, ‘Arion on his Dolphin Riding Through the Waves,’ elicited applause from all. [More about the fireworks.] … We fear that the arians have left a sulphurous [sic] impression on the minds of those people hard to eradicate. But, whatever were the theories and surmises of outsiders, the fun grew ‘fast and furious’ within. A procession of masqueraders representing ‘Napoleon the First reviewing his Troops,’ came off after the fireworks. The little corporal was not yet out of his teens or hardly into them either, but he made the most of his inches. After him came the veterans of la grande armee, looking as if they had undergone a sever campaign in the committee room. Two of them represented the wounded, having their heads bandaged, and looking very white about the lips and dark about the eyes. The procession over, the dancing was resumed with a keener zest than before. Now it was the dashing galop, again the dreamy waltz, then the exhilarating polka, or mazurka, or the social quadrille. Sparkling eyes, gleaming tresses, waving muslin, tiny feet, and dainty hats with the inevitable feather, bow or streamer, passed like a vision of the Arabian Nights circling round and round until the Chinese lanterns dropped off one by one, the letters of fire no longer told the name of the society, the first faint blush of morn reddened the east and the stairs winked themselves to sleep. Then, better late than never, with aching heads, yawning mouths and sleep laden eyes, the Arions like good law abiding citizens, went home.”

A numerous and elegant audience attended.