Excerpt from Social Silhouettes: Being the Impressions of Mr. Mark Manhattan<br><br>Those who affirm that I became an ironical and merciless critic of New York society because Lucy Van Dam rejected me and married that recent im portation of English idiocy, Lord Slantingforehead, are at liberty to circulate their fatuous dogmas. I care nothing for such baseless gossip. I esteem it, indeed, a proof of weakness that I, Mark Manhattan, should even respond by vague allu sion to their acrid aspersions. I have become an observer for various reasons. Prominent among these, I think, is a tendency toward preferring a sensible book and a big, elastic lounge in my nice suite of rooms at The Bolingbroke, to inane babble and suicidal brandy-and-soda at the Metro politan Club long after reputable hours. I sup pose that if I had not become an observer, these impressions, which I now hand to my good friend, Mr. Edgar Fawcett (and which he will publish at his discretion, and with what ever alterations in the way of syntax or elimina tion his trusted taste may find proper), would never have been written.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.