And it is an almost certain thing that, presuming her to have a damsel of condition in view for him as a compensation for the slaps he has received, he must lose her, he cannot enter a mutual path with her, if he shall have failed to retain this article of a black tail, his social passport.

I mean of course that he retain respect for the article in question.

Respect for it firmly seated in his mind, the tail may be said to be always handy.

It is fortune's uniform in Britain: the candlestick, if I may dare to say so, to the candle; nor need any young islander despair of getting to himself her best gifts, while he has her uniform at command, as glossy as may be.
The ladies of Brookfield were really stormed by Mr.Barrett's elegant tail.

When, the first glass of wine nodded over, Mr.Pole continued the discourse of the morning, with allusions to French cooks, and his cook, their sympathies were taken captive by Mr.Barrett's tact: the door to their sympathies having been opened to him as it were by his attire.
They could not guess what necessity urged Mr.Pole to assert his locked-up self so vehemently; but it certainly made the stranger shine with a beautiful mild lustre.