Seryozha understood at once that what the hall porter was speaking of was a present from Countess Lidia Ivanovna for his birthday.
"Mihail Ivanitch, when is your birthday?" he asked all, of a sudden.
"Una had, as I've told you, a lover; and they were to have been married on her twentieth
birthday. Her wedding dress was to have been a gown of white brocade with purple violets in it.
It was the night of Miss Rachel's
birthday, the twenty-first of June; and there was a party in honour of it, as usual.
'But I think to-day must be my
birthday too, for all that.'
So now the courtiers' pleasure was based as much on the fact that the news had arrived on the Emperor's
birthday as on the fact of the victory itself.
"I hope your Princess Ozma won't invite him to her
birthday celebration," remarked the shaggy man; "for the fellow's music would drive her guests all crazy.
I hope it has been made evident in these pages how superior Irais and myself are to the ordinary weaknesses of mankind; if any further proof were needed, it is furnished by the fact that we both, in defiance of tradition, scorn this celebration of
birthday rites.
My disposition is very affectionate, and perhaps I might still feel such a wound if such a wound could be received more than once with the quickness of that
birthday.
`You've got a
birthday present this time, Jim, and no mistake.
I had taken care to have it well understood in Little Britain, when my
birthday was.
It is Sophy's
birthday; and, on our road, Traddles discourses to me of the good fortune he has enjoyed.