Perpendiculars.

Parties called crushes, in which persons have to stand almost stationary from the time of entering the suite of rooms to the time of leaving them.

“The night before I duly attended my mother to three fashionable crowds, ‘perpendicularsʹ is the best name for them, for there is seldom more than standing room.”—Edna Lyall: Donovan, chap. ix.