Mansfield frequently uses nature-based similes and other figurative language in “Her First Ball,” emphasizing Leila’s grand, romanticized vision of the ball. Specifically, her figurative language often refers to flowers. One such simile comes when Leila is ushered into her first dance of the night:
‘Ours, I think–’ Someone bowed, smiled, and offered her his arm; she hadn't to die after all. Someone’s hand pressed her waist, and she floated away like a flower that is tossed into a pool.
By comparing Leila to a flower floating in a pool, this quote emphasizes Leila’s romantic view of the ball. Comparing her to a flower specifically evokes the same detailed descriptions of the azaleas and other flowers in the drill hall that recur throughout the story. In this moment, Leila imagines herself as one of the beautiful elements of the ball: a beautiful flower in an environment of romance and grace. Furthermore, comparing the dance floor to a pool also relates to Leila’s following comment that the floor is “beautifully slippery”: a similarly water-related and graceful image.
However, this feeling of being a flower in a pool fades for readers upon the realization that Leila’s dance partner has little interest in her and makes stiff conversation. In addition, this simile is multifaceted, as it is both a beautiful image and a somewhat melancholy, lonely one, since it brings to mind a single flower floating in a pool. This hints at the multifaceted nature of the ball and the impermanence of that flower-like grace and beauty.
