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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41632 ***
+
+Note: Images of the original pages are available through
+      Internet Archive. See
+      http://archive.org/details/artofentertainin00sher
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+      Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
+
+
+
+
+
+THE ART OF ENTERTAINING
+
+by
+
+M. E. W. SHERWOOD
+
+                               This night
+   Beneath my roof my dearest friends I entertain
+                                           HOMER
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+New York
+Dodd, Mead and Company
+1893
+
+Copyright, 1892,
+by Dodd, Mead and Company.
+
+All rights reserved.
+
+University Press:
+John Wilson and Son, Cambridge.
+
+
+
+
+     _With a grateful recognition of his services to_
+     "The Art of Entertaining,"
+
+     _Both at home and abroad, and with a profound respect for his wit,
+     eloquence, and learning, this book is dedicated_
+
+     TO
+     THE HON. CHAUNCEY M. DEPEW,
+
+     BY HIS FRIEND, THE AUTHOR.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+In America the art of entertaining as compared with the same art in
+England, in France, in Italy and in Germany may be said to be in its
+infancy. But if it is, it is a very vigorous infant, perhaps a little
+overfed. There is no such prodigality of food anywhere nor a more
+genuinely hospitable people in the world than those descendants of the
+Pilgrims and the Cavaliers who peopled the North and South of what we
+are privileged to call the United States. Exiles from Fatherland
+taught the Indians the words "Welcome!" and "What Cheer?"--a beautiful
+and a noble prophecy. Well might it be the motto for our national
+shield. We, who welcome to our broad garden-lands the hungry and the
+needy of an overcrowded old world, can well appropriate the legend.
+
+No stories of that old Biblical world of the patriarchs who lived in
+tents have been forgotten in the New World. The Western settler who
+placed before his hungry guest the last morsel of jerked meat, or
+whose pale, overworked wife broiled the fish or the bird which had
+just fallen before his unerring gun,--these people had mastered in
+their way the first principle in the art of entertaining. They have
+the hospitality of the heart. From that meal to a Newport dinner what
+an infinite series of gradations!
+
+Perhaps we may help those on the lower rungs of the ladder to mount
+from one to the other. Perhaps we may hint at the poetry, the romance,
+the history, the literature of entertaining; perhaps with practical
+hints of how to feed our guests we may suggest where meat faileth to
+feed the soul, and where intellect, wit, and taste come in.
+
+American dinners are pronounced by foreign critics as overdone. The
+great _too much_ is urged against us. We are a wasteful people as to
+food; we should learn an elegant and a wise economy. In a French
+family, eggs and lumps of sugar are counted. Economy is a part of the
+art of entertaining; if judiciously studied it is far from
+niggardliness. Such economy leads to judicious selection.
+
+One has but to read the Odes of Horace to learn how much of the mind
+can be appropriately devoted to the art of entertaining. Milton does
+not disdain, in Paradise Lost, to give us the _menu_ of Eve's dinner
+to the Angel. We find in all great poets and historians stories of
+great feasts. And with us in the nineteenth century, dinner is not
+alone a thing of twelve courses, it is the bright consummate flower of
+the day, which brings us all together from our various fields of work.
+It is the open sesame of the soul, the hour of repose, of amusement,
+of innocent hilarity,--the hour which knits up the ravelled sleeve of
+care. The body is carefully apparelled, the mind swept and garnished,
+the brain prepared for fresh impress. It is said that no important
+political movement was ever inaugurated without a dinner, and we may
+fancifully state that no great poem, no novel, no philosophical
+treatise, but has been made or marred by a dinner.
+
+There is much entertaining, however, which is not eating. We do not
+gorge ourselves, as in the days of Dr. Johnson, until the veins in the
+forehead swell to bursting, but perhaps we are just as far from those
+banquets which Horace describes,--a glass of Falernian, a kid roasted,
+a bunch of grapes, and a rose, with good talk afterward. We have not
+mingled enough of the honey of Hymettus with our cookery.
+
+Lady Morgan described years ago a dinner at Baron Rothschild's in
+Paris where the fineness of the napery, the beauty of the porcelain
+and china, the light, digestible French dishes, seemed to her a great
+improvement on the heaviness of an English dinner. That one paper is
+said to have altered the whole fabric of English dinner-giving.
+English dinners of to-day are superlatively good and agreeable in the
+best houses, and although national English cookery is not equal to
+that on the other side of the Channel, perhaps we could not have a
+better model to follow. We can compass an "all round" mastery of the
+art of entertaining if we choose.
+
+It is not alone the wealth of America which can assist us, although
+wealth is a good thing. It is our boundless resource, and the
+capability, spirit, and generosity of our people. Venice alone at one
+imperial moment of her success had such a chance as we have; she was
+free, she was industrious, she was commercial, she was rich, she was
+artistic. All the world paid her tribute. And we see on her walls
+to-day, fixed there by the pencils of Tintoretto and Titian, what was
+her idea of the art of entertaining. Poetry, painting, and music were
+the hand-maidens of plenty; they wait upon those Godlike men and those
+beautiful women. It is a saturnalia of colour, an apotheosis of plenty
+with no vulgar excess, with no slumberous repletion. "'Tis but the
+fool who loves excess," says our American Horace in his "Ode to an Old
+Punch Bowl."
+
+When we read Charles Lamb's "Essay on Roast Pig," Brillat Savarin's
+grave and witty "Physiologie du Gout," Thackeray's "Fitz Boodle's
+Professions," Sydney Smith's poetical recipe for a salad; when we read
+Disraeli's description of dinners, or the immortal recipes for good
+cheer which Dickens has scattered through his books, we learn how much
+the better part of dinner is that which we do not eat, but only think
+about. What a liberal education to hear the late Samuel Ward talk
+about good dinners! Variety not vegetables, manners not meat, was his
+motto. He invested the whole subject with a sort of classic elegance
+and a humorous sense of responsibility. Anacreon and Charles Delmonico
+seemed to mingle in his brain, and one would gladly now be able to
+dine with him and Longfellow at their yearly Christmas dinner.
+
+Cookery books, receipts, and _menus_ are apt to be of little use to
+young housekeepers before they have mastered the great art of
+entertaining. Then they are like the system of logarithms to the
+mariner. Almost all young housekeepers are at sea without a chart. A
+great, turbulent ocean of butchers, bakers and Irish servants swim
+before their eyes. How grapple with that important question, "How
+shall I give a dinner?" Who can help them? Shall we try?
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                                                      PAGE
+
+     OUR AMERICAN RESOURCES AND FOREIGN ALLIES          13
+
+     THE HOSTESS                                        22
+
+     BREAKFAST                                          35
+
+     THE LUNCH                                          49
+
+     AFTERNOON TEA                                      59
+
+     THE INTELLECTUAL COMPONENTS OF A DINNER            68
+
+     CONSCIENTIOUS DINERS                               79
+
+     VARIOUS MODES OF GASTRONOMICAL GRATIFICATION       94
+
+     SOUPS                                             105
+
+     FISH                                              113
+
+     SALAD                                             124
+
+     DESSERTS                                          134
+
+     GERMAN EATING AND DRINKING                        143
+
+     THE INFLUENCE OF GOOD CHEER ON AUTHORS
+       AND GENIUSES                                    152
+
+     BONBONS                                           162
+
+     FAMOUS MENUS AND RECEIPTS                         176
+
+     COOKERIES AND WINES OF SOUTHERN EUROPE            185
+
+     SOME ODDITIES IN THE ART OF ENTERTAINING          197
+
+     THE SERVANT QUESTION                              206
+
+     SOMETHING ABOUT COOKS                             221
+
+     FURNISHING A COUNTRY HOUSE                        233
+
+     ENTERTAINING IN A COUNTRY HOUSE                   241
+
+     A PICNIC                                          253
+
+     PASTIMES OF LADIES                                260
+
+     PRIVATE THEATRICALS                               271
+
+     HUNTING AND SHOOTING                              280
+
+     GOLF                                              288
+
+     GAMES                                             299
+
+     ARCHERY                                           313
+
+     THE SEASON--BALLS AND RECEPTIONS                  321
+
+     WEDDINGS                                          331
+
+     HOW ROYALTY ENTERTAINS                            340
+
+     ENTERTAINING AT EASTER                            353
+
+     HOW TO ENTERTAIN CHILDREN                         361
+
+     CHRISTMAS AND CHILDREN                            371
+
+     CERTAIN PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS                     381
+
+     THE COMPARATIVE MERITS OF AMERICAN AND
+       FOREIGN MODES OF ENTERTAINING                   389
+
+
+
+
+THE ART OF ENTERTAINING.
+
+
+
+
+OUR AMERICAN RESOURCES, AND FOREIGN ALLIES.
+
+     "Let observation, with extensive view,
+     Survey mankind from China to Peru."
+
+
+The amount of game and fish which our great country and extent of
+sea-coast give us, the variety of climate from Florida to Maine, from
+San Francisco to Boston, which the remarkable net-work of our railway
+communication allows us to enjoy,--all this makes the American market
+in any great city almost fabulously profuse. Then our steamships bring
+us fresh artichokes from Algiers in mid-winter, and figs from the
+Mediterranean, while the remarkable climate of California gives us
+four crops of delicate fruits a year.
+
+There are those, however, who find the fruits of California less
+finely flavoured than those of the Eastern States. The peaches of the
+past are almost a lost flavour, even at the North. The peach of Europe
+is a different and far inferior fruit. It lacks that essential flavour
+which to the American palate tells of the best of fruits.
+
+It may be well, for the purposes of gastronomical history, to narrate
+the variety of the larder in the height of the season, of a certain
+sea-side club-house, a few years ago:
+
+"The season lasted one hundred and eighty days, during which time from
+eighty thousand to ninety thousand game-birds, and eighteen thousand
+pounds of fish were consumed, exclusive of domestic poultry, steaks
+and chops. On busy days twenty-four kinds of fish, all fit for
+epicures, embracing turbot, Spanish mackerel, sea trout; the various
+kinds of bass, including that gamest of fish the black bass, bonito
+from the Gulf of Mexico, the purple mullet, the weakfish, chicken
+halibut, sole, plaice, the frog, the soft crab from the Chesapeake,
+were served. Here, packed tier upon tier in glistening ice, were some
+thirty kinds of birds in the very ecstasy of prime condition, and all
+ready prepared for the cook. Let us enumerate 'this royal fellowship
+of game.' There were owls from the North (we might call them by some
+more enticing name), chicken grouse from Illinois, chicken partridge,
+Lake Erie black and summer ducks and teal, woodcock, upland plover (by
+many esteemed as the choicest of morsels), dough-birds, brant, New
+Jersey millet, godwit, jack curlew, jacksnipe, sandsnipe, rocksnipe,
+humming-birds daintily served in nut-shells, golden plover,
+beetle-headed plover, redbreast plover, chicken plover, seckle-bill
+curlew, summer and winter yellow-legs, reed-birds and rail from
+Delaware (the latter most highly esteemed in Europe, where it is known
+as the ortolan), ring-neck snipe, brown backs, grass-bird, and peeps."
+
+Is not this a list to make "the rash gazer wipe his eye"?
+
+And to show our riches and their poverty in the matter of game, let us
+give the game statistics of France for one September. There are thirty
+thousand communes in France, and in each commune there were killed on
+the average on September 1, ten hares,--total, three hundred thousand;
+seventeen partridges,--total, five hundred and ten thousand; fourteen
+quail,--total, four hundred and twenty thousand; one rail in each
+commune,--thirty thousand total as to rails. That was all France could
+do for the furnishing of the larder; of course she imports game from
+Savoy, Germany, Norway, and England. And oh, how she can cook them!
+
+Woodcock, it is said, should be cooked the day it is shot, or
+certainly when fresh. Birds that feed on or near the water should be
+eaten fresh; so should snipe and some kinds of duck. The canvasback
+alone bears keeping, the others get fishy.
+
+Snipe should be picked by hand, on no account drawn; that is a
+practice worthy of an Esquimaux. Nor should any condiment be cooked
+with woodcock, save butter or pork. A piece of toast under him, to
+catch his fragrant gravy, and the delicious trail should alone be
+eaten with the snipe; but a bottle of Chambertin may be drunk to wash
+him down.
+
+The plover should be roasted quickly before a hot fire; nor should
+even a pork jacket be applied if one wishes the delicious juices of
+the bird alone. This bird should be served with water-cresses.
+
+Red wine should be drunk with game,--Chambertin, Clos de Vougeot, or a
+sound Lafitte or La Tour claret. Champagne is not the wine to serve
+with game; that belongs to the filet. With beef _braisé_ a glass of
+good golden sherry is allowable, but not champagne. The deep purple,
+full-bodied, velvety wines of the Côte d'Or,--the generous vintages of
+Burgundy,--are in order. Indeed these wines always have been in high
+renown. They are passed as presents from one royal personage to
+another, like a _cordon d'honneur_. Burgundy was the wine of nobles
+and churchmen, who always have had enviable palates.
+
+Chambertin is a lighter kind of Volnay and the _vin velouté par
+excellence_ of the Côte d'Or. It was a great favourite with Napoleon
+I. To considerable body it unites a fine flavour and a _suave bouquet_
+of great _finesse_, and does not become thin with age like other
+Burgundies. As for the Clos de Vougeot, its characteristics are a rich
+ruby colour, velvety softness, a delicate bouquet, which has a slight
+suggestion of the raspberry. It is a strong wine, less refined in
+flavour than the Chambertin, and with a suggestion of bitterness. It
+was so much admired by a certain military commander that while
+marching his regiment to the Rhine he commanded his men to halt before
+the vineyard and salute it. They presented arms in its honour.
+
+Château Lafitte, renowned for its magnificent colour, exquisite
+softness, delicate flavour, and fragrant bouquet, recalling almonds
+and violets, is one of the wines of the Gironde, and is supposed of
+late to have deteriorated in quality; but it is quite good enough to
+command a high price and the attention of _connoisseurs_.
+
+Château La Tour, a grand Médoc claret, derives its name from an
+existing ancient, massive, round tower, which the English assailed and
+defended by turns during the wars in Guienne. It has a pronounced
+flavour, and a powerful bouquet, common to all wines of the Gironde.
+It reminds one of the odour of almonds, and of Noyau cordials.
+
+These vineyards were in great repute five centuries ago; and it would
+be delightful to pursue the history of the various _crûs_, did time
+permit. The Cos d'Estoumet of the famous St. Estephe _crûs_ is still
+made by the peasants treading out the grapes, _foule à pied_, to the
+accompaniment of pipes and fiddles as in the days of Louis XIV.
+
+We will mention the two _premiers grands crûs_ of the Gironde, the
+growth of the ancient vineyards of Leoville and the St. Julian wines,
+distinguished by their odour of violets.
+
+Thackeray praises Chambertin in verse more than once:--
+
+     "'Oui, oui, Monsieur,' 's the waiter's answer;
+       'Quel vin Monsieur desire-t-il?'
+     'Tell me a good one.'--'That I can, sir:
+       The Chambertin, with yellow seal.'"
+
+Then again he speaks of dipping his gray beard in the Gascon wine 'ere
+Time catches him at it and Death knocks the crimson goblet from his
+lips.
+
+In countries where wine is grown there is little or no drunkenness. It
+is to be feared that drunkenness is increased by impure wines. It is
+shocking to read of the adulterations which first-class wines are
+subjected to, or rather the adulterations which are called first-class
+wines.
+
+Wilkie Collins has a hit at this in his "No Name," where he makes the
+famous Captain Wragge say, "We were engaged at the time in making, in
+a small back parlour in Brompton, a fine first-class sherry, sound in
+the mouth, tonic in character, and a great favourite with the Court of
+Spain."
+
+Our golden sherry, our Chambertin, our Château Lafitte is said often
+to come from the vineyards of Jersey City and the generous hillsides
+of Brooklyn; and we might perhaps quote from the famous song of "The
+Canal":--
+
+     "The tradesmen who in liquor deal,
+     Of our Canal good use can make;
+     And when they mean their casks to fill,
+     They oft its water freely take.
+
+     By this device they render less
+     The ills that spring from drunkenness;
+     For harmless is the wine, you'll own,
+     From vines that in canals is grown."
+
+A large proportion of the so-called foreign wines sold in America are
+of American manufacture. The medium grade clarets and so-called
+Sauternes are made in California, in great quantities. Our Senator,
+Leland Stanford, makes excellent wines. On the islands of Lake Erie,
+the lake region of Central New York, and along the banks of the Ohio
+and Missouri Rivers, are vineyards producing excellent wines. An
+honest American wine is an excellent thing to drink; and yet it
+disgusted Commodore McVicker, who was entertained in London as
+President of our Yacht Club, to be asked to drink American wines. Yet
+the Catawbas, "dulcet, delicious and creamy," are not to be despised;
+neither are the sweet and dry California growths.
+
+The indigenous wines which come from Ohio, Iowa, Missouri and
+Mississippi are likely to be musty and foxy, and are not pleasant to
+an American taste. The Catawbas are pleasant, and are of three
+colours,--rose colour, straw colour, and colourless, if that be a
+colour. In taste they are like sparkling Moselle, but fuller to the
+palate.
+
+The wine produced from the Isabella grape is of a decided raspberry
+flavour. The finest American wines are those produced from the vines
+known as Norton's Virginia and the Cynthiana. The former produces a
+well-blended, full-bodied, deep-coloured, aromatic, and almost
+astringent wine; the second,--probably the finer of the two,--is a
+darker, less astringent, and more delicate product.
+
+Among the American red wines may be mentioned the product of the
+Schuylkill Muscadel, which was the only esteemed growth in the country
+previous to the cultivation of the Catawba grape, being in fact
+ambitiously compared to the _crûs_ of the Gironde. It was a bitter,
+acidulous wine, little suited to the American palate, and invariably
+requiring an addition of either sugar or alcohol.
+
+Longfellow sings of the wine of the Mustang grape of Texas and New
+Mexico:--
+
+     "The fiery flood
+     Of whose purple blood
+     Has a dash of Spanish bravado."
+
+The Carolina Scuppernong is detestable, reminding us of the sweet and
+bitter medicines of childhood. The Herbemont, a rose-tinted wine is
+very like Spanish Manganilla.
+
+Longfellow says of sparkling Catawba, that it "fills the room with a
+benison on the giver." It has, indeed, a charming bouquet, as says the
+poet.
+
+The name of Nicholas Longworth is intimately connected with the
+subject of American wines. To him will ever be given all honour, as
+being the father of this industry in the New World; but the superior
+excellence of the California wines has driven the New York and Ohio
+wines, it is said, to a second place in the market.
+
+In the expositions of 1889 at Paris, and in Melbourne, silver medals
+were awarded to the Inglenook wines, which are of the red claret,
+burgundy and Médoc type; also white wines,--Sauterne Chasselas, and
+Hock, Chablis, Riesling, etc.
+
+The right soil for the cultivation of the grape is a hard thing to
+find; but Captain Niebaum, a rich California grower, has hit the
+key-note, when he says, "I have no wish to make any money out of my
+vineyard by producing a large quantity of wine at a cheap or moderate
+price. I am going to make a California wine which, if it can be made,
+will be worthily sought for by _connoisseurs_; and I am prepared to
+spend all the money needed to accomplish that result." He says frankly
+that he has not yet produced the best wine of which California is
+capable, but that he has succeeded in producing a better wine than
+many of the foreign wines sold in America. He might have added that
+hogsheads of California grape-juice are sent annually to Bordeaux to
+be doctored, and returned to America as French claret.
+
+The misfortunes of the vine-grower in Europe, the ruin of acres of
+grape-producing country by the phyloxera, should be the opportunity
+for these new vine-growers in the United States. It is only by travel,
+experiment, and by a close study of the methods of the foreign
+wine-growers that a Californian can possibly make himself a vineyard
+which shall be successful. He must induce Nature to sweeten his wines,
+and he can then laugh at the chemist.
+
+Of vegetables we have not only all that Europe can boast, excepting
+perhaps the artichoke, but we have some in constant use and of great
+excellence which they have not. For instance, sweet corn boiled or
+roasted and eaten from the cob with butter and salt is unknown in
+Europe. They have not the sweet potato, so delicious when baked. They
+have not the pumpkin-pie although they have the pumpkin. They have
+egg-plant and cauliflower and beans and peas, but so have we. They
+have bananas, but never fried, which is a negro dish, and excellent.
+They have not the plantain, good baked, nor the avocado or alligator
+pear, which fried in butter or oil is so admirable. They have not the
+ochra, of which the negro cooks make such excellent gumbo soup. They
+have all the salads, and use sorrel much more than we do. They do not
+cook summer squash as we do, nor have they anything to equal it. They
+use vegetables always as an _entrée_, not served with the meat, unless
+the vegetable is cooked with the meat, like beef stewed in carrots,
+turnips, and onions, veal and green peas, veal with spinach, and so
+on. The peas are passed as an _entrée_, so is the cauliflower, the
+beet-root, and the turnips. They treat all vegetables as we do corn
+and asparagus, as a separate course. For asparagus we must give the
+French the palm, particularly when they serve it with Hollandaise
+sauce; and the Italians cook cauliflower with cheese, _à ravir_.
+
+
+
+
+THE HOSTESS.
+
+     "A creature not too bright or good
+     For human nature's daily food;
+     For transient sorrow, simple wiles,
+     Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles."
+
+
+The "house-mother,"--the mistress of servants, the wife, the mother,
+the hostess,--is the first person in the art of entertaining; and
+considering how busy, how hard worked, how occupied, are American men,
+she is generally the first person singular. In nine cases out of ten,
+American men neither know nor care much about the conduct of the house
+if the wife will assume it; they only like to be made comfortable, and
+to find a warm, clean home, with a good dinner awaiting them. It is
+the wife who must struggle with the problems of domestic defeat or
+victory.
+
+When Washington Irving was presented at the Court of Dresden his Saxon
+Majesty remarked, "Mr. Irving, with a republic so liberal, you can
+have no servants in America."
+
+"Yes, Sire, we have servants, such as they are," said the amiable
+author of the "Sketchbook;" "but we do not call them servants, we call
+them help."
+
+"I cannot understand that," said the king.
+
+The king's mental position was not illogical; for, with his experience
+of the servile position of the domestic in Europe, he could not
+reconcile to his mind the declaration of social equality in America.
+
+The American hostess must, it would seem, for many centuries if not
+forever, have to struggle against this difficulty. As some writer said
+twenty years ago, of this question: "Rich as we are in money, profuse
+in spending it to heighten the enjoyment of life, the good servant,
+that essential of comfort and luxury, seems beyond our reach.
+Superfine houses we have, and superfine furniture, and superfine
+ladies, and all the other superfineties to excess, but the skilful
+cook, the handy maid, and the trusty nurse we rarely possess."
+
+Thus, afar from the great cities and even in them, we must forge the
+instruments with which we work, instead of finding them ready to hand,
+as in other countries. That is to say, the mistress of a household
+must teach her cook to cook, her waiter to wait, her laundress to get
+up fine linen. She is happy if she can get honest people and willing
+hands, but trained servants she durst not expect away from the great
+centres of life.
+
+Considering what has been expected of the American woman, has she not
+done rather well? That she must be first servant-trainer, then
+housekeeper, wife, mother, and conversationist, that she must keep up
+with the always advancing spirit of the times, read, write, and
+cipher, be beautifully dressed, play the piano, make the wilderness to
+blossom as the rose, be charitable, thoughtful, and good, put the mind
+at its ease, strive to learn how to do all things in the best way, be
+a student of good taste and good manners, make a house luxurious,
+ornamental, cheerful, and restful, have an inspired sense of the
+fitness of things, dress and entertain in perfect accord with her
+station, her means, and her husband's ambition, master, unassisted,
+all the ins and outs of the noble art of entertaining,--has not this
+been something of the nature of a large contract?
+
+She must go to the cooking-lecture, come home and visit the kitchen,
+go to the intelligence office, keeping her hand on all three. She must
+be the mind, while the Maggies and Bridgets furnish the hands. She
+must never be fussy, never grotesque; she must steer her ship through
+stormy seas, and she must also learn to enjoy Wagner's music. There is
+proverbially no sea so dangerous to swim in as that tumultuous one of
+a new and illy regulated prosperity; and in the changeful, uncertain
+nature of American fortunes an American woman must be ready to meet
+any fate.
+
+Judging from many specimens which we have seen, may we not claim that
+the American woman must be stamped with an especial distinction? Has
+she not conquered her fate?
+
+Curiously enough, fashion and good taste seem to lackey to the
+American woman, no matter where she was born or where educated. In
+spite of all drawbacks, and the counter-currents of destiny, she is a
+well bred and tasteful woman. No matter what the American woman has to
+fight against, poverty or lack of opportunities, she is likely, if she
+is called upon to do so, to administer gracefully the hospitalities of
+the White House or to fill the difficult _rôle_ of an ambassadress.
+
+Some of them have bad taste perhaps. "What is good taste but an
+instantaneous, ready appreciation of the fitness of things?" To most
+of us who observe it in others, it seems to be an instinct. We envy
+those few who are always well dressed, who never buy unbecoming
+stuffs, who have the gift to make their clothes look as if they had
+simply blossomed out of their inner consciousness, as a rose blossoms
+out of its calyx. Some women always dress their hair becomingly;
+others, even if handsome, look like beautiful frights. Some wear their
+clothes as if they had been hurled at them by a tornado, and remind
+one of the poor husband's remark, "I feel as if I had married a
+hurricane." The same exceptions, which only prove the rule, because
+you notice them, may extend to the housewives who aim at more than
+they can accomplish, who make their house an anguish to look at,
+pretentious without beauty, overloaded or incorrect, who have not
+tact, who say the awkward thing. Such people exist sometimes, sinning
+from ignorance, but they are decidedly in the minority. The American
+woman is generally a success. She has fought a hard battle, but she
+has won. She has had her defeats, however.
+
+Who does not remember the failure of that first dinner-party?--when
+the baby began to cry so loud; when the hostess was not dressed when
+the bell rang; when the cook spilled the soup all over the range and
+filled the house with a bad odour; when the waitress, usually so cool,
+lost all her presence of mind and fell on the basement stairs,
+breaking all the plates; when one failure succeeded another until the
+husband looked reproachfully at his wife, who, poor creature, had been
+working day and night to get up this dinner, who was responsible for
+none of the failures, and who had an attack of neuralgia afterward
+which lasted all winter.
+
+Who has not read Thackeray's witty descriptions of the dinners, poor
+and pretentious, ordered in from the green-grocer's, and
+uneatable,--in London? "If they would have a leg of mutton and an
+apple pudding and a glass of sherry, they could do well; but they must
+shine, they must outdo their neighbours." And that is the first
+mistake. People with three thousand a year should not try to emulate
+those who have fifty thousand a year.
+
+And Thackeray says again: "But there is no harm done, not as regards
+the dinner-givers, though the dinner-eaters may have to suffer. It
+only shows that the former are hospitably inclined, and wish to do the
+very best in their power. If they do badly, how can they help it? They
+know no better."
+
+The first thing at which a young housekeeper must aim is to live well
+every day. Her tablecloth must be fresh, her glass and silver clean; a
+few flowers must be on her table to make it dainty, a few dishes well
+cooked,--such a table as will be well for her children and acceptable
+to her husband; and then she has but to add a little more and it is
+fit for any guest, and any guest will be glad to join such a
+dinner-party.
+
+But here I am met by the almost unanswerable argument that the
+simplest dinner is the most difficult to find. Who knows how to cook a
+beefsteak, to roast a piece of mutton so that its natural juices are
+retained,--to roast it so that the blood shall follow the knife; to
+mash potatoes and brown them; to make a perfect rice-pudding that is
+said to "deserve that _cordon bleu_ which Vatel, Ude, and Bechamel
+craved"?
+
+The young housekeeper of to-day with very modest means has, however,
+now to meet a condition of prosperity which even twenty-five years ago
+was unknown. All extremes of luxury and every element of profusion is
+now fashionable,--one may say expected.
+
+But agreeable young people will be entertained by the man who is worth
+fifty thousand dollars a day, and they will wish to return the
+civility. Herein lie the difficulties in the art of entertaining; but
+let them remember that there is one simple dinner which covers the
+whole ground, which the poor gentleman may aspire to give, and to
+which he might invite a prince. The essentials of a comfortable dinner
+are but few. The beauty of a Grecian vase without ornament is perfect.
+You may add cameo and intaglio, vine, acanthus leaf, satyrs, and
+fauns, handles of ram's horns and circlet of gems to your vase if you
+wish, and are rich enough, but unless the outline is perfect the
+splendour and the arabesque but render the vase vulgar. So with the
+simple dinner; it is the Grecian vase unadorned.
+
+Remember that rich people, stifled with luxury at home, like to be
+asked to these dinners. A lady in England, very much admired for her
+witty conversation, said she intended to devote herself to the
+amelioration of the condition of the upper classes, as she thought
+them the most bored and altogether the least attended to of any
+people; and we have heard of the rich man in New York who complained
+that he was no longer asked to the little dinners. There is too much
+worship and fear of money in our country. In England and on the
+Continent there is no shame in acknowledging, "I cannot afford it." I
+have been asked to a luncheon in England where a cold joint of mutton,
+a few potatoes, and a plate of peaches constituted the whole repast;
+and I have heard more delightful conversation and have met more
+agreeable people than at more expensive feasts. Who in America would
+dare to give such a lunch?
+
+The simple dinner might be characterized, giving the essentials, as a
+soup, a fish, a roast, one _entrée_, and a salad, an ice and fruit
+(simply the fruit in season), a cup of coffee afterward, with a glass
+of sherry, claret, or champagne. Such a dinner is good enough for
+anybody, and is possible to the person of moderate means.
+
+From this up to the splendid dinners of millionnaires, served on gold
+and silver and priceless Sèvres, Dresden, Japanese, and Chinese
+porcelain, with flagons of ruby glass bound in gold, with Benvenuto
+Cellini vases, and silver candelabra, the ascent may be gradual. In
+the one the tablecloth is of spotless damask; in the other it may be
+of duchesse lace over red. The very mats are mirrors, the crystal
+drops of the epergne flash like diamonds. It may be served in a
+picture-gallery. Each lady has a bouquet, a fan, a ribbon painted with
+her name, a basket or _bonbonnière_ to take home with her. The courses
+are often sixteen in number, the wines are of fabulous value,
+antiquity, and age. Each drop is like the River Pactolus, whose sands
+were of gold. The viands may come from Algiers or St. Petersburg;
+strawberries and peaches in January, the roses of June in February,
+fruit from the Pacific, from the Gulf, artichokes from Marseilles,
+oranges and strawberries from Florida, game from Arizona and
+Chesapeake Bay, mutton and pheasants from Scotland, luxury from
+everywhere. The primal condition of this banquet is, that everything
+should be unusual.
+
+But remember that, after all, it is only the Grecian vase heavily
+ornamented. No one person can taste half the dishes; it takes a long
+time, and the room may be too hot. The limitations of a dinner should
+be considered. It is a splendid picture, no doubt, but it need not
+appall the young hostess who desires to return the civility.
+
+A vase of flowers or a basket of growing plants can replace the
+epergne. Some pretty dinner-cards may be etched by herself, with a
+Shakspearean quotation showing a personal thought of each guest. Her
+spotless glass and silver, her good soup, her fresh fish, the haunch
+of venison roasted before a wood fire, the salad mixed by her own fair
+hands, perhaps a dessert over which she has lingered, a bit of cheese,
+a cup of coffee, a smiling host, a composed hostess, a congenial
+company, and wit withal,--who shall say that the little dinner is not
+as amusing as the big dinner? To be composed: yes, that is the first
+thing to be remembered on the part of a young hostess. She may be
+essentially nervous and anxious, particularly if she is just beginning
+to entertain, but here she must resolutely put on a mask of composure,
+and assume a virtue if she have it not. Nothing is of much importance,
+excepting her own demeanor. A fussy hostess who scolds the servants,
+wrinkles her brow, or even forgets to listen to the man who is talking
+to her is the ruin of a dinner. The author of "Cecil" tells his niece
+that if stewed puppy-dog is brought to the table she must not notice
+it. Few hostesses are subjected to so severe an ordeal as this, but
+the remark contains a goodly hint.
+
+As, however, it is a great intellectual feat to achieve a perfect
+little dinner with a small household and small means, perhaps that
+form of entertaining may be postponed a few years. Never attempt
+anything which cannot be well done. There is the afternoon tea, the
+musical evening, the reception, the luncheon; they are all easier to
+give than the dinner. The young hostess ambitious to excel in the art
+of entertaining can choose a thousand ways. Let her alone avoid
+attempting the impossible; and let her remember that no success which
+is not honestly gained is worth a pin. If it is money, it stings; if
+it is place and position, it becomes the shirt of Nessus.
+
+But for the well mannered and well behaved American woman what a noble
+success, what a perfect present, what a delightful future there is!
+She is the founder of the American nobility. All men bow down to her.
+She is the queen of the man who loves her; he treats her with every
+respect. She is to teach the future citizen honour, loyalty, duty,
+respect, politeness, kindness, the law of love. Such a man could read
+his Philip Sidney and yet not blush to find himself a follower. An
+American woman wields the only rod of empire to which American men
+will bow. She should try to be an empress in the best sense of the
+word; and to a young woman entering society we should recommend a
+certain exclusiveness. Not snobbish exclusiveness; but it is always
+well to choose one's friends slowly and with due consideration. We are
+not the most perfect beings in all the world; we do not wish to be
+intimate with too much imperfection. A broken friendship is a very
+painful thing. We should think twice before we give an intimate
+friendship to any one. No woman who essays to entertain should ask
+everybody to her house. The respect she owes to herself should prevent
+this; her house becomes a camp unless she has herself the power of
+putting a coarse sieve outside the door.
+
+We have no such inviolable virtue that we can as yet rate Dives and
+Lazarus before they are dead. Very rich people are apt to be very good
+people; and in the realms of the highest fashion we find the simplest,
+best, and purest of characters. It is therefore of no consequence as
+to the shade of fashion and the amount of the rent-roll. It must not
+be supposed because some leaders of fashion are insolent that all are.
+A young hostess must try to find the good, true, honourable, generous,
+well bred, well educated member of society, no matter in what
+conditions of life. Read character first, and hesitate before drawing
+general deductions.
+
+A hostess is the slave of her guests after she has invited them; she
+must be all attention, and all suavity. If she has nothing to offer
+them but a small house, a cup of tea, and a smile, she is just as much
+a hostess as if she were a queen. If she offers them every luxury and
+is not polite, she is a snob and a vulgarian. There is no such
+detestable use of one's privileges as to be rude on one's ground. "The
+man who eats your salt is sacred." To patronize is a great necessity
+to some natures. There is little opportunity for it in free, brave
+America, but some mistaken hostesses have gone that way. Every one
+feels pleasantly toward the woman who invites one to her house; there
+is something gracious in the act. But if, after opening her doors, the
+hostess refuses the welcome, or treats her guests with various degrees
+of cordiality, why did she ask at all? Every young American can become
+a model hostess; she can master etiquette, and create for herself a
+polite and cordial manner. She should be as serene as a summer's day;
+she should keep all her domestic troubles out of sight. If she
+entertains, let her do it in her own individual way,--a small way if
+necessary. There was much in Touchstone's philosophy,--"a poor thing,
+but mine own." She must have the instinct of hospitality, which is to
+give pleasure to all one's guests; and it seems unnecessary to say to
+any young American hostess, _Noblesse oblige_. She should be more
+polite to the shy, ill-dressed visitor from the country--if indeed
+there is such a thing left in America, where, as Bret Harte says, "The
+fashions travel by telegraph"--than to the sweeping city dame, that
+can take care of herself. A kindly greeting to a gawky youth will
+never be forgotten; and it is to the humblest that a hostess should
+address her kindest attentions.
+
+There are born hostesses, like poets, but a hostess can also be made,
+in which she has the advantage of the poets; and to the very wealthy
+hostess we should quote this inestimable advice:--
+
+           Si tibi deficiant medici, medici tibi fiant
+     Hæc tria: mens hilaris, requies, moderata diæta.
+                                               HORACE.
+
+Do not over-feed people. Who is it that says, "If simplicity is
+admirable in manners and in literary style, in the matter of dinners
+it becomes exalted into one of the cardinal virtues"?
+
+The ambitious housewife would do well to remember this when she
+cumbers herself, and thinks too much about her forthcoming banquet. If
+she ignores this principle of simplicity and falls into the opposite
+extreme of ostentation and pretentiousness, she may bore her guests
+rather than entertain them.
+
+It is an incontestable fact that dinners are made elaborate only at a
+considerable risk; as they increase in size and importance, their
+character is likely to deteriorate. This is true not only with regard
+to the number of guests, but with reference to the number of dishes
+that go to make up a bill-of-fare.
+
+In fact we, as Americans, generally err on the side of having too much
+rather than too little. The terror of running short is agony to the
+mind of the conscientious housewife. How much will be enough and no
+more? It stands to reason that the fewer the dishes, the more the cook
+can concentrate her attention upon them; and here is reason for
+reducing the _menu_ to its lowest terms. Then to consult the proper
+gradation.
+
+Brillat Savarin recounts a rather cruel joke perpetrated on a man who
+was a well-known gourmand. The idea was that he should be induced to
+satisfy himself with the more ordinary viands, and that then the
+choicest dishes should be presented in vain before his jaded appetite.
+This treacherous feast began with a sirloin of beef, a fricandeau of
+veal, and a stewed carp with stuffing. Then came a magnificent turkey,
+a pike, six _entremets_, and an ample dish of macaroni and Parmesan
+cheese. Nor was this all. Another course appeared, composed of
+sweetbread, surrounded with shrimps in jelly, soft roes, and partridge
+wings, with a thick sauce or _purée_ of mushrooms. Last of all came
+the delicacies,--snipes by the dozen, a pheasant in perfect order, and
+with them a slice of tunny fish, quite fresh. Naturally, the gourmand
+was _hors du combat_. As a joke, it was successful; as an act of
+hospitality, it was a cruelty; as pointing a moral and adorning a
+tale, it may be useful.
+
+This anecdote has its historical value as showing us that the present
+procession of soup, fish, roast, _entrée_, game, and dessert was not
+observed one hundred years ago, as a fish was served after beef and
+after turkey.
+
+Dr. Johnson describes a dinner at Mrs. Thrales which shows us what was
+considered luxurious a hundred years ago. "The dinner was excellent.
+First course: soups at head and foot, removed by fish and a saddle of
+mutton. Second course: a fowl they call galenan at head, a capon
+larger than our Irish turkeys at foot. Third course: four different
+ices,--pineapple, grape, raspberry, and a fourth. In each remove four
+dishes; the first two courses served on massive plate."
+
+These "gentlemen of England who live at home at ease," these earls by
+the king's grace, viceroys of India, clerks and rich commoners, would
+laugh at this dinner to-day; so would our clubmen, our diners at
+Delmonico's, our millionnaires. Imagine the feelings of that _chef_
+who received ten thousand a year, with absolute power of life or
+death, with a wine-cellar which is a fortress of which he alone knows
+the weakest spot,--what would he say to such a dinner?
+
+But there are dinners where the gradation is perfect, where luxury
+stimulates the brain as Château Yquem bathes the throat. It would seem
+as if the Golden Age, the age of Leo X. had come back; and our
+nineteenth century shows all the virtues of the art of entertaining
+since the days of Lucullus, purified of the enormities, including
+dining at eleven in the morning, of the intermediate ages.
+
+It must not be forgotten that this simplicity which is so commended
+can only be obtained by the most studied, artful care. As Gray's Elegy
+reads as the most consummately easy and plain poetry in the world, so
+that we feel that we have but to sit down at the writing-desk and
+indite one exactly like it, we learn in giving a little, simple,
+perfect dinner that its combinations must be faultless. Gray wrote
+every verse of his immortal poem over many times. The hostess who
+learns enough art to conceal art in her simple dinner has achieved
+that perfection in her art which Gray reached. Perfect and simple
+cookery are, like perfect beauty, very rare.
+
+However, if the art of entertaining makes hostesses, hostesses must
+make the art of entertaining. It is for them to decide the _juste
+milieu_ between the _not enough_ and the great _too much_.
+
+
+
+
+BREAKFAST.
+
+         Before breakfast a man feels but queasily,
+         And a sinking at the lower abdomen
+         Begins the day with indifferent omen.
+             BROWNING.--_The Flight of the Duchess._
+
+     And then to breakfast with what appetite you have.
+                                             SHAKSPEARE.
+
+
+Breakfast is a hard thing to manage in America, particularly in a
+country-house, as people have different ideas about eating a hearty
+meal at nine o'clock or earlier. All who have lived much in Europe are
+apt to prefer the Continental fashion of a cup of tea or coffee in
+one's room, with perhaps an egg and a roll; then to do one's work or
+pleasure, as the case may be, and to take the _déjeûner à la
+fourchette_ at eleven or twelve. To most brain-workers this is a
+blessed boon, for the heavy American breakfast of chops, steaks, eggs,
+forcemeat balls, sausages, broiled chicken, stewed potatoes, baked
+beans, and hot cakes, good as it is, is apt to render a person stupid.
+
+It would be better if this meal could be rendered less heavy, and that
+a visitor should always be given the alternative of taking a cup of
+tea in her room, and not appearing until luncheon.
+
+The breakfast dishes most to be commended may begin with the omelet.
+This the French make to perfection. Indeed, Gustav Droz wrote a story
+once for the purpose of giving its recipe. The story is of a young
+couple lost in a forest, who take refuge in a wood-cutter's hut. They
+ask for food, and are told that they can have an omelet:
+
+"The old woman had gone to fetch a frying-pan, and was then throwing a
+handful of shavings on the fire.
+
+"In the midst of this strange and rude interior Louise seemed to me so
+fine and delicate, so elegant, with her long _gants de Suède_, her
+little boots, and her tucked-up skirts. With her two hands stretched
+out she sheltered her face from the flames, and from the corner of her
+eye, while I was talking with the splitters, she watched the butter
+that began to sing in the frying-pan.
+
+"Suddenly she rose, and taking the handle of the frying-pan from the
+old woman's hand, 'Let me help you make the omelet,' she said. The
+good woman let go the pan with a smile, and Louise found herself alone
+in the position of a fisherman at the moment when his float begins to
+bob. The fire hardly threw any light; her eyes were fixed on the
+liquid butter, her arms outstretched, and she was biting her lips a
+little, doubtless to increase her strength.
+
+"'It is a bit heavy for Madame's little hands,' said the old man. 'I
+bet that it is the first time you ever made an omelet in a
+wood-cutter's hut, is it not, my little lady?'
+
+"Louise made a sign of assent without removing her eyes from the
+frying-pan.
+
+"'The eggs! the eggs!' she cried all at once, with such an expression
+of alarm that we all burst out laughing. 'The eggs! the butter is
+bubbling! quick, quick!'
+
+"The old woman was beating the eggs with animation. 'And the herbs!'
+cried the old man. 'And the bacon, and the salt,' said the young man.
+Then we all set to work, chopping the herbs and cutting the bacon,
+while Louise cried, 'Quick! quick!'
+
+"At last there was a big splash in the frying-pan, and the great act
+began. We all stood around the fire watching anxiously, for each
+having had a finger in the pie, the result interested us all. The good
+old woman, kneeling down by the dish, lifted up with her knife the
+corners of the omelet, which was beginning to brown.
+
+"'Now Madame has only to turn it,' said the old woman.
+
+"'A little sharp jerk,' said the old man.
+
+"'Not too strong,' said the young man.
+
+"'One jerk! houp! my dear,' said I.
+
+"'If you all speak at once I shall never dare; besides, it is very
+heavy, you know--'
+
+"'One little sharp jerk--'
+
+"'But I cannot--it will all go into the fire--oh!'
+
+"In the heat of the action her hood had fallen; she was red as a
+peach, her eyes glistened, and in spite of her anxiety, she burst out
+laughing. At last, after a supreme effort, the frying-pan executed a
+rapid movement and the omelette rolled, a little heavily I must
+confess, on the large plate which the old woman held.
+
+"Never was there a finer-looking omelet."
+
+This is an excellent description of the dish which is made for you at
+every little _cabaret_ in France, as well as at the best hotels. That
+dexterous turn of the wrist by which the omelet is turned over is,
+however, hard to reach. Let any lady try it. I have been taken into
+the kitchen in a hotel in the Riviera to see a cook who was so
+dexterous as to turn the frying-pan over entirely, without spilling
+the omelet.
+
+However, they are innumerable, the omelet family, plain, and with
+parsley, the fancy omelet, and the creamy omelet. Learn to make every
+sort from any cooking-book, and your family will never starve.
+
+Conquer the art of toasting bacon with a fork; it is a fine relish for
+your egg, no matter how cooked. To fry good English bacon in a pan
+until it is hard, is to disfigure one of Fortune's best gifts.
+
+Study above all things to learn how to produce good toast; not all the
+cooks in the great kingdom or empire or republic of France (whatever
+it may be at this minute) can produce a good slice of toast. They call
+it _pain rôti_, and well they may; for after the poor bread has been
+burned they put it in the oven and roast it. No human being can eat
+it. It is taken away and grated up for sawdust.
+
+They make delicious toast in England, and in a few houses in America.
+The bread should be a little stale, the slice cut thin, the fire
+perfect, a toasting-fork should hold it before coals, which are as
+bright as Juno's eyes. It should be a delicate brown, dropped on a hot
+plate, fresh butter put on at once, and then, ah! 't would tempt the
+dying anchorite to eat. Then conquer cream toast; and there is an
+exalted substance called Boston brown bread which is delicious,
+toasted and boiled in milk.
+
+Muffins are generally failures in these United States. Why, after
+conquering the English, we cannot conquer their muffins, I do not
+know. They are well worth repeated efforts. We make up on our hot
+biscuits and rolls; and as for our waffles, griddle-cakes, and Sally
+Lunns, we distance competition. Do not believe that they are
+unhealthy! Nothing that is well cooked is unhealthy to everybody; and
+all things which are good are unhealthy to somebody. Every one must
+determine for himself what is healthy and unhealthy.
+
+A foreign breakfast in France consists of eggs in some
+form,--frequently _au beurre noir_, which is butter melted in a little
+vinegar and allowed to brown,--a stew of vegetables and meat, a little
+cold meat (tongue, ham, or cold roast beef,) a very good salad, a
+small dish of stewed fruit or a little pastry, cheese, fruit, and
+coffee, and always red wine.
+
+Or perhaps an omelet or egg _au plat_ (simply dropped on a hot plate),
+mutton cutlets, and fried potatoes, perhaps stewed pigeons, with
+spinach or green peas, or trout from the lake, followed by a
+beefsteak, with highly flavoured Alpine strawberries or fresh apricots
+or figs, then all eating is done for the day, until seven o'clock
+dinner. This is of course the mid-day _déjeûner à la fourchette_. At
+the earlier breakfast a Swiss hotel offers only coffee, rolls, butter,
+and honey.
+
+All sorts of stews--kidney, liver, chicken, veal, and beef--are good,
+and every sort of little pan-fish. In our happy country we can add the
+oyster stew, or the lobster in cream, the familiar sausage, and the
+hereditary hash; if any one knows how to make good corned-beef hash
+she need not fear to entertain the king.
+
+There are those who know how to broil a chicken, but they are
+few,--"Amongst the few, the immortal names which are not born to die."
+There are others, also few, who know how to broil ham so that it will
+not be hard, and on it to drop the egg so that it be like Saturn,--a
+golden ball in a ring of silver.
+
+Amongst the good dishes and cheap dishes which I have seen served in
+France for a breakfast I recommend lambs' feet in a white sauce, with
+a suspicion of onion.
+
+All sorts of fricassees and warmed over things can be made most
+deliciously for breakfast. Many people like a salt mackerel or a
+broiled herring for breakfast; these are good _avant goûts_,
+stimulating the appetite. The Danes and Swedes have every form of
+dried fish, and even some strange fowl served in this way. Dried beef
+served up with eggs is comforting to some stomachs. Smoked salmon
+appeals to others; and people with an ostrich digestion like toasted
+cheese or Welsh rarebits. The fishball of our forefathers is a supreme
+delicacy if well made, as is creamed codfish; but warmed over pie, or
+warmed over mutton or beef, are detestable. The appetite is in a
+parlous state at nine o'clock and needs to be tempted; a bit of
+breakfast bacon, a bit of toast, an egg, and a fresh slice of melon or
+a cold sliced tomato in summer, _voilà tout!_ as the French say. Begin
+with the melon or a plate of strawberries. These early breakfasts at
+nine o'clock may be followed by the hot cake, but later on the
+_déjeûner à la fourchette_, which with us becomes luncheon, demands
+another order of meal, as we have seen, more like a plain dinner.
+
+It is a great comfort to the housekeeper, or to the lady who has been
+imprisoned behind the tea and coffee pot that she may serve thence a
+large family, to sometimes escape and have both tea and coffee served
+from the side tables. Of course, for a small and intimate breakfast
+there is nothing like the "steaming urn," and the tea made by the lady
+at the table; and the Hon. Thomas H. Benton declared that he "liked to
+drink his tea from a cup which had been washed by a lady." Woman is
+the genius of the tea-kettle.
+
+To make a good cup of coffee is a rare accomplishment. Perhaps the old
+method is as good as any: a small cupful of roasted and ground
+coffee, one third Mocha and two thirds Java, a small egg, shell and
+all, broken into the pot with the dry coffee. Stir well with a spoon
+and then pour on three pints of boiling water; let it boil from five
+to ten minutes, counting from the time it begins to boil. Then pour in
+a cupful of cold water, and turn a little of the coffee into a cup to
+see that the nozzle of the pot is not filled with grounds. Turn this
+back, and let the coffee stand a few minutes to settle, taking care
+that it does not boil again. The advantages of boiled egg with coffee
+is, that the yolk gives a rich flavour and good colour; also the
+shells and the white keep the grounds in order, settling them at the
+bottom of the pot.
+
+But the most economical and the easiest way of making coffee is by
+filtering. The French coffee biggin should be used. It consists of two
+cylindrical tin vessels, one fitting into the other, the bottom of the
+upper being a fine strainer. Another coarser strainer, with a rod
+coming from the centre, is placed on this. Then the coffee, which must
+be finely ground, is put in, and another strainer is placed on the top
+of the rod. The boiling water is poured on, and the pot set where it
+will keep hot, but not boil, until the water has gone through. This
+will make a clear, strong coffee with a rich, smooth flavour.
+
+The advantage of the two strainers is, that the one coming next to the
+fine strainer prevents the grounds from filling up the fine holes, and
+so the coffee is clear,--a grand desideratum. Boiled milk should be
+served with coffee for an early breakfast. Clear coffee, _café noir_,
+is served after dinner, and in France, always after the twelve o'clock
+breakfast.
+
+For a nine o'clock breakfast the hostess should also serve tea, and
+perhaps chocolate, if she has a large family of guests, as all cannot
+drink coffee for breakfast.
+
+Pigs' feet _à la poulette_ find favour in Paris, and are delicious as
+prepared there; also calf's liver _à l'Alsacienne_. Chicken livers are
+very nice, and cod's tongues with black butter cannot be surpassed.
+Mutton kidneys with bacon are desirable, and all the livers and
+kidneys _en brochette_ with bacon, empaled on a spit, are excellent.
+Hashed lamb _à la Zingara_ is highly peppered and very good.
+
+Broiled fish, broiled chicken, broiled ham, broiled steak and chops
+are always good for breakfast. The gridiron made Saint Lawrence fit
+for heaven, and its qualities have been elevating and refining ever
+since.
+
+The summer breakfast can be very nice. Crab, clam, lobster,--all are
+admirable. Fresh fish should be served whenever one can get it.
+Devilled kidneys and broiled bones do for supper, but fresh fish and
+easily digested food should replace these heavier dainties for
+breakfast.
+
+Stewed fruit is much used on the Continent at an early breakfast. It
+is thought to avert dyspepsia. Americans prefer to eat fruit fresh,
+and therefore have not learned to stew it. Stewing is, however, a
+branch of cookery well worth the attention of a first-class
+housekeeper. It makes canned fruit much better to stew it with sugar.
+Stewed cherries are delicious and very healthy; and all the berries,
+even if a little stale, can be stewed into a good dish, as can the
+dried fruits, like prunes, etc.
+
+Stewed pears make an elegant dessert served with whipped cream; but
+this is too rich for breakfast. Baked pears with cream are sometimes
+offered, and eggs in every form,--scrambled, dropped, boiled, stuffed,
+and even boiled hard, sliced and dressed as a salad. "What is so good
+as an egg salad for a hungry person?" asked a hostess in the
+Adirondacks who had nothing else to offer! Eggs are the staple for
+breakfast.
+
+Ham omelet with a little parsley, lamb chops with green peas, tripe _à
+la Bourdelaise_, hashed turkey, hashed chicken with cream, and breaded
+veal with tomato sauce, calf's brains with a black butter, stewed veal
+_à la Chasseur_, broiled shad's roe, broiled soft-shell clams, minced
+tenderloin with Lyonnaise potatoes, blue-fish _au gratin_, broiled
+steak with water-cress, picked-up codfish, and smoked beef in cream
+are of the thousand and one delicacies for the early breakfast,--if
+one can eat them.
+
+It is better to eat a saucer of oatmeal and cream at nine o'clock,
+take a cup of tea, and do one's work; then at twelve to sit down to as
+good a breakfast as possible,--a regular _déjeuner à la fourchette_.
+The digestion is then active; the brain after several hours work needs
+repose, and at one or two o'clock can go to work again like a giant
+refreshed.
+
+An early breakfast with meat is thought by foreign doctors not to
+be good for children. But in France they give children wine at
+a very early age, which is rarely done in this country. At all
+boarding-schools and hospitals wine is given to young children.
+Certainly there are fewer drunkards and fewer dyspeptics in France
+than in America.
+
+Brillat Savarin says of coffee, "It is beyond doubt that coffee acts
+upon the functions of the brain as an excitant." Voltaire and Buffon
+drank a great deal of coffee. If it deprives persons of sleep it
+should never be taken. It is to many a poison; and hospitals are full
+of men made cripples by the immoderate stimulus of coffee. The Spanish
+people live and flourish on chocolate; introduced into Spain during
+the seventeenth century, it crossed the Pyrenees with Anne of Austria,
+daughter of Philip II. and wife of Louis XIII., and at the
+commencement of the Regency was more in vogue than coffee.
+
+Many modern writers advise a good cup of chocolate at breakfast as
+wholesome and easily digested, and it is good for clergymen, lawyers,
+and travellers. In America it is considered heavy and headachy; and
+doubtless the climate has something to do with this. Cocoa and the
+lighter preparations of chocolate are good at sea, and very comforting
+to those who find their nerves too much on the alert to stand coffee
+or tea. Every one must consult his own health and taste in this as in
+all matters.
+
+The boldest attempts to increase the enjoyments of the palate, or to
+tell people what they shall eat or drink, are constantly overthrown by
+some subtile enemy in the stomach; and breakfasts should especially be
+so light that they can tickle the palate without disturbing the brain.
+A red herring is a good appetizer.
+
+     "Meet me at breakfast alone,
+     And then I will give you a dish
+     Which really deserves to be known,
+     Though 'tis not the genteelest of fish.
+     You must promise to come, for I said
+     A splendid red herring I'd buy.
+     Nay, turn not aside your proud head;
+     You'll like it, I know, when you try.
+
+     "If moisture the herring betray,
+     Drain till from the moisture 'tis free.
+     Warm it through in the usual way,
+     Then serve it for you and for me.
+     A piece of cold butter prepare,
+     To rub it when ready it lies;
+     Egg sauce and potatoes don't spare,
+     And the flavour will cause you surprise."
+
+It is not only the man who has eaten a heavy supper the night before;
+it is not only the heavy drinker, although brandy and soda are not the
+best of appetite provokers, so they say; but it is also the
+brainworker who finds it impossible to eat in the morning. For sleep
+has the effect of eating. Who sleeps, eats, says the French proverb;
+and we often find healthy children unwilling to eat an early
+breakfast. Appetites vary both in individuals and at various seasons
+of the year. Nothing can be more unwise than to make children eat when
+they do not wish to do so. During the summer months we are all of us
+less inclined for food than when sharp set by hard exercise in the
+frosty air; and we loathe in July what we like in winter.
+
+The heavy domestic breakfast of steak and mutton-chops in summer is
+often repellent to a delicate child. The perfection of good living is
+to have what you want exactly when you want it. A slice of fresh
+melon, a plate of strawberries, a thin slice of bread and butter may
+be much better for breakfast in summer than the baked beans and stewed
+codfish of a later season. Do not force a child to eat even a baked
+potato if he does not like it.
+
+It is maintained by some that a strong will can keep off sea-sickness
+or any other malady. This is a fallacy. No strong will can make a
+delicate stomach digest a heavy breakfast at nine o'clock. Therefore
+we begin and end with the same idea,--breakfast is a hard thing to
+manage in America.
+
+In England, however, it is a very happy-go-lucky meal; and although
+the essentials are on the table, people are privileged to rise and
+help themselves from the sideboard. I may say that I have never seen a
+fashionable English hostess at a nine o'clock breakfast, although the
+meal is always ready for those who wish it.
+
+For sending breakfasts to rooms, trays are prepared with teapot,
+sugar, and cream, a plate of toast, eggs boiled, with cup, spoon, salt
+and pepper, a little pat of butter, and if desired a plate of chops or
+chicken, plates, knives, forks, and napkins. For an English
+country-house the supply of breakfast trays is like that of a hotel.
+The pretty little Satsuma sets of small teapot, cream jug, and
+sugar-bowl, are favourites.
+
+When breakfast is served in the dining-room, a white cloth is
+generally laid, although some ladies prefer variously coloured linen,
+with napkins to match. A vase of flowers or a dish of fruit should be
+placed in the centre. The table is then set as for dinner, with
+smaller plates and all sorts of pretty china, like an egg dish with a
+hen sitting contentedly, a butter plate with a recumbent cow, a
+sardine dish with fishes in Majolica,--in fact, any suggestive fancy.
+Hot plates for a winter breakfast in a plate-warmer near the table add
+much to the comfort.
+
+Finger bowls with napkins under them should be placed on the sideboard
+and handed to the guest with the fruit. It is a matter of taste as to
+whether fruit precedes or finishes the breakfast; and the servant must
+watch the decision of the guest.
+
+A grand breakfast to a distinguished foreigner, or some great home
+celebrity at Delmonico's for instance, would be,--
+
+                     A table loaded with flowers.
+               Oysters on the half-shell.      Chablis.
+     Eggs stuffed.      Eggs in black butter, (_au beurre noir_).
+                Chops and green peas.      Champagne.
+                         Lyonnaise potatoes.
+                      Sweetbreads.      Spinach.
+                      Woodcock.      Partridges.
+                    Salad of lettuce.      Claret.
+                           Cheese _fondu_.
+                               DESSERT:
+            Charlotte Russe.      Fruit Jelly.      Ices.
+                               Liqueurs.
+                  Grapes.      Peaches.      Pears.
+                               Coffee.
+
+A breakfast even at twelve o'clock is thus made noticeably lighter
+than the meal called lunch. It may be introduced by clam juice in
+cups, or bouillon, but is often served without either. These
+breakfasts are generally prefaced by a short reception, where all the
+guests are presented to the foreigner of distinction. There is no
+formality about leaving. Indeed, these breakfasts are given in order
+to avoid that.
+
+For an ordinary breakfast at nine o'clock in a family of ten, we
+should say that the _menu_ should be something as follows: The host
+and hostess being present, the lady makes the tea. Oatmeal and cream
+would then be offered; after that a broiled chicken would be placed
+before the host, which he carves if he can. An omelet is placed before
+the lady or passed; stewed potatoes are passed, and toast or muffins.
+Hot cakes finish this breakfast, unless fruit is also added. It is
+considered a very healthful thing to eat an orange before breakfast.
+But who can eat an orange well? One must go to Spain to see that
+done. The señorita cuts off the rind with her silver knife. Then
+putting her fork into the peeled fruit, she gently detaches small
+slices from the pulp, leaving the core and seeds untouched; passing
+the fork upward, she detaches every morsel with her pearly teeth,
+looking very pretty the while, and contrives to eat the whole orange
+without losing a drop of the juice, and lays down the core with the
+fork still in it.
+
+It seems hardly necessary to say to an American lady that she should
+be neatly dressed at breakfast. The pretty white morning dresses which
+are worn in America are rarely seen in Europe, perhaps because of the
+difference of climate. In England elderly ladies and young married
+women sometimes appear in very smart tea gowns of dark silk over a
+colour; but almost always the young ladies come in the yachting or
+tennis dresses which they will wear until dinner-time, and almost
+always in summer, in hats. In America the variety of morning dresses
+is endless, of which the dark jacket over a white vest, the
+serviceable merino, the flannel, the dark foulards, are favourites.
+
+In summer, thin lawns, percales, Marseilles suits, calicos, and
+ginghams can be so prettily made as to rival all the other costumes
+for coquetry and grace.
+
+     "Still to be neat, still to be drest
+     As she were going to a feast,"
+
+such should be the breakfast dress of the young matron. It need not be
+fine; it need not be expensive; but it should be neat and becoming.
+The hair should be carefully arranged, and the feet either in good,
+stout shoes for the subsequent walk, or in the natty stocking and well
+fitting slipper, which has moved the poet to such feeling verses.
+
+
+
+
+THE LUNCH.
+
+     "A Gothic window, where a damask curtain
+     Made the blank daylight shadowy and uncertain;
+     A slab of agate on four eagle-talons
+     Held trimly up and neatly taught to balance;
+     A porcelain dish, o'er which in many a cluster
+     Plump grapes hung down, dead ripe, and without lustre;
+     A melon cut in thin, delicious slices,
+     A cake, that seemed mosaic-work in spices;
+     Two china cups, with golden tulips sunny,
+     And rich inside, with chocolate like honey;
+     And she and I the banquet scene completing
+     With dreamy words, and very pleasant eating."
+
+
+If all lunches could be as poetic and as simple and as luxurious as
+this, the hostess would have little trouble in giving a lunch. But,
+alas! from the slice of cold ham, or chicken, and bread and butter,
+has grown the grand hunt breakfast, and the ladies' lunch, most
+delicious of luxurious time-killers. The lunch, therefore, has become
+in the house of the opulent as elaborate as the dinner.
+
+Twenty years ago in England I had the pleasure of lunching with Lord
+Houghton, and I well remember the simplicity of that meal. A cup of
+bouillon, a joint of mutton, roasted, and carved by the host, a tart,
+some peaches, very fine hot-house fruit, and a glass of sherry was all
+that was served on a very plain table to twenty guests. But what a
+company of wits, belles, and beauties we had to eat it! I once lunched
+with Browning on a much simpler bill of fare. I have lunched at the
+beautiful house of Sir John Millais on what might have been a good
+family dinner with us. And I have lunched in Hampton Court, in the
+apartments of Mr. Beresford, now dead, who was a friend of George the
+Fourth and an old Tory whipper-in, on a slice of cold meat, a cutlet,
+a gooseberry tart, and some strawberries as large as tomatoes from the
+garden which was once Anne Boleyn's.
+
+What a great difference between these lunches and a ladies' lunch in
+New York, which, laid for twenty-eight people, offers every kind of
+wine, every luxury of fish, flesh, and fowl, flowers which exhibit the
+most overwhelming luxury of an extravagant period, fruits and bonbons
+and _bonbonnières_, painted fans to carry home, with ribbons on which
+is painted one's monogram, etc.
+
+I have seen summer wild-flowers in winter at a ladies' lunch, as the
+last concession to a fancy for what is unusual. The order having been
+given in September, the facile gardener raised these flowers for this
+especial lunch. Far more expensive than roses at a dollar apiece is
+this bringing of May into January. It is impossible to say where
+luxury should stop; and, if people can afford it, there is no
+necessity for its stopping. It is only to be regretted that luxury
+frightens those who might like to give simple lunches.
+
+A lunch-party of ladies should not be crowded, as handsome gowns take
+up a great deal of room; and therefore a lunch for ten ladies in a
+moderate house is better than a larger number. As ladies always wear
+their bonnets the room should not be too hot.
+
+The menu is very much the same as a dinner, excepting the soup. In its
+place cups of bouillon or of clam juice, boiled with cream and a bit
+of sherry, are placed before each plate. There follows presumably a
+plate of lobster croquettes with a rich sauce, _filet de boeuf_
+with truffles and mushrooms, sweetbread and green peas, perhaps
+asparagus or cauliflower.
+
+Then comes _sorbet_, or Roman punch, much needed to cool the palate
+and to invigorate the appetite for further delicacies. The Roman punch
+is now often served in very fanciful frozen shapes of ice, resembling
+roses, or fruit of various kinds. If a lady is not near a confectioner
+she should learn to make this herself. It is very easy, if one only
+compounds it at first with care, Maraschino cordial or fine old
+Jamaica rum being mixed with water and sugar as for a punch, and well
+frozen.
+
+The game follows, and the salad. These two are often served together.
+After that the ices and fruit. Cheese is rarely offered at a lady's
+lunch, excepting in the form of cheese straws. Château Yquem,
+champagne, and claret are the favourite wines. Cordial is offered
+afterward with the coffee. A lady's lunch-party is supposed to begin
+at one o'clock and end at three.
+
+It is a delightful way of showing all one's pretty things. At a
+luncheon in New York I have seen a tablecloth of linen into which has
+been inserted duchesse lace worth, doubtless, several hundred dollars,
+the napkins all trimmed with duchesse, worth at least twenty dollars
+apiece. This elegant drapery was thrown over a woollen broadcloth
+underpiece of a pale lilac.
+
+In the middle of the table was a grand epergne of the time of Louis
+Seize; the glass and china were superb. At the proper angle stood
+silver and gold cups, ornamental pitchers, and claret jugs. At every
+lady's plate stood a splendid bouquet tied with a long satin ribbon,
+and various small favours, as fans and fanciful _menus_ were given.
+
+As the lunch went on we were treated to new surprises of napery and
+of Sèvres plates. The napkins became Russian, embroidered with gold
+thread, as the spoons and forks were also of Russian silver and gold,
+beautifully enamelled. Then came those embroidered with heraldic
+animals,--the lion and the two-headed eagle and griffin,--the monogram
+gracefully intertwined.
+
+Plates were used, apparently of solid gold and beautiful workmanship.
+The Roman punch was hidden in the heart of a water lily, which looked
+uncommonly innocent with its heart of fire. The service of this lunch
+was so perfect that we did not see how we were served; it all moved as
+if to music. Pleasant chat was the only addition which our hostess
+left for us to add to her hospitality. I have lunched at many great
+houses all over the world, but I have never seen so luxurious a
+picture as this lunch was.
+
+It has been a question whether oysters on the half-shell should be
+served at a lady's lunch. For my part I think that they should,
+although many ladies prefer to begin with the bouillon. All sorts of
+_hors d'oeuvres_, like olives, anchovies, and other relishes, are in
+order.
+
+In summer, ladies sometimes serve a cold luncheon, beginning with iced
+bouillon, salmon covered with a green sauce, cold birds and salads,
+ices and strawberries, or peaches frozen in cream. Cold asparagus
+dressed as a salad is very good at this meal.
+
+In English country-houses the luncheon is a very solid meal, beginning
+with a stout roast with hot vegetables, while chicken salad, a cold
+ham, and various meat pies stand on the sideboard. The gentlemen get
+up and help the ladies; the servants, after going about once or twice,
+often leave the room that conversation may be more free.
+
+It might well improve the young housekeeper to study the question of
+potted meats, the preparation of Melton veal, the various egg salads,
+as well as those of potato, of lobster and chicken, so that she may be
+prepared with dishes for an improvised lunch. Particularly in the
+country should this be done.
+
+The etiquette of invitations for a ladies' lunch is the same as that
+of a dinner. They are sent out a fortnight before; they are carefully
+engraved, or they are written on note paper.
+
+                           MRS. SOMERVILLE
+                       Requests the pleasure of
+                          MRS. MONTGOMERY'S
+                 Company at lunch on Thursday, 15th,
+                            at 1 o'clock.
+        R. S. V. P.
+
+This should be answered at once, and the whole engagement treated with
+the gravity of a dinner engagement.
+
+These lunch-parties are very convenient for ladies who, from illness
+or indisposition to society, cannot go out in the evening. It is also
+very convenient if the lady of the house has a husband who does not
+like society and who finds a dinner-party a bore.
+
+The usual custom is for ladies to dress in dark street dresses, and
+their very best. That with an American lady means much, for an
+American husband stops at no expense. Worth says that American women
+are the best customers he has,--far better than queens. The latter ask
+the price, and occasionally haggle; American women may ask the price,
+but the order is, the very best you can do.
+
+Luncheons are very fashionable in England, especially on Sunday. These
+lunches, although luxurious, are by no means the costly spreads which
+American women indulge in. They are attended by gentlemen as well as
+ladies, for in a land where a man does not go to the House of Commons
+until five in the afternoon he may well lunch with his family. What
+time did our forefathers lunch? In the reign of Francis the First the
+polite French rose at five, dined at nine, supped at five, and went to
+bed at nine. Froissart speaks of "waiting upon the Duke of Lancaster
+at five in the afternoon after he had supped." If our ancestors dined
+at nine, when did they lunch?
+
+After some centuries the dinner hour grew to be ten in the morning, by
+which time they had besieged a town and burned up a dozen heretics,
+probably to give them a good appetite, a sort of _avant goût_. The
+later hours now in vogue did not prevail until after the Restoration.
+
+Lunch has remained fastened at one o'clock, for a number of years at
+least. In England, curiously enough, they give you no napkins at this
+meal, which certainly requires them.
+
+A hunt breakfast in America is, of course, a hearty meal, to which the
+men and women are asked who have an idea of riding to hounds. It is
+usually served at little tables, and the meal begins with hot
+bouillon. It is a heartier meal than a lady's lunch, and as luxurious
+as the hostess pleases; but it does not wind up with ices and fruits,
+although it may begin with an orange. Much more wine is drunk than at
+a lady's lunch, and yet some hunters prefer to begin the day with tea
+only. Everything should be offered, and what is not liked can be
+refused.
+
+     "What is hit, is History,
+     And what is missed is Mystery."
+
+There are famous breakfasts in London which are not the early morning
+meal, neither are they called luncheons. It is the constant habit of
+the literary world of London to have reunions of scientific and
+agreeable people early in the day, and what would be called a party in
+the evening, is called a breakfast. We should call it a reception,
+except that one is asked at eleven o'clock. But the greatest misnomer
+of all is the habit in London of giving a dinner, a ball, and a supper
+out of doors at five o'clock, and calling that a "breakfast." Except
+that the gentlemen are in morning dress and the ladies in bonnets this
+has no resemblance to what we call breakfast.
+
+Breakfast at nine, or earlier, is a solemn process. It has no great
+meaning for us, who have our children to send to school, our husbands
+to prepare for business, ourselves for a busy day or a long journey.
+For the very luxurious it no longer exists.
+
+Luncheon on the contrary is apt to be a lively and exhilarating
+occasion. It is the best moment in the day to some people. A thousand
+dollars is not an unusual sum to expend on a lady's lunch in New York
+for eighteen or twenty-five guests, counting the favours, the flowers,
+the wines, and the viands, and even then we have not entered into the
+cost of the china, the glass, porcelain, _cloisonné_, Dresden, Sèvres,
+and silver, which make the table a picture. The jewelled goblets from
+Carlsbad, the knives and forks with crystal handles, set in silver,
+from Bohemia, and the endless succession of beautiful plates,--who
+shall estimate the cost of all this?
+
+As to the precedence of plates, it is meet that China, oldest of
+nations, should suffice for the soup. The oysters have already been
+served on shell-like Majolica. England, a maritime nation surrounded
+by ocean, must furnish the plates for the fish. For the roast, too,
+what plates so good as Doulton, real English, substantial _faïence_?
+
+For the _Bouchers à la Reine_ and all the _entrées_ we must have
+Sèvres again.
+
+Japanese will do for the _filet aux champignons_, the venison, the
+_pièces de resistance_, as well as English. Japanese plates are
+strong. But here we are running into dinner; indeed, these two feasts
+do run into each other.
+
+One should not have a roast at ladies' lunch, unless it be a roast
+pheasant.
+
+Dresden china plates painted with fruits and flowers should be used
+for the dessert. On these choice plates, with perforated edges marked
+"A R" on the back, should lie the ices frozen as natural fruits. We
+can scarcely tell the frozen banana or peach before us, from the
+painted banana on our plate.
+
+For the candied fruit, we must again have Sèvres. Then a gold dish
+filled with rose-water must be passed. We dip a bit of the napkin in
+it, for in this country we do have napkins with our luncheon, and wipe
+our lips and fingers. This is called a _trempoir_.
+
+The cordials at the end of the dinner must be served in cups of
+Russian gold filagree supporting glass. There is an analogy between
+the rival, luscious richness of the cordial and the cup.
+
+The coffee-cups must be thin as egg-shells, of the most delicate
+French or American china. We make most delicate china and porcelain
+cups ourselves nowadays, at Newark, Trenton, and a dozen other places.
+
+There is a vast deal of waste in offering so much wine at a ladies'
+lunch. American women cannot drink much wine; the climate forbids it.
+We have not been brought up on beer, or on anything more stimulating
+than ice-water. Foreign physicians say that this is the cause of all
+our woes, our dyspepsia, our nervous exhaustion, our rheumatism and
+hysteria. I believe that climate and constitution decide these things
+for us. We are not prone to over-eat ourselves, to drink too much
+wine; and if the absence of these grosser tastes is visible in pale
+cheeks and thin arms, is not that better than the other extreme?
+
+All entertaining can go on perfectly well without wine, if people so
+decide. It would be impossible, however, to make many poetical
+quotations without an allusion to the "ruby," as Dick Swiveller called
+it. Since Cleopatra dissolved the pearl, the wine-cup has held the
+gems of human fancy.
+
+     _Champagne Cup_: One pint bottle of soda water, one quart dry
+     champagne, one wine-glass of brandy, a few fresh strawberries,
+     a peach quartered, sugar to taste; cracked ice.
+
+     _Another recipe_: One quart dry champagne, one pint bottle of
+     Rhine wine, fruit and ice as above; cracked ice. Mix in a
+     large pitcher.
+
+     _Claret Cup_: One bottle of claret, one pint bottle of soda
+     water, one wine-glass brandy, half a wine-glass of
+     lemon-juice, half a pound of lump sugar, a few slices of fresh
+     cucumber; mix in cracked ice.
+
+     _Mint Julep_: Fresh mint, a few drops of orange bitters and
+     Maraschino, a small glass of liqueur, brandy or whiskey, put
+     in a tumbler half full of broken ice; shake well, and serve
+     with fruit on top with straws.
+
+     _Another recipe for Mint Julep_: Half a glass of port wine, a
+     few drops of Maraschino, mint, sugar, a thin slice of lemon,
+     shake the cracked ice from glass to glass, add strawberry or
+     pineapple.
+
+     _Turkish Sherbets_: Extract by pressure or infusion the rich
+     juice and fine perfume of any of the odouriferous flowers or
+     fruits; mix them in any number or quantity to taste. When
+     these essences, extracts, or infusions are prepared they may
+     be immediately used by adding a proper proportion of sugar or
+     syrup; and water. Some acid fruits, such as lemon or
+     pomegranate, are used to raise the flavour, but not to
+     overpower the chief perfume. Fill the cup with cracked ice and
+     add what wine or spirit is preferred.
+
+     _Claret Cobbler_: One bottle wine, one bottle Apollinaris or
+     Seltzer, one lemon, half a pound of sugar; serve with ice.
+
+     _Champagne Cobbler_: One bottle of champagne, one half bottle
+     of white wine, much cracked ice, strawberries, peaches or
+     sliced oranges.
+
+     _Sherry Cobbler_: Full wine-glass of sherry, very little
+     brandy, sugar, sliced lemon, cracked ice. This is but one
+     tumblerful.
+
+     _Kümmel_: This liqueur is very good served with shaved ice in
+     small green claret-cups.
+
+     _Punch_: One bottle Arrack, one bottle brandy, two quart
+     bottles dry champagne, one tumblerful of orange curaçoa, one
+     pound of cracked sugar, half a dozen lemons sliced, half a
+     dozen oranges sliced. Fill the bowl with large lump of ice and
+     add one quart of water.
+
+     _Shandygaff_: London porter and ginger ale, half and half.
+
+
+
+
+AFTERNOON TEA.
+
+     "And while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn
+     Throws up a steamy column, and the cups
+     That cheer but not inebriate wait on each,
+     So let us welcome peaceful evening in."
+
+
+Whatever objections can be urged against all other systems of
+entertaining, including the expense, the bore it is to a gentleman to
+have his house turned inside out, the fatigue to the lady, the
+disorganization of domestic service, nothing can be said against
+afternoon tea, unless that it may lead to a new disease, the _delirium
+teamens_. There is danger to nervous women in our climate in too great
+indulgence in this delicious beverage. It sometimes murders sleep and
+impairs digestion. We cannot claim that it is always safer than opium.
+It was very much abused in England in 1678, ten years after Lords
+Arlington and Ossory brought it over from the meditative Dutchman, who
+was the first European to appreciate it. It was then called a "black
+water with an acrid taste." It cost, however, in England sixty
+shillings a pound, so that it must have been fashionable. Pepys in his
+diary records that he sent for a cup of tea, a "China drink which he
+had not used before." He did not like it, but then he did not like the
+"Midsummer Night's Dream." "The most insipid, ridiculous play I ever
+saw in my life," he writes; so we do not care what he thought about a
+blessed cup of tea.
+
+In the middle of the sixteenth century, with pasties and ale for
+breakfast, with sugared cakes and spiced wines at various hours of the
+day, with solid "noonings," and suppers with strong potations of sack
+and such possets as were the ordinary refreshments, it is not probable
+that tea would have been appreciated. The Dutch were crafty, however;
+they saw that there was a common need of a hot, rather stimulating
+beverage, which had no intoxicating effects. They exported sage enough
+to pay for the tea, and got the better of even the wily Chinaman, who
+avowed some time after, in their trade with America, "That spent
+tea-leaves, dried again, were good enough for second-chop Englishmen."
+
+Jonas Haunay wrote a treatise against tea-drinking in Johnson's time,
+and that vast, insatiable, and shameless tea-drinker took up the
+cudgels for tea, settling it as a brain-inspirer for all time, and
+wrote Rasselas on the strength of it. Cobbett wrote against its use by
+the labouring classes, and the "Edinburgh Review" endorsed his
+arguments, stating that a "prohibition absolute and uncompromising of
+the noxious beverage was the first step toward insuring health and
+strength for the poor," and asserting that when a labourer fancied
+himself refreshed with a mess of this stuff, sweetened with the
+coarsest brown sugar and diluted by azure-blue milk, it was only the
+warmth of the water which consoled him for the moment. Cobbett claimed
+that the tea-table cost more to support than would keep two children
+at nurse.
+
+The "Quarterly Review" in an article written perhaps by the most
+famous chemist of the day, said, however, that "tea relieves the pains
+of hunger rather by mechanical distention than by supplying the waste
+of nature by adequate sustenance," but claimed for it the power of
+calm, placid, and benignant exhilaration, greatly stimulating the
+stomach, when fatigued by digestive exertion, and acting as an
+appropriate diluent of the chyle. More recent inquiries into the
+qualities of the peculiar power of tea have tended to raise it in
+popular esteem, although no one has satisfactorily explained _why_ it
+has become so universally necessary to the human race.
+
+An agreeable little book called "The Beverages We Indulge In," "The
+Herbs Which We Infuse," or some such title, had a great deal to do
+with the adoption of tea as a drink for young men who were training
+for a boat-race, or who desired to economize their strength for a
+mountain climb. But every one, from the tired washerwoman to the
+student, the wrestler, the fine lady, and the strong man, demands a
+cup of tea.
+
+To the invalid it is the dearest solace, dangerous though it may be.
+Tannin, the astringent element in tea, is bad for delicate stomachs
+and seems to ruin appetite. Tea, therefore, should never be allowed to
+stand. Hot water poured on the leaves and poured off into a cup can
+hardly afford the tannin time to get out. Some tea-drinkers even put
+the grounds in a silver ball, perforated, and swing this through a cup
+of boiling water, and in this way is produced the most delicate cup of
+tea.
+
+The famous Chinese lyric which is painted on almost all the teapots of
+the Empire is highly poetical. "On a slow fire set a tripod; fill it
+with clear rain-water. Boil it as long as it would be needed to turn
+fish white and lobsters red. Throw this upon the delicate leaves of
+choice tea; let it remain as long as the vapour rises in a cloud. At
+your ease drink the pure liquor, which will chase away the five causes
+of trouble."
+
+The "tea of the cells of the Dragons," the purest Pekoe from the
+leaf-buds of three-year-old plants, no one ever sees in Europe; but we
+have secured many brands of tea which are sufficiently good, and the
+famous Indian tea brought in by the great Exposition in Paris in 1889
+is fast gaining an enviable reputation. It has a perfect bouquet and
+flavour. Green tea, beloved by our grandmothers and still a favourite
+with some connoisseurs, has proved to have so much theine, the element
+of intoxication in tea, that it is forbidden to nervous people. Tea
+saves food by its action in preventing various wastes to the system.
+It is thus peculiarly acceptable to elderly persons, and to the tired
+labouring-woman. Doubtless Mrs. Gamp's famous teapot with which she
+entertained Betsy Prig contained green tea.
+
+There is an unusually large amount of nitrogen in theine, and green
+tea possesses so large a proportion of it as to be positively
+dangerous. In the process of drying and roasting, this volatile oil is
+engendered. The Chinese dare not use it for a year after the leaf has
+been prepared, and the packer and unpacker of the tea suffer much from
+paralysis. The tasters of tea become frequently great invalids, unable
+to eat; therefore our favourite herb has its dangers.
+
+More consoling is the legend of the origin of the plant. A drowsy
+hermit, after long wrestling with sleep, cut off his eyelids and cast
+them on the ground. From them sprang a shrub whose leaves, shaped like
+eyelids and bordered with a fringe of lashes, possessed the power of
+warding off sleep. This was in the third century, and the plant was
+tea.
+
+But what has all this to do with that pleasant visage of a steaming
+kettle boiling over a blazing alcohol lamp, the silver tea-caddy, the
+padded cozy to keep the teapot warm, the basket of cake, the thin
+bread and butter, the pretty girl presiding over the cups, the
+delicate china, the more delicate infusion? All these elements go to
+make up the afternoon tea. From one or two ladies who stayed at home
+one day in the week and offered this refreshment, to the many who came
+to find that it was a very easy method of entertaining, grew the
+present party in the daytime. The original five o'clock tea arose in
+England from the fact that ladies and gentlemen after hunting required
+some slight refreshment before dressing for dinner, and liked to meet
+for a little chat. It now is used as the method of introducing a
+daughter, and an ordinary way of entertaining.
+
+The primal idea was a good one. People who had no money for grand
+spreads were enabled to show to their more opulent neighbours that
+they too had the spirit of hospitality. The doctors discovered that
+tea was healthy. English breakfast tea would keep nobody awake. The
+cup of tea and the sandwich at five would spoil nobody's dinner. The
+ladies who began these entertainments, receiving modestly in plain
+dresses, were not out of tone with their guests who came in
+walking-dress.
+
+But then the other side was this,--ladies had to go to nine teas of an
+afternoon, perhaps taste something everywhere. Hence the new disease,
+_delirium teamens_. It was uncomfortable to assist at a large party in
+a heavy winter garment of velvet and fur. The afternoon tea lost its
+primitive character and became an evening party in the daytime, with
+the hostess and her daughters in full dress, and her guests in
+walking-costume.
+
+The sipping of so much tea produces the nervous prostration, the
+sleeplessness, the nameless misery of our overwrought women; and thus
+a healthful, inexpensive and most agreeable adjunct to the art of
+entertaining grew into a thing without a name, and became the large,
+gas-lighted ball at five o'clock, where half the ladies were in
+_decolleté_ dresses, the others in fur tippets. It was pronounced a
+breeder of influenzas, and the high road to a headache.
+
+If a lady can be at home every Thursday during the season, and always
+at her position behind the blazing urn, and will have the firmness to
+continue this practice, she may create a _salon_ out of her teacups.
+
+In giving a large afternoon tea for which cards have been sent out,
+the hostess should stand by the drawing-room door and greet each
+guest, who, after a few words, passes on. In the adjoining room,
+usually the dining-room, a large table is spread with a white cloth;
+and at one end is a tea service with a kettle of water boiling over an
+alcohol lamp, while at the other end is a service for chocolate. There
+should be flowers on the table, and dishes containing bread and butter
+cut as thin as a shaving. Cake and strawberries are always
+permissible. One or two servants should be in attendance to carry away
+soiled cups and saucers, and to keep the table looking fresh; but for
+the pouring of the tea and chocolate there should always be a lady,
+who like the hostess should wear a gown closed to the throat; for
+nothing is worse form now-a-days than full dress before dinner. The
+ladies of the house should not wear bonnets.
+
+When tea is served every afternoon at five o'clock, whether or no
+there are visitors, as is often the case in many houses, the
+servant--who, if a woman, should always in the afternoon wear a plain
+black gown, with a white cap and apron--should place a small, low
+table before the lady of the house, and lay over it a pretty white
+cloth. She should then bring in a large tray, upon which are the tea
+service, and a plate of bread and butter, or cake, or both, place it
+upon the table, and retire,--remaining within call, though out of
+sight, in case she should be needed. The best rule for making tea is
+the old-fashioned one: "one teaspoonful for each person and one for
+the pot." The pot should first be rinsed with hot water, then the tea
+put in, and upon it should be poured enough water, actually boiling,
+to cover the leaves. This decoction should stand for five minutes,
+then fill up the pot with more boiling water, and pour it immediately.
+Some persons prefer lemon in their tea to cream, and it is a good plan
+to have some thin slices, cut for the purpose, placed in a pretty
+little dish on the tray. A bowl of cracked ice is also a pleasant
+addition in summer, iced tea being a most refreshing drink in hot
+weather. Neither plates nor napkins need appear at this informal and
+cosey meal. A guest arriving at this time in the afternoon should
+always be offered a cup of tea.
+
+Afternoon tea, in small cities or in the country, in villages and
+academic towns, can well be made a most agreeable and ideal
+entertainment, for the official presentation of a daughter or for the
+means of seeing one's friends. In the busy winter season of a large
+city it should not be made the excuse for giving up the evening party,
+or the dinner, lunch, or ball. It is not all these, it is simply
+itself, and it should be a refuge for those women who are tired of
+balls, of over dressing, dancing, visiting, and shopping. It is also
+very dear to the young who find the convenient tea-table a good arena
+for flirtation. It is a form of entertainment which allows one to
+dispense with etiquette and to save time.
+
+Five-o'clock teas should be true to their name, nor should any other
+refreshment be offered than tea, bread and butter, and little cakes.
+If other eatables are offered the tea becomes a reception.
+
+There is a high tea which takes the place of dinner on Sunday evenings
+in cities, which is a very pretty entertainment; in small rural
+cities, in the country, they take the place of dinners. They were
+formerly very fashionable in Philadelphia. It gave an opportunity to
+offer hot rolls and butter, escalloped oysters, fried chicken,
+delicately sliced cold ham, waffles and hot cakes, preserves--alas!
+since the days of canning, who offers the delicious preserves of the
+past? The hostess sits behind her silver urn and pours the hot tea or
+coffee or chocolate, and presses the guest to take another waffle. It
+is a delightful meal, and has no prototype in any country but our own.
+
+It is doubtful, however, whether the high tea will ever be popular in
+America, in large cities at least, where the custom of seven-o'clock
+dinners prevails. People find in them a violent change of living,
+which is always a challenge to indigestion. Some wit has said that he
+always liked to eat hot mince-pie just before he went to bed, for then
+he always knew what hurt him. If anyone wishes to know what hurts him,
+he can take high tea on Sunday evening, after having dined all the
+week at seven o'clock. A pain in his chest will tell him that the hot
+waffle, the cold tongue, the peach preserve, and that "last cup of
+tea" meant mischief.
+
+Oliver Cromwell is said to have been an early tea-drinker; so is Queen
+Elizabeth,--elaborate old teapots are sold in London with the cipher
+of both; but the report lacks confirmation. We cannot imagine Oliver
+drinking anything but verjuice, nor the lion woman as sipping anything
+less strong than brown stout. Literature owes much to tea. From Cowper
+to Austin Dobson, the poets have had their fling at it. And what could
+the modern English novelist do without it? It has been in politics, as
+all remember who have seen Boston Harbor, and it goes into all the
+battles, and climbs Mt. Blanc and the Matterhorn. The French, who
+despised it, are beginning to make a good cup of tea, and Russia
+bathes in it. The Samovar cheers the long journeys across those dreary
+steppes, and forms again the most luxurious ornament of the palace. On
+all the high roads of Europe one can get a cup of tea, except in
+Spain. There it is next to impossible; the universal chocolate
+supersedes it. If one gets a cup of tea in Spain, there is no cream to
+put in it; and to many tea drinkers, tea is ruined without milk or
+cream.
+
+In fact, the poor tea drinker is hard to please anywhere. There are to
+the critic only one or two houses of one's acquaintance where five
+o'clock tea is perfect.
+
+
+
+
+THE INTELLECTUAL COMPONENTS OF DINNER.
+
+     "Lend me your ears."
+
+
+"It has often perplexed me to imagine," writes Nathaniel Hawthorne,
+"how an Englishman will be able to reconcile himself to any future
+state of existence from which the earthly institution of dinner is
+excluded. The idea of dinner has so imbedded itself among his highest
+and deepest characteristics, so illuminated itself with intellect, and
+softened itself with the kindest emotions of his heart, so linked
+itself with Church and State, and grown so majestic with long
+hereditary custom and ceremonies, that by taking it utterly away,
+Death, instead of putting the final touch to his perfection, would
+leave him infinitely less complete than we have already known him. He
+could not be roundly happy. Paradise among all its enjoyments would
+lack one daily felicity in greater measure than London in the season."
+
+No dinner would be worth the giving that had not one witty man or one
+witty woman to lift the conversation out of the commonplace. As many
+more agreeable people as one pleases, but one leader is absolutely
+necessary.
+
+Not alone the funny man whom the _enfant terrible_ silenced by asking,
+"Mamma would like to know when you are going to begin to be funny,"
+but those men who have the rare art of being leaders without seeming
+to be, who amuse without your suspecting that you are being amused;
+for there never should be anything professional in dinner-table wit.
+
+The dinner giver has often to feel that something has been left out of
+the group about the table; they will not talk! She has furnished them
+with food and wine, but can she amuse them? Her witty man and her
+witty woman are both engaged elsewhere,--they are apt to be,--and her
+room is too warm, perhaps. She determines that at the next dinner she
+will have some mechanical adjuncts, even an empirical remedy against
+dulness. She tries a dinner card with poetical quotations, conundrums,
+and so on. The Shakspeare Club of Philadelphia inaugurated this
+custom, and some very witty results followed:--
+
+                  "Enter Froth" (before champagne).
+   "What is thine age?" (_Romeo and Juliet_) brings in the Madeira.
+
+                            LOBSTER SALAD.
+                  "Who hath created this indigest?"
+
+    Pray you bid these unknown friends welcome, for it is a way to
+              make us better friends.--_Winter's Tale._
+
+                            ROAST TURKEY.
+     See, here he comes swelling like a turkey cock.--_Henry IV._
+
+                              YORK HAMS.
+           Sweet stem from York's great stock.--_Henry VI._
+
+                               TONGUE.
+        Silence is only commendable in a neat's tongue dried--
+                                            _Merchant of Venice._
+
+                        BRAISED LAMB AND BEEF.
+    What say you to a piece of lamb and mustard?--a dish that I do
+              love to feed upon.--_Taming of the Shrew._
+
+                            LOBSTER SALAD.
+             Sallat was born to do me good.--_Henry IV._
+
+And so on. The Bible affords others, well worth quoting:--
+
+                               OYSTERS.
+             He brought them up out of the sea.--_Isaiah._
+         And his mouth was opened immediately.--_Luke_ i. 64.
+
+                              BEAN SOUP.
+            "Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentils."
+
+                         FISH, STRIPED BASS.
+         We remember the fish we did eat freely.--_Numbers._
+               These with many stripes.--_Deuteronomy._
+
+                         STEINBERGER CABINET.
+       Thou hast kept the good wine until now.--_John_ ii. 10.
+
+                            BOILED CAPON.
+          Accept it always and in all places.--Acts xxiv. 3.
+
+                            PIGEON BRAISE.
+             Pigeons such as he could get.--_Leviticus._
+
+                              SUCCOTASH.
+               They brought corn and beans.--_Samuel._
+
+                            QUAIL LARDED.
+                     Even quail came.--_Exodus._
+              Abundantly moistened with fat.--_Isaiah._
+
+                            LETTUCE SALAD.
+          A pleasant plant, green before the sun.--_Isaiah._
+           Pour oil upon it, pure oil, olive.--_Leviticus._
+     Oil and salt, without prescribing how much.--_Ezra_ vii. 22.
+
+                              ICE CREAM.
+                     Ice like morsels.--_Psalms._
+
+                               CHEESE.
+         Carry these ten cheeses unto the captain.--_Samuel._
+
+                               FRUITS.
+                    All kind of fruits.--_Eccles._
+
+                               COFFEE.
+                   Last of all.--_Matthew_ xxi. 37.
+           They had made an end of eating.--_Amos_ vii. 2.
+
+                               CIGARS.
+            Am become like dust and ashes.--_Job_ xxx. 19.
+
+And so on. Written conundrums are good stimulants to conversation, and
+dinner cards might be greatly historical, not too learned. A legend of
+the day, as Lady Day, or Michaelmas, is not a bad promoter of talk. Or
+one might allude to the calendar of dead kings and queens, or other
+celebrities, or ask your preferences, or quote something from a
+memoir, to find out that it is a birthday of Rossini or Goethe. All
+these might be written on a dinner card, and will open the flood gates
+of a frozen conversation.
+
+Let each dinner giver weave a net out of the gossamer threads of her
+own thoughts. It will be the web of the Lady of Shalott, and will bid
+the shadows of pleasant memory to remain, not float "forever adown the
+river," even toward "towered Camelot" where they may be lost.
+
+Some opulent dinner giver once made the dinner card the vehicle of a
+present, but this became rather burdensome. It was trying and
+embarrassing to carry the gifts home, and the poorer entertainer
+hesitated at the expense. The outlay had better come out of one's
+brain, and the piquing of curiosity with a contradiction like this
+take its place:--
+
+     "A lady gave me a gift which she had not,
+     And I received the gift, which I took not,
+     And if she take it back I grieve not."
+
+But there is something more required to form the intellectual
+components of a dinner than these instruments to stimulate curiosity
+and give a fillip to thought. We must have variety.
+
+Mrs. Jameson, the accomplished author of the "Legends of the Madonna"
+gives the following description of an out-of-door dinner, which should
+embolden the young American hostess to go and do likewise:--
+
+"Yesterday we dined _al fresco_ in the Pamfili Gardens, in Rome, and
+although our party was rather too large, it was well assorted, and the
+day went off admirably. The queen of our feast was in high good humour
+and irresistibly charming, Frattino very fascinating, T. caustic and
+witty, W. lively and clever, J. mild, intelligent and elegant, V. as
+usual quiet, sensible, and self-complacent, L. as absurd and assiduous
+as ever.
+
+"Everybody played their part well, each by a tacit convention
+sacrificing to the _amour propre_ of his neighbour, each individual
+really occupied with his own peculiar _rôle_, but all apparently happy
+and mutually pleased. Vanity and selfishness, indifference and _ennui_
+were veiled under a general mask of good humour and good breeding, and
+the flowery bonds of politeness and gallantry held together those who
+knew no common tie of thought or interest.
+
+"Our luxurious dinner, washed down by a competent proportion of
+Malvoisie and champagne, was spread upon the grass, which was
+literally the flowery turf, being covered with violets, iris, and
+anemones of every dye.
+
+"For my own peculiar taste there were too many servants, too many
+luxuries, too much fuss; but considering the style and number of our
+party, it was all consistently and admirably managed. The grouping of
+the company, picturesque because unpremeditated, the scenery around,
+the arcades and bowers and columns and fountains had an air altogether
+poetical and romantic, and put me in mind of some of Watteau's
+beautiful garden pieces."
+
+Now in this exquisite description Mrs. Jameson seems to me to have
+given the intellectual components of a dinner. "The hostess,
+good-humoured and charming, Frattino very fascinating, T. caustic and
+witty, W. lively and clever, J. mild, intelligent, and elegant, V. as
+usual quiet, sensible, and self-complacent, L. as absurd and as
+assiduous as ever."
+
+There was variety for you, and the three last were undoubtedly
+listeners. In the next paragraph she covers more ground, and this is
+most important:--
+
+"Each by a tacit convention sacrificing to the _amour propre_ of his
+neighbour."
+
+That is an immortal phrase, for there can be no pleasant dinner when
+this unselfishness is not shown. It was said by a witty Boston hostess
+that she could never invite two well-known diners-out to the same
+dinner, for each always silenced the other. You must not have too many
+good talkers. The listeners, the receptive listeners, should outnumber
+the talkers.
+
+In England, the land of dinners, they have, of course, no end of
+public, semi-official, and annual dinners,--as those of the Royal
+Literary Fund, the Old Rugbians, the Artists Benevolent Fund, the
+Regimental dinners, the banquets at the Liberal and the Cobden Club,
+and the nice little dinners at the Star and Garter, winding up with
+the annual fish dinner.
+
+Now of all these the most popular and sought after is the annual
+dinner of the Royal Academy. Few gratifications are more desired by
+mortals than an invitation to this dinner. The president, Sir Frederic
+Leighton, is handsome and popular. The dinner is representative in
+character; one or more members of the Royal Family are present; the
+Church, the Senate, the Bar, Medicine, Literature and Science, the
+Army, the Navy, the City,--all these have their representatives in the
+company.
+
+Who would not say that this would be the most amusing dinner in
+London? Intellect at its highest water mark is present. The _menu_ is
+splendid. But I have heard one distinguished guest say that the thing
+is over-freighted, the ship is too full, and the crowd of good things
+makes a surfeit.
+
+Dinners at the Lord Mayor's are said to be pleasant and fine specimens
+of civic cheer, but the grand nights at the Middle Temple and others
+of the Inns of Court are occasions of pleasant festivity.
+
+We have nothing to do with these, however, except to read of them, and
+to draw our conclusions. I know of no better use to which we can put
+them than the same rereading which we gave Mrs. Jameson's
+well-considered _menu_: "Each individual really occupied with his own
+_rôle_, but all apparently happy and mutually pleased. Variety and
+selfishness or indifference or _ennui_ well veiled under a general
+mask of good humour and good breeding, and the flowery bands of
+politeness and gallantry holding together those who knew no common tie
+of thought and interest." It requires very civilized people to veil
+their indifference and _ennui_ under a general mask of good humour.
+
+To have unity, one must first have units; and to make an agreeable
+dinner-party the hostess should invite agreeable people, and her
+husband should be a good host; and here we must again compliment
+England. An Englishman is churlish and distant, self-conscious and
+prejudiced everywhere else but at his own table. He is a model host,
+and a most agreeable guest. He is the most genial of creatures after
+the soup and sherry. Indeed the English dinner is the keynote to all
+that is best in the English character. An Englishman wishes to eat in
+company.
+
+How unlike the Spaniard, who never asks you to dinner. However
+courtly and hospitable he may be at other times and other hours of the
+day, he likes to drag his bone into a corner and gnaw it by himself.
+
+The Frenchman, elegant, _soigné_, and economical, invites you to the
+best-cooked dinner in the world, but there is not much of it. He
+prefers to entertain you at a café. Country life in France is
+delightful, but there is not that luxurious, open-handed entertaining
+which obtains in England.
+
+In Italy one is seldom admitted to the privacy of the family dinner.
+It is a patriarchal affair. But when one is admitted one finds much
+that is _simpatica_. The cookery is good, the service is perfect, the
+dinner is short, the conversation gay and easy.
+
+In making up a dinner with a view to its intellectual components,
+avoid those tedious talkers who, having a theme, a system, or a fad to
+air, always contrive to drag the conversation around to their view,
+with the intention of concentrating the whole attention upon
+themselves. One such man, called appropriately the Bore Constrictor of
+conversation in a certain city, really drove people away from every
+house to which he was invited; for they grew tired of hearing him talk
+of that particular science in which he was an expert. Such a talker
+could make the planet Jupiter a bore, and if the talker were of the
+feminine gender how one would shun her verbosity.
+
+"I called on Mrs. Marjoribanks yesterday," said a free lance once,
+"and we had a little gossip about Copernicus." We do not care to have
+anything quite so erudite, for if people are really very intimate with
+Copernicus they do not mention it at dinner.
+
+It is as impossible to say what makes the model diner-out as to
+describe the soil which shall grow the best grapes. We feel it and we
+enjoy it, but we can give no receipt for the production of the same.
+
+As history, with exemplary truthfulness, has always painted man as
+throwing off all the trouble of giving a dinner on his wife, why have
+not our clever women appreciated the power of dinner-giving in
+politics? Why are not our women greater politicians? Where is our Lady
+Jersey, our Lady Palmerston, our Princess Belgioso? The Princess
+Lieven, wife of the Russian Ambassador in London, was said to have
+held the peace of Europe in the conduct of her _entrées_; and a
+country-woman of our own is to-day supposed to influence the policy of
+Germany largely by her dinners. From the polished and versatile
+memoirs of the Grammonts, Walpoles, D'Azelios, Sydney Smith, and Lord
+Houghton, how many an anecdote hinges on the efficacy of a dinner in
+reconciling foes, and in the making of friends. How many a conspiracy
+was hatched, no doubt, behind an aspic of plover's eggs or a _vol au
+vent de volaille_. How many a budding ministry, according to Lord
+Lammington, was brought to full power over a well-ordered table-cloth.
+How many a war cloud dispelled by the proper temperature of the
+Burgundy. It is related of Lord Lyndhurst that when somebody asked him
+how to succeed in life, he answered, "Give good wine." A French
+statesman would have answered, "Give good dinners." Talleyrand kept
+the most renowned table of his day, quite as much for political as
+hygienic reasons. At eighty years of age he still spent an hour every
+morning with his _chef_, discussing the dishes to be served at dinner.
+The Emperor Napoleon, who was no epicure, nor even a connoisseur, was
+nevertheless pleased with Talleyrand's luxurious and refined
+hospitality, in consequence of the impression it made on those who
+were so fortunate as to partake of it. On the other hand, one
+hesitates to contemplate the indigestions and bad English cooking
+which must have hatched an Oliver Cromwell, or still earlier that
+decadence of Italian cookery which made a Borgia possible.
+
+Social leaders in all ages and countries have thus studied the tastes
+and the intellectual aptitudes and capabilities of those whom they
+have gathered about their boards; and Mythology would suggest that the
+_petits soupers_ on high Olympus, enlivened by the "inextinguishable
+laughter of the gods," had much to do with the politics of the Greek
+heaven under Jupiter. Reading the Northern Saga in the same
+connection, may not the vague and awful conceptions of cookery which
+seem to have filled the Northern mind have had something to do with
+the opera of Siegfried? Even the music of Wagner seems to have been
+inspired by a draught from the skull of his enemy. It has the
+fascination of clanging steel, and the mighty rustling of armour. The
+wind sighs through the forest, and the ice-blast freezes the hearer.
+The chasms of earth seem to open before us. But it has also the terror
+of an indigestion, and the brooding horror of a nightmare from
+drinking metheglia and eating half-roasted kid. The political aspect
+of a Scandinavian heaven was always stormy. Listen to the Trilogy.
+
+In America a hostess sure of her soups and her _entrées_, with such
+talkers as she could command, could influence American political
+movements--she might influence its music--by her dinners, and become
+an enviable Lady Palmerston.
+
+Old people are apt to say that there is a decay in the art of
+conversation, that it is one of the lost arts. No doubt this is in a
+measure true all over the world. A French _salon_ would be to-day an
+impossibility for that very reason. It is no longer the fashion to
+tell anecdotes, to try to be amusing. A person is considered a prig
+who sits up to amuse the company. All this is bad; it is reactionary
+after the drone of the Bore Constrictor. It is going on all over the
+world. It is part of that hurry which has made us talk slang, the
+jelly of speech, speech condensed and boiled down, easily transported,
+and warranted to keep in all climates.
+
+But there is a very pleasant _juste milieu_ between the stately,
+perhaps starchy, anecdotist of the past and the easy and witty talker
+of to-day, who may occasionally drop into slang, and what is more, may
+permit a certain slovenliness of speech. There are certain mistakes in
+English, made soberly, advisedly, and without fear of Lindley Murray,
+which make one sigh for the proprieties of the past. The trouble is we
+have no standard. Writers are always at work at the English language,
+and yet many people say that it is at present the most irregular and
+least understood of all languages.
+
+The intellectual components of a successful dinner, should, if we may
+quote Hawthorne, be illuminated with intellect, and softened by the
+kindest emotions of the heart. To quote Mrs. Jameson, they must
+combine the caustic and the witty, the lively and the clever, and even
+the absurd, and the assiduous above all. Everybody must be unselfish
+enough not to yawn, and never seem bored. They must be self-sacrificing,
+but all apparently well-pleased. The intellectual components of a
+dinner, like the condiments of a salad, must be of the best; and it is
+for the hostess to mix them with the unerring tact and fine
+discrimination of an American woman.
+
+
+
+
+CONSCIENTIOUS DINERS.
+
+     It is chiefly men of intellect who hold good eating in honour.
+     The head is not capable of a mental operation which consists in
+     a long sequence of appreciations, and many severe decisions of
+     the judgment, which has not a well-fed brain.
+                                       BRILLAT SAVARIN.
+
+
+A good dinner and a pretty hostess,--for there are terms on which
+beauty and beef can meet much to the benefit of both,--one wit,
+several good talkers, and as many good listeners, or more of the
+latter, are said to make a combination which even our greatest
+statesmen do not despise. Man wants good dinners. It is woman's
+province to provide them; but nature and education must make the
+conscientious diner.
+
+It is to be feared that we are too much in a hurry to be truly
+conscientious diners. Our men have too many school-tasks
+yet,--politics, money-making, science, mental improvement, charities,
+psychical research, building railroads, steam monitors, colleges, and
+such like gauds,--too many such distractions to devote themselves as
+they ought to the question of _entrées_ and _entremets_. They should
+endeavour to give the dinner a fitting place. Just see how the noble
+language of France, which Racine dignified and Molière amplified,
+respectfully puts on its robes of state which are lined with ermine
+when it approaches the great subject of dinner!
+
+It is to be feared that we are far off from the fine art of dining,
+although many visits to Paris and much patronage of Le Doyon's, the
+Café Anglais, and the Café des Ambassadeurs, may have prepared us for
+the _entremet_ and the _pièce de résistance_. We are improving in this
+respect and no longer bolt our dinners. The improvement is already
+manifest in the better tempers and complexions of our people.
+
+But are we as conscientious as the gentleman in "Punch" who rebuked
+the giddy girl who would talk to him at dinner? "Do you remember, my
+dear, that you are in the house of the best _entrées_ in London? I
+wish to eat my dinner."
+
+That was a man to cook for! He had his appropriate calm reserve of
+appreciation, for the _suprême de volaille_. He knew how to watch and
+wait for the sweetbreads, and green peas. Not thrown away upon him was
+that last turn which makes the breast of the partridge become of a
+delicate Vandyck brown. How respectful was he to that immortal art for
+which the great French cook died, a suicide for a belated turbot.
+
+"Ah," said Parke Godwin once, when in one of his most brilliant
+Brillat Savarin moods, "how it ennobles a supper to think that all
+these oysters will become ideas!"
+
+But if a dinner is not a cookery book, neither is it a matter of
+expense alone, nor a payment of social debts. It is a question of
+temperature, of the selection of guests, of the fitness of things, of
+a proper variety, and of time. The French make their exquisite dinners
+light and short. The English make theirs a trifle long and heavy.
+
+The young hostess, to strike the _juste milieu_, must travel, reflect,
+and go to a cooking-school. She must buy and read a library of
+cooking-books. And when all is done and said, she must realize that a
+cookery-book is not a dinner. There are some natures which can absorb
+nothing from a cookery-book. As Lady Galway said that she had put all
+her wits into Bradshaw's "Railway Guide" and had never got them out
+again, so some amateur cook remarked that she had tested her recipes
+with the "cook-book in one hand and the cooking-stove in the other,"
+yet the wit had stayed away. All young housekeepers must go through
+the discipline--in a land where cooks are as yet scarce--of trying and
+failing, of trying and at length succeeding. They must go to _La Belle
+France_ to learn how to make a soup, for instance. That is to say,
+they must study the best French authorities.
+
+The mere question of sustenance is easy of solution. We can stand by a
+cow and drink her milk, or we can put some bread in our pockets and
+nibble it as we go along; but dinner as represented by our complicated
+civilization is a matter of interest which must always stand high
+amongst the questions which belong to social life. It is a very
+strange attendant circumstance that having been a matter of profound
+concern to mankind for so many years, it is now almost as easy to find
+a bad dinner as a good one, even in Paris, that headquarters of
+cookery.
+
+There would be no sense in telling a young American housekeeper to
+learn to make sauces and to cook like a French _chef_, for it is a
+profession requiring years of study and great natural taste and
+aptitude. A French _chef_ commands a higher salary than a secretary of
+state or than a civil engineer. As well tell a young lady that she
+could suddenly be inspired with a knowledge of the art of war or of
+navigation. She would only perhaps learn to do very badly what they in
+ten years learn to do so well. She would say in her heart, "For my
+part I am surfeited with cookery. I cry, something _raw_ if you please
+for me,--something that has never been touched by hand except the one
+that pulled it off the blooming tree or uprooted it from the honest
+ground. Let me be a Timon if you will, and eat green radishes and
+cabbages, or a Beau Brummel, asphyxiated in the consumption of a green
+pea; but no _ragoût_, _côtelette_, _compote_, _crème_, or any hint or
+cooking till the remembrance of all that I have seen has faded and the
+smell of it has passed away!"
+
+Thus said one who attended a cooking-school, had gone through the
+mysteries of soup-making, had learned what _sauté_ means; had mastered
+_entremets_, and _entrées_, and _plats_, and _hors d'oeuvres_; had
+learned that _boudins de veau_ are simply veal puddings, something a
+little better than a veal croquette made into a little pie; and had
+found that all meats if badly cooked are much alike. There is a great
+deal of nonsense talked about making good dishes out of nothing. A
+French cook is very economical, he uses up odds and ends, but he must
+have something to cook with.
+
+Stone broth does not go down with a hungry man, nor bad food, however
+disguised with learned sauces. A little learning is a dangerous thing,
+and one who attempts too much will fail. But one can read, and
+reflect, and get the general outlines of cultivated cookery. As to
+cultivated cookery being necessarily extravagant, that is a mistake. A
+great, heavy, ill-considered dinner is no doubt costly. Almost all
+American housekeeping is wasteful in the extreme, but the modern
+vanities which depend on the skill of the cook and the arranging mind
+of the housekeeper, all these are the triumphs of the present age, and
+worthy of deep thought and consideration. Let the young housekeeper
+remember that the pretty _entrées_ made out of yesterday's roast
+chicken or turkey will be a great saving as well as a great luxury,
+and she will learn to make them.
+
+Amongst a busy people like ourselves, from poorest to the richest,
+dinners are intended to be recreations, and recreations of inestimable
+value. The delightful contrast which they offer to the labours of the
+day, the pleasant, innocent triumph they afford to the hostess, in
+which all may partake without jealousy, the holiday air of guests and
+of the dining-room, which should be fresh, well aired, filled with
+flowers, made bright with glass and silver,--all this refreshes the
+tired man of affairs and invigorates every creature. As far as
+possible, the discussion of all disagreeable subjects should be kept
+from the dinner-table. All that is unpleasant lowers the pulse and
+retards digestion. All that is cheerful invigorates the pulse and
+helps the human being to live a more brave and useful life. No one
+should bring an unbecoming grumpiness to the dinner-table. Be grumpy
+next day if you choose, when the terrapin may have disagreed with you,
+but not at the feast. Bring the best bit of news and gossip, not
+scandal, the choicest critique of the last novel, the cream of your
+correspondence. Be sympathetic, amiable, and agreeable at a feast,
+else it were better you had stayed away. The last lesson of luxury is
+the advice to contribute of our very best to the dinners of our
+friends, while we form our own dinners on the plane of the highest
+luxury which we can afford, and avoid the great _too much_. Remember
+that in all countries the American lavish prodigality of feasting,
+and the expensive garniture of hothouse flowers, are always spoken of
+as vulgar. How well it will be for us when our splendid array of fish,
+flesh, and fowl shall have reached the benediction of good cookery;
+when we know how to serve it, not with barbaric magnificence and
+repletion, but with a delicate sense of fitness.
+
+Mr. Webster, himself an admirable dinner giver, said of a codfish
+salad that it was "fit to eat." He afterwards remarked, more
+gravely,--and it made him unpopular,--that a certain nomination was
+"not fit to be made."
+
+That led to a discussion of the word "fit." The fitness of things, the
+right amount, the thing in the right place, whether it be the
+condiment of a salad or the nomination to the presidency,--this is the
+thing to consult, to think of in a dinner; let it be "fit to be made."
+
+An American dinner resolves itself into the following formula:--
+
+The oyster is offered first. What can equal the American oyster in all
+his salt-sea freshness, raw, on the half-shell, a perpetual stimulant
+to appetite,--with a slice of lemon, and a bit of salt and pepper,
+added to his own luscious juices, his perfect flavor? The jaded
+palate, worn with much abuse, revives, and stands, like Oliver, asking
+for more.
+
+The soup follows. To this great subject we might devote a chapter.
+What visions of white and brown, clear and thick, fresh beef stock or
+the maritime delicacies of cray fish and prawn rise before us,--in
+every colour, from pink or cream to the heavy Venetian red of the
+mulligatawny or the deep smoke-tints of mock turtle and terrapin! The
+subject grows too large for mere mention; we must give a chapter to
+soup.
+
+When we speak of fish we realize that the ocean even is inadequate to
+hold them all. Have we not trout, salmon, the great fellows from the
+Great Lakes, and the exclusive ownership of the Spanish mackerel? Have
+we not the fee simple of terrapin and the exclusive excellence of
+shad? This subject, again, requires a volume.
+
+The roast! Ah! here we once bowed to our great Mother England, and
+thought her roast beef better than ours. There are others who think
+that we have caught up on the roasts. Our beef is very good, our
+mutton does not equal always the English Southdowns; but we are even
+improving in the blacknosed woolly brethren who conceal such delicious
+juices under their warm coats.
+
+A roast saddle of mutton with currant jelly--but let us not linger
+over this thrilling theme. Our venison is the best in the world.
+
+As for turkeys,--_we discovered them_, and it is fair to say that,
+after looking the world over, there is no better bird than a Rhode
+Island Turkey, particularly if it is sent to you as a present from a
+friend. Hang him a week, with a truffle in him, and stuff him with
+chestnuts.
+
+As for chickens--there France has us at a disadvantage. There seems to
+be a secret of fowl-feeding, or rearing, in France which we have not
+mastered. Still we can get good chickens in America, and noble capons,
+but they are very expensive.
+
+The _entrées_--here we must go again to those early missionaries to a
+savage shore, the Delmonicos. They were the high priests of the
+_entrée_.
+
+The salads--those daughters of luxury, those delicate expressions, in
+food, of the art of dress--deserve a separate chapter.
+
+And now the _sorbet_ cools our throats and leads us up to the game.
+
+The American desserts are particularly rich and profuse. Our pies have
+been laughed at, but they also are fit to eat, especially mince-pie,
+which is first cousin to an English plum-pudding.
+
+Our puddings are like our Western scenery, heavy but magnificent. Our
+ices have reached, under our foreign imported artists, the greatest
+perfection. Our fruit is abundant and highly flavoured. We have not
+yet perhaps known how to draw the line as to desserts. The great _too
+much_ prevails.
+
+Do we not make our dinners too long and too heavy? How great an artist
+would he be who should so graduate a dinner that there would be no
+to-morrow in it! We eat more like Heliogabalus than like that
+_gourmet_ who took the _beccafico_ out of the olive which had been
+hidden in the pigeon, which had in its turn been warmed in the
+chicken, which was cooked in the ox, which was roasted whole for the
+birthday of a king. The _gourmet_ discarded the rest, but ate the
+_beccafico_.
+
+The first duty of a guest who is asked to one of these dinners is to
+be punctual. Who wishes to sit next to Mr. Many-Courses, when he has
+been kept waiting for his dinner? Imagine the feelings of an amiable
+host and hostess who, after taking the trouble to get up an excellent
+dinner, feel that it is being spoiled by the tardiness of one guest!
+They are nervously watching Mr. Many-Courses, for hungry animals are
+frequently snappish, and sometimes dangerous.
+
+The hostess who knows how to invite her guests and to seat them
+afterwards is a power in the State. She helps to refine, elevate, and
+purify our great American conglomerate. She has not the Englishman's
+Bible, "The Peerage," to help her seat her guests; she must trust to
+her own intelligence to do that. Our great American conglomerate
+repels all idea of rank, or the precedence idea, which is so well
+understood in England.
+
+Hereditary distinction we have not, for although there are some
+families which can claim a grandfather, they are few. A grandfather is
+of little importance to the men who make themselves. Aristocracy in
+America is one of talent or money.
+
+Even those more choice intelligences, which in older countries are put
+on glass pedestals, are not so elevated here as to excite jealousy. We
+all adore the good diner-out, but somebody would be jealous if he had
+always the best seat. Therefore the hostess has to contend with much
+that is puzzling in the seating of her guests; but if she says to
+herself, "I will place those people near each other who are
+sympathetic," she will govern her festive board with the intelligence
+of Elizabeth, and the generosity of Queen Margharita.
+
+She must avoid too many highly scented flowers. People are sometimes
+weary of the "rapture of roses." Horace says: "Avoid, at an agreeable
+entertainment, discordant music, and muddy perfume, and poppies mixed
+with Sardinian honey; they give offence." Which is only another way of
+saying that some music may be too heavy, and the perfume of flowers
+too strong.
+
+Remember, young hostess, or old hostess, that your dinner is to be
+made up of people who have to sit two hours chatting with each other,
+and that this is of itself a severe ordeal of patience.
+
+Good breeding is said to be the apotheosis of self-restraint, and so
+is good feeding. Good breeding puts nature under restraint, controls
+the temper, and refines the speech. Good feeding, unless it is as well
+governed as it should be, inflames the nose and the temper, and
+enlarges the girth most unbecomingly. Good breeding is the guardian
+angel of a woman. Good feeding, that is, conscientious dining, must be
+the patron saint of a man! A truly well bred and well fed man is quiet
+in dress, does not talk slang, is not prosy, is never unbecomingly
+silent, nor is he too garrulous. He is always respectful to everybody,
+kind to the weak, helpful to the feeble. He may not be an especially
+lofty character, but good feeding inducts him into the character and
+duties of a gentleman. He simulates a virtue if he has it not,
+especially after dinner. _Noblesse oblige_ is his motto, and he feels
+what is due to himself.
+
+Can we be a thorough-bred, or a thorough-fed, all by ourselves? It is
+easy enough to learn when and where to leave a card, how to behave at
+a dinner, how to use a fork, how to receive and how to drop an
+acquaintance; but what a varied education is that which leads up to
+good feeding, to becoming a conscientious diner. It is not given to
+every one, this lofty grace.
+
+A dinner should be a good basis for a mutual understanding. They say
+that few great enterprises have been conducted without it. People are
+sure to like each other much better after dining together. It is
+better to go home from a dinner remembering how clever everybody was,
+than to go home merely to wonder at the opulence that could compass
+such a pageant.
+
+A dinner should put every one into his best talking condition. The
+quips and quirks of excited fancy should come gracefully, for society
+well arranged brings about the attrition of wits. If one is
+comfortable and well-fed--not gorged--he is in his best condition.
+
+The more civilized the world gets, the more difficult it is to amuse
+it. It is the common complaint of the children of luxury that dinners
+are dull and society stupid. How can the reformer make society more
+amusing and less dangerous? Eliminate scandal and back-biting.
+
+The danger and trials and difficulties of dinner-giving are manifold.
+First, whom shall we ask? Will they come? It is often the fate of the
+hostess, in the busy season, to invite forty people before she gets
+twelve. Having got the twelve, she then has perhaps a few days before
+the dinner to receive the unwelcome news that Jones has a cold, Mrs.
+Brown has lost a relative, and Miss Malcontent has gone to Washington.
+The dinner has to be reconstructed; deprived of its original intention
+it becomes a balloon which has lost ballast. It goes drifting about,
+and there is no health in it and no purpose. This is especially true
+also of those dinners which are conducted on debt-paying principles.
+
+How many hard-worked, rich men in America are bored to death by the
+gilded and over-burdened splendour of their wives' dinners and those
+to which they are to go. They sit looking at their hands during two or
+three courses, poor dyspeptics who cannot eat. To relieve them, to
+bring them into communion with their next neighbour, with whom they
+have nothing in common, what shall one do? Oh, that depressing cloud
+which settles over the jaded senses of even the conscientious diner,
+as he fails to make his neighbour on either side say anything but yes
+or no!
+
+We must, perhaps, before we give the perfect dinner, renounce the idea
+that dinner should be on a commercial basis. Of course our social
+debts must be paid. It is a large subject, like the lighting of a
+city, the cleaning of the streets, and must be approached carefully,
+so that the lesser evil may not swamp the greater good. Do not invite
+twelve people to bore them.
+
+The dinner hour differs in different cities,--from seven to half-past
+seven, to eight, and eight and a half; all these have their adherents.
+In London, many a party does not sit down until nine. Hence the
+necessity of a hearty meal at five o'clock tea. The royalties, all
+blessed with good appetites, eat eggs on toast, hot scones and other
+good things at five o'clock tea, and take often an _avant goût_ also
+at seven.
+
+In our country half-past seven is generally the most convenient hour,
+unless one is going to the play afterward, when seven is better. A
+dinner should not last more than an hour and a half. But it does last
+sometimes three hours.
+
+Ladies dress for a large dinner often in low neck and short sleeves,
+wear their jewels, and altogether their finest things. But now
+Pompadour waists are allowed. For a small dinner, the Pompadour dress,
+half-open at the throat, with a few jewels, is in better taste.
+
+Men should be always in full dress,--black coat, waistcoat, and
+trousers, and white cravat. There is no variation from this dress at a
+dinner, large or small.
+
+For ladies in delicate health who cannot expose throat or arms, there
+is always the largest liberty allowed; but the dinner dress must be
+handsome.
+
+In leaving the house and ordering the carriage, name the earliest hour
+rather than the latest; it is better to keep one's coachman waiting
+than to weary one's hostess. It is quite impossible to say when one
+will leave, as there may be music, recitations, and so on, after the
+dinner. It is now quite the fashion, as in London, to ask people in
+after the dinner.
+
+Everybody should go to a dinner intending to be agreeable.
+
+     "E'en at a dinner some will be unblessed,
+     However good the viands, and well dressed;
+     They always come to table with a scowl,
+     Squint with a face of verjuice o'er each dish,
+     Fault the poor flesh, and quarrel with the fish,
+     Curse cook, and wife, and loathing, eat and growl."
+
+Such men should never be asked twice; yet such were Dr. Johnson, and
+later on, Abraham Hayward, the English critic, who were invited out
+every night of their lives. It is a poor requital for hospitality, to
+allow any personal ill-temper to interfere with the pleasure of the
+feast. Some hostesses send around the champagne early to unloose the
+tongues; and this has generally a good effect if the party be dull.
+Excessive heat in a room is the most benumbing of all overweights. Let
+the hostess have plenty of oxygen to begin with.
+
+For a little dinner of eight we might suggest that the hostess
+write:--
+
+     DEAR MRS. SULLIVAN,--Will you and Mr. Sullivan dine with us on
+     Thursday at half-past seven to meet Mr. and Mrs. Evarts, quite
+     informally?
+
+                    Ever yours truly,
+                                     MARY MONTGOMERY.
+
+This accepted, which it should be in the first person, cordially, as
+it is written, let us see what we would have for dinner--
+
+        Sherry.      Soup.      Sorrel, _à l'essence de veau_.
+            Lobsters, _sauté à la Bonnefoy_.      Chablis.
+                    Veal Cutlets, _à la Zingara_.
+                Fried sweet potatoes.      Champagne.
+              Roast Red-Head Ducks.      Currant jelly.
+         Claret.      Curled Celery in glasses.      Olives.
+                         Cheese.      Salad.
+                           Frozen Pudding.
+                               Grapes.
+                        Coffee.      Liqueurs.
+
+Or, if you please, a brown soup, a white fish or bass, boiled, a
+saddle of mutton, a pair of prairie chickens and salad, a plate of
+broiled mushrooms, a _sorbet_ of Maraschino, cheese, ice-cream, fruit.
+It is not a bad "look-out," is it?
+
+How well the Italians understand the little dinner! They are frugal
+but conscientious diners until they get to the dessert.
+
+Their dishes have a relish of the forest and the field. First comes
+wild boar, stewed in a delicious condiment called sour-sweet sauce,
+composed of almonds, pistachio nuts, and plums. Quails, with a twang
+of aromatic herbs, are followed by macaroni flavoured with spiced
+livers, cocks' combs, and eggs called _risotto_, then golden _fritto_,
+cooked in the purest _cru_ of olive oil, and _quocchi_ cakes, of newly
+ground Indian corn, which is all that our roasted green corn is,
+without the trouble of gnawing it off the cob,--a process abhorrent to
+the conscientious diner unless he is alone. One should first take
+monastic vows of extreme austerity before he eats the forbidden fruit,
+onion, or the delicious corn. But when we can conquer Italian cooking,
+we can eat these two delicious things, nor fear to whisper to our
+best friend, nor fear to be seen eating.
+
+The triumphs of the _dolce_ belong also to the Italians. Their sugared
+fruits, ices, and pastry are all matchless; and their wines, Chianti,
+Broglio, and Vino Santo, a kind of Malaga, as "frankly luscious as the
+first grape can make it," are all delicious.
+
+
+
+
+VARIOUS MODES OF GASTRONOMIC GRATIFICATION.
+
+     Phyllis, I have a cask full of Albanian wine upwards of nine
+     years old; I have parsley in the garden for the weaving of
+     chaplets. The house shines cheerfully with plate; all hands
+     are busy.                            HORACE, _Ode XI_.
+
+
+Some old French wit spoke of an "idea which could be canonized."
+Perhaps yet we may have a Saint Table-Cloth. There have been worse
+saints than Saint Table-Cloth and clean linen, since the days of Louis
+XIII!
+
+We notice in the old pictures of feasting that the table-cloth was of
+itself a picture,--lace, in squares, blocks, and stripes, sometimes
+only lace over a colour, but generally mixed with linen.
+
+It was the highest ambition of the Dutch housewife to have much double
+damask of snowy whiteness in her table-linen chest. That is still the
+grand reliable table-linen. No one can go astray who uses it.
+
+Table-linen is now embroidered in coloured cottons, or half of its
+threads are drawn out and it is then sewed over into lace-work. It is
+then thrown over a colour, generally bright red. But pale lilac is
+more refined, and very becoming to the lace-work.
+
+Not a particle of coarse food must go on that table-cloth. Everything
+must be brought to each guest from the broad, magnificent buffet; all
+must be served _à la Russe_ from behind a grand, impenetrable
+screen, which should fence off every dining-room from the butler's
+pantry and the kitchen. All that goes on behind that screen is the
+butler's business, and not ours. The butler is a portly man,
+presumably, with a clean-shaven face, of English parentage. He has the
+key of the wine-cellar and of the silver-chest, two heavy
+responsibilities; for nowadays, not to go into the question of the
+wines, the silver-chest is getting weighty. Silver and silver-gilt
+dishes, banished for some years, are now reasserting their pre-eminent
+fitness for the dinner-table: The plates may be of solid silver; so
+are the high candlesticks and the salt-cellars, of various and
+beautiful designs after Benvenuto Cellini.
+
+Old silver is reappearing, and happy the hostess who has a real Queen
+Anne teapot. The soup-tureen of silver is again used, and so are the
+old beer-mugs. Our Dutch ancestors were much alive to good silver; he
+may rejoice who, joking apart, had a Dutch uncle. I, for one, do not
+like to eat off a metallic plate, be it of silver or gold. It is
+disagreeable to hear the knife scrape on it, even with the delicate
+business of cutting a morsel of red canvas-back. Gastronomic
+gratification should be so highly refined that it trembles at a
+crumpled rose-leaf. Porcelain plates seem to be perfect, if they have
+not on them the beautiful head of Lamballe. Nobody at a dinner desires
+to cut her head off again, or to be reminded of the French Revolution.
+Nor should we hurry. A master says, "I have arrived at such a point
+that if the calls of business or pleasure did not interpose, there
+would be no fixed date for finding what time might elapse between the
+first glass of sherry and the final Maraschino."
+
+However, the pleasures of a dinner may be too prolonged. Men like to
+sit longer eating and drinking than women; so when a dinner is of both
+sexes it should not continue more than one hour and a half. Horace,
+that prince of diners, objected to the long-drawn-out meal. "Then we
+drank, each as much as he felt the need," meant no orgy amongst the
+Greeks.
+
+But if the talk lingers after the biscuit and cheese the hostess need
+not interrupt it.
+
+Talleyrand is said to have introduced into France the custom of taking
+Parmesan with the soup, and the Madeira after it.
+
+There are many conflicting opinions about the proper place for the
+cheese in order of serving. The old fashion was to serve it last. It
+is now served with, or after, the salad. "A dessert without cheese is
+like a beautiful woman with one eye," says an old gourmet.
+
+"Eat cheese after fruit, to prepare the palate for fresh wine," says
+another.
+
+"After melon, wine is a felon."
+
+If it is true that "an American devours, an Englishman eats, and a
+Frenchman dines," then we must take the French fashion and give the
+cheese after the salad.
+
+Toasted cheese savouries are very nice. The Roman punch should be
+served just before the game. It is a very refreshing interlude. Some
+wit called it at Mrs. Hayes' dinners "the life-saving station."
+
+When the ices are removed a dessert-plate of glass, with a
+finger-bowl, is placed before each person, with two glasses, one for
+sherry, one for claret, or Burgundy; and the grapes, peaches, pears,
+and other fruits are then passed.
+
+The hostess makes the sign for retiring to a _salon_ perhaps rich
+with magnificent hangings of old gold, with pictures, with vases of
+Dresden, of Sèvres, of Kiota, with statuary, and specimens of Capo di
+Monti. There coffee may be brought and served by the footmen in cups
+which Catherine of Russia might have given to Potemkin. The gentlemen,
+in England and America, remain behind to smoke.
+
+There is much exquisite porcelain in use in the opulent houses of
+America. It is getting to be a famous fad with us, and nothing adds
+more to one's pleasure in a good dinner than to have it served on
+pretty plates. And let us learn to say "footman," and not "waiter;"
+the latter personage belongs to a club or a hotel. It would prevent
+disagreeable mistakes if we would make this correction in our ordinary
+conversation.
+
+In the arrangement of a splendid dinner let us see what should be the
+bill of fare.
+
+This is hard to answer, as the delicacies vary with the season. But we
+will venture on one:--
+
+                      Oysters on the half-shell.
+    Sherry.                     Soups:
+                    _Crème d'Asperges_, Julienne.
+                                Fish:                    Chablis.
+                       Fried Smelts, or Salmon.
+                           Fresh Cucumbers.
+    Champagne.       _Filet de Boeuf_, with Truffles      Claret.
+                            and Mushrooms.
+                            Fried Potatoes.
+                               Entrées:
+             _Poulet à la Maréchale_.      _Petits Pois._
+                        _Timbale de Macaroni_.
+                             Sweetbreads.
+                     Vegetables.      Artichokes.
+     Sorbet.                 Roman Punch.
+     Steinberger.               Game:
+             Canvas-back or Wild Duck with Currant Jelly.
+                      Quail with Water-Cresses.
+               Salad of Lettuce.      Salad of Tomato.
+     Rudesheimer.        _Pâté de foie gras._
+                             Hot dessert:
+                           Cabinet Pudding.
+                            Cold dessert:
+                   _Crème glacée aux tutti frutti._
+         _Marron glacés._      Cakes.      Preserved ginger.
+     Madeira.                 Cheese.                       Port.
+                         Café.      Cordials.
+
+I apologize to my reader for mixing thus French and English. It is a
+vulgar habit, and should be avoided. But it is almost impossible to
+avoid it when speaking of a dinner; the cooks being French, the
+_menus_ are written in French, and the names of certain dishes are
+usually written in French. Now all people understand French, or should
+do so. If they do not, it is very easy to learn that the "_vol au vent
+de volaille_" is simply chicken pie, that potatoes are still potatoes
+under whatever alias they are served, and so on.
+
+No such dinner as this can be well served in a private house unless
+the cook is a _chef_, a _cordon bleu_,--here we must use French
+again,--and unless the service is perfect this dinner will be a
+failure. It is better to order such a dinner from Delmonico's or
+Sherry's or from the best man you can command. Do not attempt and
+fail.
+
+But the little dinners given by housekeepers whose service is perfect
+are apt to be more eatable and palatable than the best dinner from a
+restaurant, where all the food is cooked by gas, and tastes alike.
+
+The number of guests is determined by the size of the room. The
+etiquette of entering the dining-room is this: the host goes first,
+with the most distinguished lady. The hostess follows last, with the
+most distinguished gentleman.
+
+Great care and attention must be observed in seating the guests. This
+is the province of the hostess, who must consider the subject
+carefully. All this must be written out, and a diagram made of the
+table. The name of each lady is written on a card and enclosed in an
+envelope, on the outside of which is inscribed the name of the
+gentleman who has the honour to take her in. This envelope must be
+given each man by the servant in the dressing-room, or he must find it
+on the hall table. Then, with the dinner-card at each place, the
+guests find their own places.
+
+The lady of the house should be dressed and in the drawing-room at
+least five minutes before the guests are to arrive, which should be
+punctually. How long must a hostess wait for a tardy guest? Only
+fifteen minutes.
+
+It is well to say to the butler, "Dinner must be served at half-past
+seven," and the guests may be asked at seven. That generally ensures
+the arrival of all before the fish is spoiled. Let the company then go
+in to dinner, allowing the late-comer to follow. He must come in
+alone, blushing for his sins. These facts may help a hostess: No great
+dinner in Europe waits for any one; royalty is always punctual. In
+seating your guests do not put husband and wife, sisters or relatives
+together.
+
+An old courtesy book of 1290 says:--
+
+     "Consider about placing
+     Each person in the post that befits him.
+     Between relations it behooves
+     To place others midway sometimes."
+
+We should respect the _superstitions_ of the dinner-table. No one
+should be helped twice to soup; it means an early death. Few are free
+from the feeling that thirteen is an unlucky number; so avoid that, as
+no one wishes to make a guest uncomfortable. As we have said, Gasthea
+is an irritable muse; she must be flattered and pampered. No one must
+put salt on another's plate. There is a strong prejudice against
+spilling the salt; but evil consequences can be avoided by throwing a
+pinch of salt over the left shoulder.
+
+These remarks may seem frivolous to those unhappy persons who have not
+the privilege of being superstitious. It gives great zest to life to
+have a few harmless superstitions. It is the cheese _fondu_ of the
+mental faculties; and we may add that a consideration of these maxims,
+handed down from a glorious past of gastronomes, contributes to the
+various modes of gastronomic gratification. We must remember that the
+tongue of man, by the delicacy of its structure, gives ample evidences
+of the high functions to which it is destined. The Roman epicures
+cultivated their taste so perfectly that they could tell if a fish
+were caught above or below a bridge. Organic perfection, epicureanism,
+or the art of good living, belongs to man alone. The pleasure of
+eating is the only one, taken in moderation, which is common to every
+time, age, and condition, which is enjoyed without fatigue or danger,
+which must be repeated two or three times a day. It can combine with
+our other pleasures, or console us for their loss.
+
+"_Un bon diner, c'est un consolation pour les illusions perdus._" And
+we have an especial satisfaction, when in the act of eating, that we
+are prolonging our existence, and enabling ourselves to become good
+citizens whilst enjoying ourselves.
+
+Thus the pleasures of the table, the act of dining, the various modes
+of gastronomic gratification should receive our most respectful
+consideration. "Let the soup be hot, and the wines cool. Let the
+coffee be perfect, and the liqueurs chosen with peculiar care. Let the
+guests be detained by the social enjoyment, and animated with the hope
+that before the evening is over there is still some pleasure in
+store."
+
+Our modern hostesses who understand the art of entertaining often have
+music, or some recitations, in the drawing-room after the dinner; and
+in England it is often made the occasion of an evening party.
+
+Thus gourmandize is that social love of good dinners which combines in
+one Athenian elegance, Roman luxury, and Parisian refinement. It
+implies discretion to arrange, skill to prepare, and taste to direct.
+It cannot be done superficially, and if done well it takes time,
+experience, and care. "To be a success, a dinner must be thought out."
+
+"By right divine, man is the king of nature, and all that the earth
+produces is for him. It is for him that the quail is fattened, the
+grape ripened. For him alone the Mocha possesses so agreeable an
+aroma, for him the sugar has such wholesome properties."
+
+He, and he alone, banquets in company, and so far from good living
+being hurtful to health, Brillat Savarin declares that the _gourmets_
+have a larger dose of vitality than other men. But they have their
+sorrows, and the worst of them is a bad dinner,--an ill-considered,
+wretchedly composed, over-burdened repast, in which there is little
+enjoyment for the brain, and a constant disappointment to the palate.
+
+"Let the dishes be exceedingly choice and but few in number, and the
+wines of the best quality. Let the order of serving be from the more
+substantial to the lighter." Let the eating proceed without hurry or
+bustle, since the dinner is the last business of the day; and let the
+guests look upon themselves as travellers about to reach the same
+destination together.
+
+A dinner is not, as we see, a matter of butler or _chef_ alone. "It is
+the personal trouble which a host and hostess are willing to take; it
+is the intimate association of a cultivated nature with the practical
+business of entertaining, which makes the perfect dinner.
+
+"Conviviality concerns everything, hence it produces fruits of all
+flavours. All the ingenuity of man has been for centuries concentrated
+upon increasing and intensifying the pleasures of the table."
+
+The Greeks used flowers to adorn vases and to crown the guests. They
+ate under the vault of heaven, in gardens, in groves, in the presence
+of all the marvels of nature. To the pleasures of the table were
+joined the charms of music and the sound of instruments. Whilst the
+court of the king of the Phoenicians were feasting, Phenius, a
+minstrel, celebrated the deeds of the warriors of bygone times. Often,
+too, dancers and jugglers and comic actors, of both sexes and in every
+costume, came to engage the eye, without lessening the pleasures of
+the table.
+
+We eat in heated rooms, too much heated perhaps, and brilliantly
+lighted, as they should be. The present fancy for shaded lamps, and
+easily ignitible shades, leads to impromptu conflagrations which are
+apt to injure Saint Table-Cloth. That poor martyr is burned at the
+steak quite too often. Our dancers and jugglers are introduced after
+dinner, not during dinner; and we have our warriors at the table
+amongst the guests. Nor do we hire Phenius, a minstrel, to discourse
+of their great deeds.
+
+I copy from a recent paper the following remarks. Mr. Elbridge T.
+Gerry, says: "There are in society some newly admitted members who,
+with the best intentions imaginable, are never able to do things in
+just the proper style. They are persons of wealth, fairly good
+breeding and possessed of a desire to entertain. With all the
+good-humoured witticisms that the newspapers indulge in on this
+subject, it is nevertheless a fact that the art of entertaining
+requires deep and careful study, as well as natural aptitude."
+
+Some of the greatest authors have stated this in poetry and prose.
+
+"A typical member of this new class recently gave a dinner to a number
+of persons in society. It was a very dull affair. There was
+prodigality in everything, but no taste, and no refinement. The fellow
+amused me by telling us he had no trouble in getting up a fine dinner;
+he had only to tell his butler and _chef_ to get up a meal for so many
+persons, and the whole thing was done. There are few persons fortunate
+enough to possess _chefs_ and butlers of that kind; he certainly was
+not. Of the persons who attended his dinner, nine out of ten were
+displeased and will never attend another. It does not take long for
+the experienced member of society to know whether a host or hostess is
+qualified to entertain, and the climbers soon find it a hard piece of
+business to secure guests."
+
+But on the other hand, we can reason that so fond of the various modes
+of gastronomic gratification is the human race, that the dinner giver
+is a very popular variety of the _genus homo_; nor does the host or
+hostess generally find it a hard matter to secure guests. Indeed
+there is a vulgar proverb to the effect that if the Devil gives a
+ball, all the angels will go to it.
+
+"If you want an animal to love you, feed it." So that the host can
+stand a great deal of criticism. We should, however, take a hint from
+the Arabs, nor abuse the salt; it is almost worse than spilling it.
+
+Lady Morgan described the cookery of France as being "the standard and
+gauge of modern civilization;" and when, during the peace which
+followed Waterloo, Brillat Savarin turned his thoughts to the
+æsthetics of the dinner-table, he probably added more largely to the
+health and happiness of the human race than any other known
+philanthropist. We must not forget what had gone before in the
+developments and refinements of the reigns of Louis XIV., XV., and the
+Regent; we must not forget the honour done to gastronomy by such
+statesmen as Colbert, such soldiers as Condé, nor by such a wit and
+beauty as Madame de Sevigné.
+
+
+
+
+OF SOUPS.
+
+     "Oh, a splendid soup is the true pea-green,
+         I for it often call,
+     And up it comes, in a smart tureen,
+         When I dine in my banquet hall.
+     When a leg of mutton at home is boiled,
+         The liquor I always keep,
+     And in that liquor, before 't is spoiled,
+         A peck of peas I steep;
+     When boiled till tender they have been
+     I rub through a sieve the peas so green.
+
+     "Though the trouble the indolent may shock,
+         I rub with all my power,
+     And having returned them to the stock,
+         I stew them for an hour;
+     Of younger peas I take some more,
+         The mixture to improve,
+     Thrown in a little time before
+         The soup from the fire I move.
+     Then seldom a better soup is seen
+     Than the old familiar soup pea-green."
+
+
+The best of this poetical recipe is that it is not only funny, but a
+capital formula.
+
+     "The giblet may tire, the gravy pall,
+         And the truth may lose its charm;
+     But the green pea triumphs over them all
+         And does not the slightest harm."
+
+Some of us, however, prefer turtle. It would seem sometimes as if
+turtle soup were the synonym for a good dinner, and as if it dated
+back to the days of good Queen Bess. But fashion did not set its seal
+on turtle soup until about seventy years ago; as an entry in the
+"Gentleman's Magazine" mentions calipash and calipee as rarities. It
+is now inseparable from the Lord Mayor's dinner. When we notice
+ninety-nine recipes for soup in the latest French cookery book, and
+when we see the fate of a dinner made or marred by the first dish, we
+must concede that it will be a stumbling-block to the young
+housekeeper.
+
+Add to that the curious fact that no Irishwoman can make a good soup
+until she has been taught by years of experience, and we have the
+first problem in the dangerous process of dinner-giving staring us in
+the face. A greasy, watery, ill-considered soup will take away the
+appetite of even a hungry man; while a delicate white or brown soup,
+or the _purées_ of peas and asparagus, may well whet the appetite of
+the most pampered _gourmet_.
+
+The subject of soup-making may well be studied. A good soup is at once
+economical and healthful, and of the first importance in the
+construction of a dinner. Soup should be made the day before it is to
+be eaten, by boiling either a knuckle of veal for a white soup, three
+or four pounds of beef, with the bone well cracked, for a clear
+_consommé_, or by putting the bones of fish, chickens, and meat into
+water with salt and pepper, and thus making an economical soup, which
+may, however, be very good. The French put everything into the soup
+pot,--bones, scraps, pot liquor, the water in which onions have been
+boiled, in fact in which all vegetables including beans and potatoes
+have been boiled; even as a French writer says "rejected MSS. may be
+thrown into the soup pot;" and the result in France is always good. It
+is to be observed that every soup should be allowed to cool, and all
+the fat should be skimmed off, so that the residuum may be as clear as
+wine.
+
+Delicate soups, clear _consommé_, and white soups _à la Reine_, are
+great favourites in America, but in England they make a strong,
+savoury article, which they call gravy soup. It is well to know how to
+prepare this, as it makes a variety.
+
+     Cut two pounds of beef from the neck into dice, and fry until
+     brown. Break small two or three pounds of bones, and fry
+     lightly. Bones from which streaked bacon has been cut make an
+     excellent addition, but too many must not be used, lest the
+     soup be salt. Slice and fry brown a pound of onions, put them
+     with the meat and bones and three quarts of cold water into
+     the soup pot; let it boil up, and having skimmed add two large
+     turnips, a carrot cut in slices, a small bundle of sweet
+     herbs, and a half a dozen pepper-corns. Let the soup boil
+     gently for four or five hours, and about one hour before it is
+     finished add a little piece of celery, or celery-seed tied in
+     muslin. This is a most delicious flavour. When done, strain
+     the soup and set it away for a night to get cold. Remove the
+     fat and next day let it boil up, stirring in two spoonfuls of
+     corn starch, moistened with cold water. Season with salt and
+     pepper to taste, not too salt; add forcemeat balls to the
+     soup, and you have a whole dinner in your soup.
+
+An oxtail soup is made like the above, only adding the tail, which is
+divided into joints, which are fried brown. Then these joints should
+be boiled until the meat comes easily off the bones. When the soup is
+ready put in two lumps of sugar, a glass of port wine, and pour all
+into the tureen.
+
+The Julienne soup, so delicious in summer, should be a nice clear
+stock, with the addition of prepared vegetables. Unless the cook can
+buy the excellent compressed vegetables which are to be had at the
+Italian warehouses, it is well to follow this order:--
+
+     Wash and scrape a large carrot, cut away all the yellow parts
+     from the middle, and slice the red outside. Take an equal
+     quantity of turnips and three small onions, cut in a similar
+     manner. Put them in a stewpan with two ounces of butter and a
+     pinch of powdered sugar, stir over the fire until a nice brown
+     colour, then add a quart of clear, well-flavoured stock, and
+     let all simmer together gently for three hours. When done,
+     skim the fat off very carefully, and ten minutes before
+     serving add a lettuce cut in shreds and blanched for a minute
+     in boiling water. Simmer for five minutes and the soup will be
+     ready. This is a most excellent soup if well made.
+
+Mock-turtle soup is easily made:--
+
+     Boil the bones of the head three hours, add a piece of gravy
+     meat cut in dice and fried brown, three onions sliced and
+     fried brown, a carrot, a turnip, celery, and a small bundle of
+     sweet herbs; boil gently for three hours and take off the fat.
+     When it is ready to be served add a glass of sherry and slices
+     of lemon. The various parts of a calf's-head can be cooked and
+     used as forcemeat balls, and made to look exactly like turtle.
+     This soup is found canned and is almost as good as the real
+     article.
+
+Dried-pea soup, _crème d'asperge_, and bean soup, in fact all the
+_purées_, are very healthful and elegant soups. The _purée_ is the
+mashed mass of pea or bean, which is added to the stock.
+
+     Boil a pint of large peas in a quart of water with a sprig of
+     parsley or mint, and a dozen or so of green onions. When the
+     peas are done strain and rub them through a sieve, put the
+     _purée_ back into the liquor the peas were boiled in, add a
+     pint of good veal or beef broth, a lump of sugar, and pepper
+     and salt to taste. Let the soup get thoroughly hot without
+     boiling, stir in an ounce of good butter, and the soup is
+     ready.
+
+A plain but quick and delicious soup may be made by using a can of
+corn, with a small piece of pork. This warmed up quickly, with a
+little milk added, is very good.
+
+As for a _crème d'asperge_, it is better to employ a _chef_ to teach
+the new cook.
+
+Mulligatawny soup is a visitor from India. It should not be too strong
+of curry powder for the average taste. The stock should be made of
+chicken or veal, or the liquor in which chickens have been boiled.
+
+     Slice and fry in butter six large onions, add four sharp, sour
+     apples, cored and quartered, but not peeled. Let them boil in
+     a little of the stock until quite tender, then mix with them a
+     quarter of a pound of flour, and a small teaspoonful of curry
+     powder. Take a quart of the stock and when the soup has boiled
+     skim it; let it simmer for half an hour, then carefully take
+     off all the fat, strain the soup, and rub the onions through a
+     sieve. When ready to heat the soup for the dinner-table add
+     any pieces of meat or chicken cut into small, delicate shapes.
+     When these have been boiled together for ten minutes the soup
+     will be ready; salt to taste. Boiled rice should be sent in on
+     a separate dish.
+
+Sorrel soup is a great favourite with the French people. We do not
+make enough of sorrel in this country; it adds an excellent flavour.
+
+     Carefully wash a pound of sorrel, and having picked, cut it in
+     shreds, put it into a stewpan with two ounces of fresh butter
+     and stir it over the fire for ten minutes. Stir in an ounce of
+     flour, mix well together and add a pint and a half of good
+     white stock made as for veal broth. Let it simmer for half an
+     hour. Having skimmed the soup, stir in the yolks of three eggs
+     beaten up in half a pint of milk or cream. Stir in a little
+     pat of butter, and when dissolved pour the whole over thin
+     pieces of toasted bread into the tureen.
+
+With the large family of the broths every housewife should become
+acquainted. They are invaluable for the sick, especially broths of
+chicken and mutton. For veal broth the following is an elaborate, but
+excellent recipe:
+
+     Get three or four pounds of scrag, or a knuckle of veal,
+     chopped into small pieces, also a ham bone, or slice of ham,
+     and cover with water; let it boil up, skim it until no more
+     rises. Put in four or five onions, a turnip, and later a bit
+     of celery or celery seed tied in muslin, a little salt, and
+     white pepper. Let it boil gently for four hours; strain the
+     gravy and having taken off all the fat return the residue to
+     the pot and let it boil; then slightly thicken with corn
+     flour, about one teaspoonful to a quart of soup; let it simmer
+     before serving. Three pounds of veal should make two quarts of
+     good soup.
+
+A sheep's-head soup is famous all over Scotland and is made as
+follows:--
+
+     Get the head of a sheep with the skin on, soak it in tepid
+     water, take out the tongue and brains, break all the thin
+     bones inside the cheek, and carefully wash it in several
+     waters; put it on in a quart of water with a teaspoonful of
+     salt and let it boil ten minutes. Pour away this water and put
+     two quarts more with one pound of a scrag of mutton; add, cut
+     up, six onions, two turnips, two carrots, a sprig of parsley,
+     and season with pepper and salt. Let it boil gently for four
+     or five hours, when the head and neck will not be too much
+     cooked for the family dinner, and may be served either with
+     parsley or onion sauce. It is a most savoury morsel. Strain
+     the soup, and let it cool so as to remove every particle of
+     fat. Rub the vegetables through a sieve to a fine _purée_. Mix
+     a tablespoonful of flour in a quarter of a pint of milk; make
+     the soup boil up and stir it in with the vegetables.
+
+     Have the tongue boiled until it is very tender, skin and trim
+     it, have the brains also well cooked, and chop and pound them
+     very fine with the tongue, mix them with an equal weight of
+     sifted bread-crumbs, a tablespoonful of chopped green
+     parsley, pepper, salt, and egg, and if necessary a small
+     quantity of flour to enable you to roll the mixture into
+     little balls. Put an ounce of butter into a small frying-pan
+     and fry the balls until a nice brown, lay them on paper before
+     the fire to drain away all the fat, and put them into the soup
+     after it is poured into the tureen. Scald and chop some green
+     parsley and serve separately on a plate.
+
+Thackeray thought so much of a boiled sheep's head that he made it the
+point of one of his humorous poems.
+
+     "By that grand vow that bound thee
+       Forever to my side,
+     And by the ring that made thee
+       My darling and my bride!
+     Thou wilt not fail or falter
+       But bend thee to the task--
+     A boiled sheep's head on Sunday
+       Is all the boon I ask!"
+
+In France, cabbage is much used in soup.
+
+         "Ha, what is this that rises to my touch
+         So like a cushion--can it be a cabbage?
+         It is, it is, that deeply inspired flower
+     Which boys do flout us with, but yet--I love thee,
+         Thou giant rose, wrapped in a green surtout.
+         Doubtless in Eden thou didst blush as bright
+         As these thy puny brethren, and thy breath
+           Sweetened the fragrance of her spicy air;
+         And now thou seemst like a bankrupt beau
+           Stripped of his gaudy hues and essences,
+             And growing portly in his sober garments."
+
+The cabbage is without honour in America; and yet if boiled in water
+which is thrown away, having absorbed all its grosser essences, and
+then boiled again and chopped and dressed with butter and cream, it is
+an excellent vegetable. Its disagreeable odour has led to its
+expulsion from many a house, but corn-beef and cabbage are not to be
+despised.
+
+Cauliflower, which Thackeray calls the "apotheosis of cabbage," is the
+most delicate of vegetables; and a _purée_ of cauliflower shall close
+our chapter on soups.
+
+     Boil in salted water, using a small piece of butter, two heads
+     of cauliflower, drain and pass them through a colander, dilute
+     with two quarts of sauce and a quart of chicken broth, season
+     with salt, white pepper, and grated nutmeg. Add a teaspoonful
+     of fine white sugar, then pass the whole forcibly with a
+     wooden presser through a fine sieve,--the finer the sieve the
+     better the _purée_. Put the residue in a stewpan, set it on
+     the fire, stir all the while till it boils, let it boil for
+     ten minutes, strain well, add a mixture made with the yolks of
+     six eggs and half a pint of cream, finish with four ounces of
+     table butter, and serve with small, fried, square _croûtons_.
+
+A _purée_ of celery is equally excellent; but all these soups require
+an intelligent cook. It is better to have one's cook taught to make
+soups by an expert, for it is the most difficult of all the dishes, if
+thoroughly good. The plain soup, free from grease and well flavoured,
+is easy enough after a little training, "but the chief ingredient of
+soup is brains," according to a London _chef_. It is, however, a good
+practice for an amateur cook to experiment and to try these various
+recipes, all of which are practicable.
+
+
+
+
+FISH.
+
+     What is thy diet? Canst thou gulf a shoal
+     Of herrings? Or hast thou gorge and room
+     To bolt fat porpoises and dolphins whole
+     By dozens, e'en as oysters we consume?
+                                     PUNCH.
+
+     The world's mine oyster, which I with sword will open.
+                                     HOTSPUR.
+
+
+The Egyptians, strange to say, did not deify fish, that important
+article of their food. We read of the enormous yield of Lake Moeris,
+which was dammed up by the great Rameses, and whose draught of fishes
+brought him so enormous a revenue.
+
+One of the most fascinating of all the Egyptian Queens, Sonivaphra,
+received the revenues of one of these fisheries to keep her in
+shoe-strings,--probably another name for pin money.
+
+And yet the Egyptians, while mummying the cats and dogs and beetles,
+and such small deer, made no gods of the good carp or other fish which
+must have stocked the river Nile. They emblazoned the crocodile on
+their monuments, but never a fish. It is a singular foreshadowing of
+that great vice of the human race, ingratitude.
+
+The Romans were fond of fish, and the records of their gastronomy
+abound in fish stories. We read of Licinius Crassus, the orator, that
+he lived in a house of great elegance and beauty. This house was
+called the "Venus of the Palatine," and was remarkable for its size,
+the taste of the furniture, and the beauty of the grounds. It was
+adorned with pillars of Hymettian marbles, with expensive vases and
+_triclinia_ inlaid with brass; his gardens were provided with
+fish-ponds, and noble lotus-trees shaded his walks. Abenobarbus, his
+colleague in the censorship, found fault with such luxury, such
+"corruption of manners," and complained of his crying for the loss of
+a lamprey as if it had been a favourite daughter!
+
+This, however, was a tame lamprey, which used to come to the call of
+Crassus and feed out of his hand. Crassus retorted by a public speech
+against his colleague, and by his great power of ridicule turned him
+into derision, jested upon his name, and to the accusation of weeping
+for a lamprey, replied that it was more than Abenobarbus had done for
+the loss of any of his three wives!
+
+In the sixteenth century, that golden age of the Vatican, the splendid
+court of Leo X. was the centre of artistic and literary life, and the
+witty and pleasure-loving Pope made its gardens the scene of his
+banquets and concerts, where he listened to the recitations of the
+poets who sprung up under his protection. There beneath the shadow of
+the ilex and the lauristines, in a circle so refined that ladies were
+admitted, Leo himself leaned on the shoulder of the handsome Raphael,
+who was allowed to caress and admire the Medicean white hand of his
+noble patron. We read that this famous Pope was so fastidious as to
+the fish dinners of Lent, that he invented twenty different recipes
+for the chowder of that day! Walking in disguise with Raphael through
+the fish-market, he espied a boy who, on his knees, was presenting a
+fish to a pretty _contadina_. The scene took form and immortality in
+the famous _Vierge au Poisson_, in which, conducted by the Angel
+Gabriel, the youthful Saint John presents the fish to the Virgin and
+child,--a beautiful picture for the church whose patron saint was a
+fisherman.
+
+Indeed, that picture of the sea of Galilee, and the sacred meaning
+attached to the etymology of the word "fish," has given the finny
+wanderer of the seas a peculiar and valuable personality. All this,
+with the selection by our Lord of so many of his disciples from
+amongst the fishermen, the many poetical associations which form
+around this, the cheapest and most delicate form of food with which
+the Creator has stocked this world of ours, would, if followed out,
+afford a volume of suggestion, quotation, poetry, and romance with
+which to embellish the art of entertaining.
+
+Fish is now believed to produce aliment for the brain, and as such is
+recommended to all authors and editors, statesmen, poets and lawyers,
+clergymen and mathematicians,--all who draw on that finer fibre of the
+brain which is used for the production of poetry or prose.
+
+England is famed for its good fish, as why should it not be, with the
+ocean around it? The turbot is, _par excellence_, the fish for a Lord
+Mayor's dinner, and it is admirable _à la crème_ for anybody's dinner.
+Excellent is the whitebait of Richmond, that mysterious little dwarf.
+Eaten with slices of brown bread and butter it is a very delicious
+morsel, and the whiting, which always comes to the table with his tail
+in his mouth, beautifully browned outside, white as snow within, what
+so excellent as a whiting, except a _sole au gratin_ with sauce
+Tartare?
+
+Fresh herrings in Scotland are delicious, almost equal to the red
+mullets which Cæsar once ate at Marseilles. The fresh sardines at
+Nice, and all along the Mediterranean, are very delicate, as are the
+thousand shell-fish. The langoose, or large lobster of France and the
+Mediterranean, is a surprise to the American traveller. Not so
+delicate as our American lobster, it still is admirable for a salad.
+It is so large that the flesh--if a fish has flesh--can be sliced up
+and served like cold roast turkey.
+
+The salmon, king of fish, inspires in his capture, in Scotland rivers,
+in Labrador, in Canada, some of the best writing of the day. William
+Black, in Scotland, and Dr. Wier Mitchell, of Philadelphia, can tell
+stories of salmon-fishing which are as brilliant as Victor Hugo's
+description of Waterloo, or of that mysterious jelly-fish in his
+novel, "The Toilers of the Sea."
+
+The New York market boasts the red snapper, the sheepshead, the
+salmon, the salmon-trout, the Spanish mackerel, most toothsome of
+viands, the sea bass, cod, halibut, the shad, the greatest profusion
+of excellent oysters and clams, the cheap pan-fish, and endless eels.
+The French make many fine dishes of eels, as the Romans did.
+
+To be good, fish must be fresh. It is absolutely indispensable, to
+retain certain flavours, that the fish should go from one element to
+another, out of the water into the fire, and onto the gridiron or into
+the frying pan as soon as possible. Therefore, if the housewife has a
+fish seasonable and fresh, and a gridiron, she can make a good dish
+for a hungry man.
+
+We shall begin with the cheapest of the products of the water, and
+although they may squirm out of our hands, try to bring to the table
+the despised eels.
+
+An old proverb said that matrimony was a bag in which there were
+ninety-nine snakes and one eel, and the young lady who put her hand
+into this agreeable company had small chance at the eel. It would seem
+at first blush as if no one would care particularly for the eel. In
+old England, eels were exceedingly popular, and the monks dearly loved
+to feed upon them. The cellarist of Barking Abbey, Essex, in the
+ancient times of monastic foundations, was, amongst other eatables, to
+provide stewed eels in Lent and to bake eels on Shrove Tuesday. There
+were artificial receptacles made for eels. The cruel custom of salting
+eels alive is mentioned by some old writers.
+
+"When the old serpent appeared in the guise of a stewed eel it was
+impossible to resist him."
+
+     Eels _en matelote_ should be cut in three-inch pieces, and
+     salted; fry an onion brown in a little dripping, add half a
+     pint of broth to the brown onion, part of a bay leaf, six
+     broken pepper-corns, four whole cloves, and a gill of claret.
+     Add the eels to this and simmer until thoroughly cooked.
+     Remove the eels, put them on a hot dish, add a teaspoonful of
+     brown flour to the sauce, strain and pour over the eels.
+     Spatch-cooked eels are good.
+
+     _Fricasseed eels_: Cut three pounds of eels into pieces of
+     three inches in length, put them into a stewpan, and cover
+     them with Rhine wine, or two thirds water and one third
+     vinegar; add fifteen oysters, two pieces of lemon, a bouquet
+     of herbs, one onion quartered, six cloves, three stalks of
+     celery, a pinch of cayenne pepper, and salt to taste. Stew the
+     eels one hour, remove them from the dish, strain the liquor.
+     Put it back into the saucepan with a gill of cream and an
+     ounce of butter rolled in flour, simmer gently a few minutes,
+     pour over the fish, and you have a dish for a king.
+
+Stewed eels are great favourites with _gourmets_, cooked as
+follows:--
+
+     Cut into three-inch pieces two pounds of medium-sized cleaned
+     eels. Rub the inside of each piece with salt. Let them stand
+     half an hour, then parboil them. Boil an onion in a quart of
+     milk and remove the onion. Drain the eels from the water and
+     add them to the milk. Season with half a teaspoonful of
+     chopped parsley, salt and pepper, and the smallest bit of
+     mace. Simmer until the flesh falls from the bones.
+
+Fried eels should be slightly salted before cooking. Do not cover them
+with batter, but dredge them with just flour enough to absorb all
+moisture, then cover them with boiling lard.
+
+As for the thousand and one recipes for cooking an oyster, no one need
+tell an American hostess much on that subject. Raw, roasted, boiled,
+stewed, scalloped and baked in patties, what so savoury as the oyster?
+They should be bought alive, and opened with care by an expert, for
+the bits of shell are dangerous. If eaten raw, pieces of lemon should
+be served with them. Plates of majolica to hold five or seven oysters
+are now to be bought at all the best crockery stores.
+
+To stew oysters well, cream and butter should be added, and the whole
+mixture done in a silver dish over an alcohol lamp. Broiled oysters
+should be dipped first in melted butter, then in bread crumbs, then
+put in a very fine wire gridiron, and broiled over a bright bed of
+coals. Scalloped oysters should be carefully dried with a clean
+napkin, then laid in a deep dish on a bed of crumbs and fresh butter,
+all softened by the liquor of the oyster; a layer of oysters and a
+layer of crumbs should follow each other, with little walnuts of
+butter put between. The mixture should be put in a very hot oven and
+baked a delicate brown, but not dried.
+
+The plain fried oyster is very popular, but it should not be cooked
+in small houses just before an entertainment, as the odour is not
+appetizing. To dip them in egg batter, then in bread-crumbs, and fry
+them in drippings is a common and good fashion. A more elaborate
+fashion is to beat up the yolks of four eggs with three tablespoonfuls
+of sweet oil, and season them with a teaspoonful of salt, and a
+saltspoonful of cayenne pepper. Beat up thoroughly, dip each oyster in
+this mixture and then in bread crumbs, and fry in hot oil. The best
+and most elegant way of cooking an oyster is, however, "_à la
+poulette_."
+
+     Scald the oysters in their own liquor, drain them, and add to
+     the liquor, salt, half an ounce of butter, the juice of half a
+     lemon, a gill of cream, and a teaspoonful of dissolved flour.
+     Beat the yolk of one egg, and add to the sauce, stir until the
+     sauce thickens; place the oysters on a hot dish, pour the
+     sauce over them, add a little chopped parsley and serve.
+
+A simpler and more primitive but excellent way of cooking oysters is
+to clean the shells thoroughly, and place them in the coals in an open
+fireplace, or to roast them in hot ashes until the shells snap open.
+
+When the oyster departs then the clam takes his place, and is
+delicious as an _avant goût_ or an appetizer at a dinner. If clams are
+broiled they must be done quickly, else they become hard and
+indigestible.
+
+The soft-shell clam, scalloped, makes a good dish. Clean the shells
+well, then put two clams to each shell, with half a teaspoonful of
+minced celery. Cut a slice of fat bacon small, add a little to each
+shell, put bread crumbs on top and a little pat of butter, bake in the
+oven until brown. A clam broth is a delicious and healthful beverage
+for sick or well; add cream and a spoonful of sherry to it, and it
+becomes a fabulously fine thing. In this mixture the clams must be
+strained out before the cream and wine are added.
+
+But if the clam is good what shall we say of crabs. Hard-shell crabs
+must be boiled about twelve minutes, drained, and set away to cool.
+Eaten with sandwiches and a dressing they are considered a delicacy
+for supper. They can be more cooked with chopped eggs, or treated like
+a chicken pasty, and cooked in a paste shell they are very good.
+
+Take half an ounce of butter, half an onion minced, half a pound of
+minced raw veal, and a small carrot shredded, a chopped crab, a pint
+of boiling cream; simmer an hour, then strain into a saucepan, and
+what a sauce you have!
+
+The soft-shell crab is an invalid. He is caught when he is helpless,
+feverish, and not at all, one would say, healthy. He is killed by the
+jarring of the train, by thunder, by some passing noisy cart, and some
+say by a fall in stocks, or a sudden change in political circles.
+
+Such sensitive creatures must be cooked as soon as possible. It is
+only necessary to remove the feathery substance under the pointed
+sides of the shells, rinse them in cold water, drain, season with salt
+and pepper, dredge them in flour and fry in hot fat. Crab patties and
+crabs cooked in any other way than this fail to please the epicure.
+Nothing with so pronounced an individuality as a soft-shelled crab
+should be disguised.
+
+A devilled crab is considered good, but it should be cooked by a negro
+expert from Maryland.
+
+Scallops are essentially good in stews, or fried, and when, cut in
+small pieces, with a pint of milk, a little butter, and a little salt,
+they again return to their beautiful shells and are baked as a
+scallop, they are delicious. Put in pork fat, and fried, they are also
+very fine.
+
+The lobster is now considered very healthful, and as conveying more
+phosphorus into the human system than any other fish. Broiled,
+devilled, stewed, cooked in a fashion called _Bourdelaise_, it is the
+most delicious of dishes, and as a salad what can equal it?
+
+A baked whitefish with Bordeaux sauce is very fine.
+
+     Clean and stuff the fish with bread-crumbs, onions, butter,
+     and sweet marjoram. Put it in a baking pan, add a liberal
+     quantity of butter previously rolled in flour, put in the pan
+     a pint of claret, and bake for an hour. Remove the fish and
+     strain the gravy, put in a teaspoonful of brown flour and a
+     pinch of cayenne pepper.
+
+Halibut with an egg sauce and a border of parsley is a dish for a
+banquet, only the cook must know how to make egg sauce. Supposing we
+tell her?
+
+     Put two ounces of butter in a stew-pan; when it melts, add one
+     ounce of flour. Stir for one minute or more, but do not brown.
+     Then add by degrees two gills of boiling water, stirring until
+     smooth, and boiling about two minutes. If not perfectly
+     smooth, pass it through a sieve; then add another ounce of
+     butter cut in pieces. When the butter is melted, add three
+     hard-boiled eggs, chopped not too fine, season with pepper and
+     salt, and serve immediately.
+
+This sauce is admirable for cod, and for all boiled fish.
+
+But the "perfectest thing on earth" is a broiled fish, a shad for
+instance; and one of the best preventives against burning is to rub
+olive oil on the fish before putting it on the gridiron. Charcoal
+affords the best fire, and it must be free from all smoke and flame.
+
+A little sweet butter, half a teaspoonful of chopped parsley and the
+juice of a lemon should be melted together, and stand ready to be
+poured over the broiled fish.
+
+Mr. Lowell, in one of his delightful, witty papers in the Atlantic
+Monthly years ago, regretted that he could not find a gridiron near
+the St. Lawrence, although its patron saint suffered martyrdom on that
+excellent kitchen utensil. It is a lamentable fact that wood fires and
+gridirons are giving out. They contain within themselves the merits of
+all the kitchen ranges, all the lost juices of that early American
+cookery, which one who has tasted it can never forget. Where are the
+broils of our childhood?
+
+Codfish is a family stand-by, but a tasteless fish unless covered with
+oysters or something very good; but salt-codfish balls are a great
+luxury.
+
+Brook trout, boiled, baked, and broiled, are all inferior to the fry.
+The frying-pan has to answer for a multitude of sins, but nothing so
+base can be found as to deprive it of its great glory in sending us a
+fried brook-trout. "Clean and rinse a quarter-of-a-pound trout in cold
+water," says one recipe.
+
+Why not a pound-and-a-quarter trout? The recipe begins later on: after
+some pork has been fried in the pan, throw in your carefully cleaned
+fish, no matter what their weight may be, turn them three times most
+carefully. Send to table without adding or detracting from their
+flavour.
+
+This is for the sportsman who cooks his trout himself by a wood fire
+in the woods; and no other man ever arrives at just that perfect way
+of cooking a trout. When the trout has come down from cooling springs
+to the hot city, it requires a seasoning of salt, pepper, and
+lemon-juice.
+
+Frogs--frogs as cooked in France, _grenouilles à la poulette_--are a
+most luxurious delicacy. They are very expensive and are to be bought
+at the _marché St. Honoré_. As only the hind legs are eaten, and the
+price is fifteen francs a dozen, they are not often seen. We might
+have them in this country for the catching. Of their tenderness,
+succulence, and delicacy of flavour there can be no question. They are
+clean feeders, and undoubtedly wholesome.
+
+Sala, writing in "Breakfasts in Bed" does not praise _bouillabaisse_.
+He declares that the cooks plunge a rolling-pin in tallow and then
+with it stir that _pot pourri_ of red mullet, tomatoes, red pepper,
+red Burgundy, oil, and garlic to which Thackeray has written so
+delightful a lyric. "Against fish soups, turtle, terrapin, oyster, and
+bisque," he says, "I can offer no objection." The Italians again have
+their good _zuppa marinara_, which is not all like the _bouillabaisse_,
+and the Russians make a very appetizing fish pottage which is called
+_batwina_, the stock of which is composed of _kraus_, or half-brewed
+barley beer, and oil. Into this is put the fish known as the sterlet
+of the Volga, or the sassina of the Gulf of Finland, together with bay
+leaves, pepper, and lumps of ice. _Batwina_ is better than
+_bouillabaisse_.
+
+
+
+
+THE SALAD.
+
+     "Epicurean cooks shall sharpen with cloyless sauce the
+     appetite."
+
+
+Of all the vegetables of which a salad can be made, lettuce is the
+greatest favourite. That lettuce which is _panachée_, says the
+_Almanach des Gourmands_, that is, when it has streaked or variegated
+leaves, is truly _une salade de distinction_. We prefer in this
+country the fine, crisp, solid little heads, of which the leaves are
+bright green. The milky juices of the lettuce are soporific, like
+opium seeds, and predispose the eater to sleep, or to repose of temper
+and to philosophic thought.
+
+After, or before, lettuce comes the fragrant celery, always an
+appetizer. Then the tomato, a noble fruit as sweet in smell as Araby
+the blest, which makes an illustrious salad. Its medicinal virtue is
+as great as its gastronomical goodness. It is the friend of the well,
+for it keeps them well, and the friend of the sick, for it brings them
+back to the lost sheep-folds of hygeia.
+
+There are water-cress and dandelion, common mustard, boiled asparagus,
+and beet root, potato salad, beloved of the Germans, the cucumber,
+most fragrant and delicate of salads, a salad of eggs, of lobsters, of
+chickens, sausages, herrings, and sardines. Anything that is edible
+can be made into a salad, and a vegetable mixture of cold French
+beans, boiled peas, carrots and potato, onion, green peppers, and
+cucumber, covered with fresh mayonnaise dressing, is served ice cold
+in France, to admiration.
+
+To learn to make a salad is the most important of qualifications for
+one who would master the art of entertaining.
+
+Here is a good recipe for the dressing:--
+
+     Two yolks of eggs, a teaspoonful of salt, and three of
+     mustard,--it should have been mixed with hot water before
+     using,--a little cayenne pepper, a spoonful of vinegar; pound
+     the eggs and mix well. Common vinegar is preferred by many,
+     but some like tarragon vinegar better. Stir this gently for a
+     minute, then add two full spoonfuls of best oil of Lucca.
+
+     "A sage for the mustard, a miser for the vinegar, a
+     spendthrift for the oil, and a madman to stir" is the old saw.
+     Add a teaspoonful of brown sugar, half a dozen little spring
+     onions cut fine, three or four slices of beet root, the white
+     of the egg, not cut too small, and then the lettuce itself,
+     which should be torn from the head stock by the fingers.
+
+Some French salad dressers say _fatiguez la salade_, which means,
+shake it, mix it, and bruise it; but the modern arrangement is to
+delicately cover the leaves with the dressing, and not to bruise them.
+This is an old-fashioned salad.
+
+An excellent salad of cold boiled potatoes cut into slices about an
+inch thick, may be made with thin slices of fresh beet root, and
+onions cut very thin, and very little of them, with the same dressing,
+minus the sugar.
+
+Francatelli speaks of a Russian salad with lobster, a German salad
+with herrings, and an Italian salad with potatoes; but these come more
+under the head of the mayonnaises than of the simpler salads.
+
+The cucumber comes next to lettuce, as a purely vegetable salad, and
+is most desirable with fish. Dr. Johnson declared that the best thing
+you could do with a cucumber, after you had prepared it with much care
+and thought, was to throw it out of the window; but Dr. Johnson,
+although he could write Rasselas and a dictionary, knew nothing about
+the art of entertaining. He was an eater, a glutton, a _gourmand_, not
+a _gourmet_. How should he dare to speak against a cucumber salad?
+
+Endive and chiccory should be added to the list of vegetable salads.
+Neither of them is good, however.
+
+An old-fashioned French salad is made thus: "Chop three anchovies, an
+onion, and some parsley small; put them in a bowl with two
+tablespoonfuls of vinegar, one of oil, a little mustard and salt. When
+well mixed, add some slices of cold roast beef not exceeding two or
+three inches long. Make three hours before eating. Garnish with
+parsley." This is by no means a bad way of serving up yesterday's
+roast beef.
+
+The etymology of salad is said to be "sal," or something salted.
+Shakspeare mentions the salad five or six times. In Henry VI., Jack
+Cade, in his extremity of peril when hiding from his pursuers in Ida's
+garden, says he has climbed over the wall to see if he could eat
+grass, or pick a salad, which he says "will not come amiss to cool a
+man's stomach in the hot weather." In Antony and Cleopatra, the
+passionate queen speaks of her "salad days" when she was "green in
+judgment, cool in blood." This means, however, something raw or
+unripe. Hamlet uses the word with the more ancient orthography of
+"sallet," and says in his speech to the players, "I remember when
+there were no sallets in these times to make them savoury." By this he
+meant there was nothing piquant in them, no Attic salt. One author,
+not so illustrious, claims that the noblest prerogative of man is
+that he is a cooking animal, and a salad eater.
+
+"The lion is generous as a hero, the rat artful as a lawyer, the dove
+gentle as a lover, the beaver is a good engineer, the monkey is a
+clever actor, but none of them can make a salad. The wisest sheep
+never thought of culling and testing his grasses, seasoning them with
+thyme or tarragon, softening them with oil, exasperating them with
+mustard, sharpening them with vinegar, spiritualizing them with a
+suspicion of onions, in that no sheep has made a salad. Their only
+sauce is hunger.
+
+"Salads," says this pleasant writer, "were invented by Adam and
+Eve,--probably made of pomegranates as to-day in Spain."
+
+Of all salads, lobster is the most picturesque and beautiful. Its very
+scarlet is a trumpet tone to appetite. It lies embedded in green
+leaves like a magnificent tropical cactus. A good dressing for lobster
+is essence of anchovy, mushroom ketchup, hard-boiled eggs, and a
+little cream.
+
+Mashed potatoes, rubbed down with cream, or simply mixed with vinegar,
+are no bad substitute for eggs, and impart to the salad a new and not
+unpleasing flavour. French beans, the most delicate of vegetables,
+give the salad eater a new sensation. A dressing can be mixed in the
+following proportions: "Four mustard ladles of mustard, four salt
+ladles of salt. Three spoonfuls of best Italian oil, twelve of
+vinegar, three unboiled eggs. All are to be carefully rubbed
+together." This is for those who like sours and not sweets. An old
+French _émigré_, who had to make his living in England during the time
+of the Regency, a man of taste and refinement, an epicurean Marquis,
+carried to noblemen's houses his mahogany box full of essences,
+spices, and condiments, and made his salad in this way: he chopped up
+three anchovies with a little shallot and some parsley; these he threw
+into a bowl with a little mustard and salt, two tablespoonfuls of oil,
+and one brimming over with vinegar. When thoroughly merged he added
+his lettuce, or celery, or potato, extremely thin, short slices of
+best Westphalia ham, or the finest roast beef, which he had steeped in
+the vinegar. He garnished with parsley and a few layers of bacon. This
+man was called _Le Roi de la salade_.
+
+A cod mayonnaise is a good dish:--
+
+     Boil a large cod in the morning. Let it cool; then remove the
+     skin and bones. For sauce put some thick cream in a porcelain
+     sauce-pan and thicken it with corn-flour which has been mixed
+     with cold water. When it begins to boil stir in the beaten
+     yolks of two eggs. As it cools beat it well to prevent it from
+     being lumpy, and when nearly cold stir in the juice of two
+     lemons, a little tarragon vinegar, a pinch of salt, and a
+     _soupçon_ of cayenne pepper. Peel and slice some very ripe
+     tomatoes or cold potatoes, steep them in vinegar with cayenne,
+     pounded ginger, and plenty of salt. Lay these around the fish
+     and cover with cream sauce. The tomatoes and potatoes should
+     be carefully drained before they are placed around the fish.
+
+A salmon covered with a green sauce is a famous dish for a ball
+supper; indeed, there are thirty or forty salads with a cold fish
+foundation.
+
+This art of dressing cold vegetables with pepper, salt, oil, and
+vinegar, should be studied. In France they give you these salads to
+perfection at the _déjeuner à la fourchette_. Fillippini, of
+Delmonico's, in his admirable work, "The Table," adds Swedish salad,
+String Bean Salad, Russian Salad, Salad Macédoine, _Escarolle_,
+_Doucette_, _Dandelion à la coutoise_, _Baib de Capucine_,
+Cauliflower salad, and _Salad a l'Italian_. I advise any young
+housekeeper to buy this book of his, as suggestive. It is too
+elaborate and learned, however, for practical application to any
+household except one in which a French cook is kept.
+
+A mayonnaise dressing is a triumph of art when well made:--
+
+     A tablespoonful of mustard, one teaspoonful of salt, the yolk
+     of three uncooked eggs, the juice of half a lemon, a quarter
+     of a cupful of butter, a pint of oil, and a cupful of whipped
+     cream. Beat the yolks and dry ingredients until they are very
+     light, with a wooden spoon or with a wire beater. The bowl in
+     which the dressing is being made should be set in a pan of ice
+     water. Add oil, a few drops at a time, until the dressing
+     becomes thick and rather hard. After it has reached this stage
+     the oil can be added more rapidly. When it gets so thick as to
+     be difficult to beat add a little vinegar, then add the juice
+     of the lemon and the whipped cream, and place on ice until
+     desired to be used.
+
+Another dressing can be made more quickly:--
+
+     The yolk of a raw egg, a tablespoonful of mixed mustard, one
+     fourth of a teaspoonful of salt, six tablespoonfuls of oil.
+     Stir the yolk, mustard, and salt together with a fork until
+     they begin to thicken; add the oil gradually, stirring all the
+     time.
+
+An excellent salad dressing is also made by using the yolk of
+hard-boiled eggs, some cold mashed potatoes well pressed together with
+a fork, oil, vinegar, mustard, and salt rubbed in, in the proportions
+of two of oil to one of vinegar.
+
+A salad must be fresh and freshly made, to be good. Never serve a
+salad the second day; and it is not well to cover a delicate salad
+with too much mayonnaise. The very heart of the celery or the
+delicate inner leaves of the lettuce are the best for dinners. The
+heavy chicken and lobster, cabbage and potato salads, are dishes for
+lunches and suppers.
+
+The chief employment of a kitchen maid, in France, where a man cook is
+kept, is to wash the vegetables; and you see her swinging the salad in
+a wire safe after washing it delicately in fresh water. The care
+bestowed on these minor morals of cookery, so often wholly neglected,
+adds the finishing touch to the excellence of a French dinner.
+
+For a green mayonnaise dressing, so much admired on salmon, use a
+little chopped spinach and finely chopped parsley. The juice from
+boiled beets can be used to make a fine red dressing. Two of these
+dishes will make a plain, country lunch-table very nice, and will have
+an appetizing effect, as has anything that betokens care, forethought,
+neatness, and taste.
+
+Some people cannot eat oil. Often the best oil cannot be bought in a
+retired and rural neighbourhood. But an excellent substitute is fresh
+butter or clarified chicken-fat, very carefully prepared, and icy
+cold. The yolks of four raw eggs, one tablespoonful of salt, one of
+mustard, the juice of a lemon, and a speck of cayenne pepper should be
+used.
+
+Two drops of onion juice, or a bit of onion sliced, will add great
+piquancy to salad dressing, if every one likes onion.
+
+I have never tried the following recipe,--I have tried all the
+others,--but I have heard that it was very good:
+
+     Four tablespoonfuls of butter, one of flour, one tablespoonful
+     of salt, one of sugar, one heaping teaspoonful of mustard, a
+     speck of cayenne, one cupful of milk, half a cupful of
+     vinegar, three eggs. Let the butter get hot in a saucepan. Add
+     the flour and stir until smooth, being careful not to brown.
+     Add the milk and boil up. Place the saucepan in another of hot
+     water. Beat the eggs, salt, pepper, sugar, and mustard
+     together, and add the vinegar. Stir this into the boiling
+     mixture and stir until it thickens like soft custard, which
+     will be about five minutes. Set away to cool, and when cold,
+     bottle and place in the ice-chest. This will keep two weeks.
+
+If one wishes to use prepared mayonnaise it is better to buy that
+which is sold at the grocers. It has not the charm of a fresh
+dressing, however, but is rather like those elaborated impromptus
+which some studied talkers get off.
+
+A very pretty salad can be made of nasturtium-blossoms, buttercups, a
+head of lettuce, and a pint of water-cresses. It is to be covered with
+the French dressing and eaten immediately.
+
+Asparagus is so good in itself that it seems a shame to dress it as a
+salad; yet it is very good eaten with oil, vinegar, and salt.
+Cauliflower, cold, is delicious as a salad, and can be made very
+ornamental with a garniture of beet root, which is a good ingredient
+for a salad of salt codfish, boiled.
+
+Sardine salads are very appetizing for lunch. Arrange a cold salmon or
+codfish on a bed of lettuce. Split six sardines, remove the bones, and
+mix them into the dressing. Garnish the whole dish with sardines, and
+cover with the dressing.
+
+All kinds of cooked fish can be served with salads. Lettuce is the
+best green salad to serve with them; but all cooked and cold
+vegetables go well with fish. Add capers to the mayonnaise.
+
+A housekeeper who has conquered the salad question can always add to
+the plainest dinner a desirable dish. She can feed the hungry, and she
+can stimulate the most jaded fancy of the over-fastidious _gourmet_ by
+these delicate and consummate luxuries.
+
+Here is Sydney Smith's recipe for a salad:--
+
+    "To make this condiment your poet begs
+       The pounded yellow of two hard-boiled eggs;
+     Two boiled potatoes, passed through kitchen sieve,
+       Smoothness and softness to the salad give.
+     Let onion atoms wink within the bowl,
+       And half suspected, animate the whole;
+     Of mordant mustard, add a single spoon,
+       (Distrust the condiment that bites too soon),
+     But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault,
+       To add a double quantity of salt.
+     Four times the spoon with oil of Lucca crown,
+       And twice with vinegar, procured from town;
+     And lastly, o'er the favoured compound toss
+       A magic _soupçon_ of anchovy sauce.
+     Oh, green and glorious! Oh, herbaceous treat!
+       'T would tempt the dying anchorite to eat!
+     Back to the world would turn his fleeting soul,
+       To plunge his fingers in a salad bowl!
+     Serenely full, the epicure would say,
+       'Fate cannot harm me,--I have dined to-day.'"
+
+LOBSTER SALAD.
+
+     "Take, take lobsters and lettuces,
+       Mind that they send you the fish that you order;
+     Take, take a decent sized salad bowl,
+       One that's sufficiently deep in the border;
+     Cut into many a slice,
+       All of the fish that's nice;
+     Place in the bowl with due neatness and order;
+       Then hard-boiled eggs you may
+     Add in a neat array,
+       All toward the bowl, just by way of a border.
+
+     "Take from the cellar of salt a proportion,
+       Take from the castors both pepper and oil,
+     With vinegar too, but a moderate portion,--
+       Too much of acid your salad will spoil;
+     Mix them together,
+       You need not mind whether
+     You blend them exactly in apple-pie order,
+       But when you've stirred away,
+     Mix up the whole you may,
+       All but the eggs which are used as a border.
+
+     "Take, take plenty of seasoning;
+       A teaspoonful of parsley that's chopped in small pieces
+     Though, though, the point will bear reasoning,
+       A small taste of onion the flavour increases
+     As the sauce curdle may,
+       Should it, the process stay.
+     Patiently do it again in good order;
+       For if you chance to spoil
+     Vinegar, eggs, and oil,
+       Still to proceed would on lunacy border."
+
+A Spanish salad, _gaspacho_, is a favourite food of the Andalusian
+peasant. It is but bread soaked in oil and water, with a large Spanish
+onion peeled, and a fresh cucumber.
+
+     Slice three tomatoes, take out the grain and cut up the fruit.
+     Arrange carefully all these materials in a shallow earthen
+     pan, tier upon tier, salting and peppering each to taste,
+     pouring in oil plentifully, and vinegar. Last of all, let the
+     salad lie in some cool spot for an hour or two, then sprinkle
+     over it two handfuls of bread-crumbs.
+
+In Spanish peasant houses, the big wooden bowl hanging below the eaves
+to keep it cool is always ready for attack. The oil in Spain is not to
+our taste; but the salad made as above, with good oil, is delicious.
+It should have a sprinkling of red pepper.
+
+
+
+
+DESSERTS.
+
+     There is not in the wide world so tempting a sweet
+     As that trifle where custard and macaroons meet.
+     Oh! the latest sweet tooth from my head must depart
+     Ere the taste of that trifle shall not win my heart.
+
+     Yet it is not the sugar that's thrown in between,
+     Nor the peel of the lemon so candied and green,
+     'T is not the rich cream that's whipped up by a mill,
+     Oh, no; it is something more exquisite still!
+
+
+The great meaning of dessert is to offer "something more exquisite
+still." And it is the province of the housekeeper, be she young or
+old, to study how this can be done.
+
+Nothing in European dinners can compare with the American custards,
+puddings, and pies. We are accused as a nation of having eaten too
+many sweets, and of having ruined our teeth thereby; but who that has
+languished in England over the insipid desserts at hotels, and the
+tooth-sharpeners called "sweets," meaning tarts as sour as an east
+wind, has not sighed for an American pie? In Paris the cakes are
+pretty to look at, but oh, how they break their promise when you eat
+them! Nothing but sweetened white of egg. One thing they surpass us
+in,--_omelette soufflé_; and a _gâteau St. Honoré_ is good, but with
+that word of praise we dismiss the great French nation.
+
+Just look at our grand list of fruit desserts: apple charlotte,
+apricots with rice, banana charlotte, banana fritters, blackberry
+short-cake, strawberry short-cake, velvet cream with strawberries,
+fresh pine-apples in jelly, frozen bananas, frozen peaches in cream,
+orange cocoanut salad, orange salad, peach fritters, peach meringue,
+peach short-cake, plum salad, salad of mixed fruits, sliced pears with
+whipped cream, stewed pears, plain, and pumpkin pie! But oh! there is
+"something more exquisite still," and that is an apple pie.
+
+     "All new dishes fade, the newest oft the fleetest;
+     Of all the pies ever made, the apple's still the sweetest.
+     Cut and come again, the syrup upward springing,
+     While life and taste remain, to thee my heart is clinging.
+     Who a pie would make, first his apple slices,
+     Then he ought to take some cloves and the best of spices,
+     Grate some lemon rind, butter add discreetly,
+     Then some sugar mix, but mind,--the pie not made too sweetly.
+     If a cook of taste be competent to make it,
+     In the finest paste will enclose and bake it."
+
+During years of foreign travel I have never met a dish so perfect as
+the American apple pie can be, with cream.
+
+Then look at our puddings; they are richer, sweeter, more varied than
+any in the world, the English plum-pudding excepted. That is a
+ponderous dainty, which few can eat. It looks well when dressed with
+holly and lighted up, but it is not to be eaten every day. Baked bread
+pudding, carrot pudding, exceedingly delicate, chocolate pudding, cold
+cabinet-pudding, boiled rice-pudding with custard sauce, poor man's
+rice-pudding, green-apple pudding, Indian pudding, minute pudding,
+tapioca pudding, and all the custards boiled and baked with infinite
+variety of flavour,--these are the every-day luxuries, and they are
+very great ones, of the American table.
+
+One charming thing about dessert and American dishes is that ladies
+can make them. They do not flush the face or derange the white apron.
+They are pleasant things to dally with,--milk and eggs, and spice and
+sugar. A model kitchen is every lady's delight. In these days of
+tiles, and marble pastry-boards, and modern improvements, what pretty
+things kitchens are.
+
+The model dairy, too, is a delight, with its upright milk-pans, in
+which the cream is marked off by a neat little thermometer, and its
+fire-brick floor. How cool and neat it is! Sometimes a stream of fresh
+water flows under the floor, as the river runs under the Château of
+Chenonceaux, where Diane de Poitiers dressed her golden hair.
+
+In the model kitchen is the exquisite range, with its polished
+_batterie de cuisine_. Every brilliant saucepan seems to say, "Come
+and cook in me;" every porcelain-lined pan urges upon one the
+necessity of stewing nectarines in white sugar; every bright can
+suggests the word "conserve," which always makes the mouth water;
+every clatter of the skewers says, "Dainty dishes, come and make me."
+All this is quite fascinating to an amateur.
+
+No pretty woman, if she did but know it, is ever so pretty as when she
+is playing cook, and doing it well. The clean white apron, the short,
+clean, cambric gown, the little cap, the white, bare arms,--the
+glorified creams and jellies, pies and Charlotte Russe, cakes and
+puddings, which fall from such fingers are ambrosial food.
+
+There is a great passion, in the properly regulated woman's heart, for
+the cleanly part of the household work. The love of a dairy is, with
+many a duchess, part of the business of her rank. In our country,
+where ladies are compelled to put a hand, once perhaps too often,
+owing to the insufficiency of servants, to the cooking, it is less a
+pastime, but a knowledge of it is indispensable. To cook a heavy
+dinner in hot weather, to wash the dishes afterward, this is sober
+prose, and by a very dull author; but to make the dessert, this is
+poetry. In the early morning the hostess should go into her neat dairy
+to skim the cream; it will be much thicker if she does. She will
+prepare all things for the desserts of the day. She will make her
+well-flavoured custard and set it in the ice-chest. She will place her
+compote of pears securely on a high shelf, away from that ubiquitous
+cat who has, in most families, so remarkable and so irrepressible an
+appetite.
+
+Then she should make a visit to the kitchen before dinner, to see to
+it that the roast birds are garnished with water-cress, that the
+vegetables are properly prepared, that the dishes are without a smear
+on their lower surface. All this attention makes good servants and
+very good dinners.
+
+In the matter of flavouring, the coloured race has us at a great
+disadvantage. Any old coloured cook can distance her white "Missus"
+there. This highly gifted race seem to have a sixth sense on the
+subject of flavours. The rich tropical nature breaks out in
+reminiscences of orange-blossoms, pineapple, guava, cocoanut, and
+mandarin orange. Never can the descendants of the poor, half-starved,
+frozen exiles of Plymouth Rock hope to achieve such custards and
+puddings as these Ethiops pour out. It is as if some luxurious and
+beneficent gift had left us when we were made poets, orators,
+philosophers, preachers, and authors, when we were given what we
+proudly term a higher intelligence. Who would not exchange all the
+cold, mathematical, intellectual supremacy of which we boast for that
+luscious gift of making pies and puddings _à ravir_?
+
+The making of pastry is so delicate and so varied a task that we can
+only say, approach it with cold hands, cold ice-water, roll it on a
+marble slab, then bake it in a very hot oven.
+
+Learn to stew well. Stew your fruit in a porcelain stewpan before
+putting it in your tarts. It is one of the most wholesome forms of
+cookery; a French novelist calls the stewpan the "favourite arm, the
+talisman of the cook." A celebrated physician said that the action of
+the stewpan was like that of the stomach, and it is a great gain if we
+can help that along. Stewing gooseberries, cherries, and even apples
+with sugar and lemon-peel before putting them in the tart, ensures a
+good pie.
+
+Whipped white of egg is an elegant addition to most dessert dishes,
+and every lady should provide herself with wire whisks.
+
+Whipped to a strong froth with sugar, and lemon or vanilla flavouring,
+this garnish makes an ordinary into a superior pudding. New-laid eggs
+are exceedingly difficult to beat up well. Take those which have been
+laid several days. Have a deep bowl with a circular bottom, and in
+beating the eggs keep the whisk as much as possible in an upright
+position, moving it very rapidly; a little boiling water, a
+tablespoonful to two eggs, and a teaspoonful of sifted sugar put to
+them before beating is commenced, facilitates the operation.
+
+For _omelette soufflé_ the white of eggs, beaten, should be firm
+enough to cut.
+
+An orange-custard pudding is so very good that we must give a
+time-honoured recipe:--
+
+     Boil a pint of new milk, pour it upon three eggs lightly
+     beaten, mix in the grated peel of an orange, and two ounces of
+     loaf sugar; beat all together for ten minutes, then pour the
+     custard into a pie dish, set it into another containing a
+     little water, and put it in a moderate oven. When the custard
+     is set, which generally takes about half an hour, take it out
+     and let it get cold. Then sprinkle over rather thickly some
+     very fine sugar, and brown with a salamander. This should be
+     eaten cold.
+
+Of rice and tapioca puddings the variety is endless, and they are most
+healthful. A wife who will give her dyspeptic husband a good pudding
+every day may perhaps save his life, his fortunes, and if he is an
+author, his literary reputation.
+
+An antiquary of the last century wrote, "Cookery was ever reckoned a
+branch of the art medical; the verb _curare_ signifies equally to
+dress vegetables and to cure a distemper, and everybody has heard of
+Dr. Diet, and kitchen physic."
+
+Indeed that most sacred part of a woman's duty, learning to cook for
+the sick, can be studied through desserts. A lady, very ill in Paris
+through a long winter, declared that she would have been cured had she
+once tasted cream-toast, or tapioca pudding; both were luxuries which
+she never encountered.
+
+Then come all the jellies; and it is better to make your own gelatine
+from the real calves'-feet than to use patent gelatine. The latter,
+however, is very good, and saves time. It also makes excellent
+foundation for all the so-called creams.
+
+Some ardent housekeepers put up all their jams, preserves, and
+currant jelly; some even make the cordials curaçoa, noyau, peach
+brandy, ginger cordial, and cherry brandy, but this is unnecessary.
+They can be bought cheaper and better than they can be made.
+
+The history of liqueurs is a curious one. Does any one ever think, as
+he tastes Chartreuse, of the gloomy monks who dig their own graves,
+and never speak save to say, "Mes frères, il faut mourir," who alone
+can make this sparkling and delicate liqueur which figures at every
+grand feast?
+
+I have made an expedition to their splendid mountain-bound convent. It
+is one of the most glorious drives in Europe, and rises into Alpine
+grandeur and solemnity. There, amid winter's cold and summer's heat,
+the Chartreuse lives in severe penance, making his hospitable liqueur
+which enchants the world, out of the chamomile and other herbs which
+grow around his convent.
+
+The best French liqueurs were made formerly at La Côte by the
+Visetandine nuns. Kirschwasser is made from the cherries which grow in
+the Alpine Tyrol, in one small province which produces nothing else.
+
+Liqueurs were invented for Louis XIV. in his old age. A cordial was
+made by mixing brandy with sugar and scents.
+
+In making a mince pie, do not forget the excellent brandy, and the
+dash of orange curaçoa, which should be put in by the lady herself.
+Else why is it that otherwise the mince pie seems to lack the
+inspiriting and hidden fire. We read that there is "many a slip 'twixt
+the cup and the lip." Perhaps the cook could tell, but one may be very
+sure she will not.
+
+The modern, elegant devices by which strawberries, violets, and
+roseleaves, orange blossoms, and indeed all berries can be candied
+fresh in sugar, afford a pretty pastime for amateur cooks. But if near
+a confectioner in the city these can be bought cheaper than they can
+be made. It may amuse an invalid to make them, and the art is easily
+learned.
+
+The cheese _fondu_ is a great favourite at foreign desserts. It is of
+Swiss origin. It is a healthful, savoury, and appetizing dish, quickly
+dressed and good to put at the end of a dinner for unexpected guests.
+
+     Take as many eggs as there are guests, and then about a third
+     as much by weight of the best Gruyères cheese, and the half of
+     that of butter. Break and beat up well the eggs in a saucepan,
+     then add the butter and the cheese, grated or cut in small
+     pieces; place the saucepan on the fire, and stir with a wooden
+     spoon till it is of a thick and soft consistence; put in salt
+     according to the age of the cheese,--fresh cheese requires the
+     most,--and a strong dose of pepper, then bake it like macaroni
+     and send to table hot.
+
+One pie we have which is national; it is that made of the pumpkin, and
+it is notoriously good. Also we may claim the squash pie and the
+sweet-potato pie, both of which merit the highest encomiums.
+
+Our fruits are so plentiful and so good that few housekeepers can fail
+of having a good dessert of fruits alone. But do not force the
+seasons. Take them as they come. When fruits are cheapest then they
+are best. Our peaches have more flavour than those of Europe, and our
+grapes are unrivalled. Of plums and pears, France has better than we
+can boast, but our strawberries are as good and as plentiful as in
+England.
+
+In fact, all the wild berries which are now getting to be cultivated
+berries, like blackberries, blueberries, huckleberries, and
+raspberries, are better than similar fruits abroad. The wild
+strawberry of the Alps is, however, delicious in flavour and
+sweetness.
+
+A very grand dessert is furnished with ices of every flavour, jellies
+holding fruit and flavoured with maraschino, all sorts of bonbons,
+nuts in sugar, candied grapes and oranges, fresh fruits in season, and
+ending with liqueurs and black coffee.
+
+A simple pudding, or pie followed by grapes and peaches, with the cup
+of black coffee afterward, is the national dessert of our United
+States. In winter it may be enriched by a Newtown pippin or a King of
+Tompkins County apple, some boiled chestnuts and a few other nuts,
+some Florida oranges, or those delicious little mandarins, perhaps
+raised by the immortal Rip Van Winkle, our own Joe Jefferson, on his
+Louisiana estate. He seems to have infused them with the flavour of
+his own rare and cheerful genius. He has raised a laugh before this,
+as well as the best mandarin oranges. Some dyspeptics declare that to
+chew seven roasted almonds after dinner does them good. And the
+roasted almonds fitly close the chapter on desserts.
+
+
+
+
+GERMAN EATING AND DRINKING.
+
+     "I wonder if Charlemagne ever drank
+     A tankard of Assmanschausen. Nay!
+     If he had, his empire never would rank
+     As it does with the royalist realms to-day;
+     For the goddess that laughs within the cup
+     Had wiled and won him from blood and war,
+     And shown, as he drained her long draughts up,
+     There was something better worth living for
+     Than kingcraft keeping his gruff brow sad.
+     I wish from my very soul she had."
+
+
+The deep, dark, swiftly flowing Rhine, its legends, its forests of
+silver firs and pines, its mountains crowned with castles, and its
+hillsides blushing with the bending vine, the convent's ancient walls,
+the glistening spire, the maidens with their plaited hair, and "hands
+that offer early flowers," all the bright, beautiful, romantic
+landscape, the dancing waves which wash its historic shores, its
+donjon keeps and haunted Tenter Rock, its
+
+     "Beetling walls with ivy grown,
+     Frowning heights of mossy stone,"--
+
+all this beauty is placed in the land of the sauer-kraut, the herring
+salad, the sweet stewed fruit with pork, pig and prune sauce, carp
+stewed in beer, raw goose-flesh or Göttingen sausages, potato
+sweetened, and cabbage soured,--in a land, in short, whose kitchen is
+an abomination to all other nations.
+
+Not that one does not get an excellent dinner at a German hotel in a
+great city. But all the cooks are French. The powerful young emperor
+has, however, given his orders that all _menus_ shall hereafter be
+written in German; the language of Ude, Soyer, Valet, and Francatelli,
+Brillat, Savarin, and Béchamel, is to be replaced by German.
+
+But if the viands are not good, the wines are highly praised by the
+_gourmet_; and as these wines are often exported, it is said that one
+gets a better German wine in New York than at a second-class hotel at
+Bonn or Cologne or Düsseldorf,--on the same principle that fish at
+Newport is less fresh than at New York, for it is all bought, sent to
+New York, and then sent back to Newport. In other words, the exporters
+are careful to keep up the reputation of their exported wines.
+
+Assmanschausen is a red Rhine wine of high degree; some _gourmets_
+call it the Burgundy of the Rhine. This poetic beverage is found
+within the gorge of the Rhine.
+
+The bend which the noble river assumes at the Rheingau is said to have
+the effect of concentrating the sun's rays, reflected from the surface
+of the water as from a mirror, upon the vine-clad slopes; and it is to
+this circumstance, combined with the favourable nature of the soil,
+and to the vineyards being completely sheltered from the north winds
+by the Taunus range, that the marked superiority of the wines of the
+Rheingau is ordinarily attributed.
+
+     "Bacharach has produced another fine wine.
+     'He never has been to Heaven and back
+     Who has not drunken of Bacharach.'"
+
+And Longfellow says:--
+
+     "At Frankfort on the Maine,
+     And at Würtzburg on the Stein,
+     At Bacharach on the Rhine,
+     Grow the three best kinds of wine."
+
+We know but little of the superior red wines of Walporzheimer,
+Ahrweiler, and Bodendorfer, which come from the valley of the Ahr. The
+Ahr falls into the Rhine near Sinzig, midway between Coblenz and Bonn.
+The wines from its beautiful vineyards are a fine deep red. The taste
+is astringent, somewhat like port. There is an agreeable red wine
+called Kreutzburger which comes from the neighbourhood of
+Ehrenbreitstein. Linz on the Rhine sends us a good red wine known as
+Dattenberger. These are all pure wines which know no doctoring.
+
+The Liebfrauenmilch is a Riesling wine with a fine bouquet. It owes
+its celebrity rather to its name than its merits. It comes from the
+vineyards adjoining the Liebfrauen Kirche near Worms, and was named by
+some pious churchman.
+
+No wines have as many poetical tributes as the Rhine wines. One of the
+English poets sings:--
+
+     "O for a kingdom rocky-throned,
+     Above the brimming Rhine,
+     With vassals who should pay their toll
+     In many sorts of wine.
+     Above me naught but the blue air,
+     And all below, the vine,
+     I'd plant my throne, where legends say
+     In nights of harvest-time
+     King Charlemagne, in golden robe,--
+     So runs the rustic rhyme,--
+     Doth come to bless the mellowing crops
+     While bells of Heaven chime."
+
+The Steinbergers, the Hochheimers, Marcobrunners, and Rüdesheimers,
+sound like so many noble families. Indeed an American senator, hearing
+these fine names, remarked: "I have no doubt, sir, they are all very
+nice girls."
+
+There is a famous Hochheimer, no less than a hundred and sixty-seven
+years old, the vintage of that year when the Duke of Marlborough
+gained the Battle of Ramillies. Let us hope that he and Prince Eugene
+moistened their clay and labours with some of this famous wine. These
+wines do not last, however. The best age is ten years, and those which
+have been stored in the antique vaulted cellar of the Bernardine Abbey
+of Eberbach, world-renowned as the Grand-ducal Cabinet wine of the
+ruler of Nassau, are now completely run out. Even Rudesheimer of 1872
+is no longer good.
+
+It must be remembered, however, that these wines are never fortified.
+To put extraneous alcohol into their beloved Rhine wine would rouse
+Rudolph of Hapsburg and Conrad of Hotstettin from the sleep of
+centuries.
+
+The Steinberger Cabinet of 1862 is the most superb. Of Rhine wines for
+bouquet, refined flavour, combined richness and delicacy. We do not
+except Schloss Johannisberger, because that is not in the market. A
+Marcobrunner and a Rüdesheimer are not to be despised.
+
+Prince Metternich sent to Jules Janin for his autograph, and the witty
+poet editor sent a receipt for twelve bottles of Imperial Schloss
+Johannisberger. The Prince took the hint and had a dozen of the very
+best cabinet wine forwarded, every bottle being sealed and every cork
+duly branded with the Prince's crest! The Johannisberger wine is
+excessively sweet, singularly soft, and gives forth a delicious
+perfume, a rich, limpid, amber-coloured wine, with a faint bitter
+flavour; it is as beautiful to look at as it is luscious to the taste,
+and it possesses a bouquet which the Empress Eugénie compared to that
+of heliotrope, violets, and geranium leaves combined.
+
+The refined pungent flavour of a good Hock, its slight racy
+sharpness, with an after almond flavour, make it an admirable
+appetizer. The staircase vineyards, in which the grapes grow on the
+Rhine, seem to catch all the revivifying influences of sunshine. Their
+splendid golden colour is caught from those first beams of the sun as
+he greets his bride, the Earth, after he has been separated from her
+for twelve dark hours.
+
+Some very good wine comes from the Rochusberg, immediately opposite
+Rüdesheim. Goethe heard a sermon here once in which the preacher
+glorified God in proportion to the number of bottles of good wine it
+was daily vouchsafed to him to stow away under his waistband.
+
+It was here that the rascal lived who drank wine out of a boot,
+immortalized by Longfellow. We can hardly, however, abuse the man, for
+he had an incurable thirst, and no crystal goblet would have held
+enough for him,--not indeed the biggest German beer mug.
+
+Longfellow, in the "Golden Legend," has a chapter devoted to wine. In
+this poem the old cellarer muses, as he goes to draw the fine wine for
+the fathers, who sit above the salt, and he utters this truth of those
+brothers who sit below the salt:--
+
+       "Who cannot tell bad wine from good,
+     And are much better off than if they could."
+
+The superior wines of the Rhine, Walporzheimer, Ahrweiler and
+Bodendorfer, all deserve notice.
+
+The kind of wine to be served with a dinner must depend on the means
+of the host. It is to be feared that, ignorantly or otherwise, many
+wines with high-sounding names which are not good are offered to
+guests.
+
+Mr. Evarts made a witty remark on this subject. Some one said to him,
+"I hear that as a great diner-out you find yourself the worse for
+drinking so many different sorts of wine." "Oh no," said Mr. Evarts,
+"I do not object to the different wines, it is the indifferent wines
+which hurt me!"
+
+Savarin says, sententiously, "Nothing can exceed the treachery of
+asking people to dinner under the guise of friendship, and then giving
+them to eat or drink of that which may be injurious to health." We
+should think so. That was the pleasant hospitality of the Borgias. In
+the neighbourhood of Neuwied, the dealers are accused of much
+doctoring of wine. During the vintage, at night, when the moon has
+gone down, boats glide over the Rhine freighted with a soapy substance
+manufactured from potatoes, and called by its owners sugar. This stuff
+is thrown into the vats containing the must, water is introduced from
+pumps and wells, chemical ferments and artificial heat are applied.
+This noble fluid is sent everywhere by land and water, and labelled as
+first-class wine. It is not bad to the taste, but does not bear
+transportation. This adulteration chiefly affects the wines sold at
+German hotels.
+
+Heinrich Heine has left us this picture of a German dinner: "I dined
+at the Crown at Clausthal. My repast consisted of spring greens,
+parsley soup, violet blue cabbage, a pile of roast veal, which
+resembled Chimborazo in miniature, and a sort of smoked herring called
+buckings, from their inventor William Buckings, who died in 1447, and
+who on account of that invention was so greatly honoured by Charles V.
+that the great monarch in 1556 made a journey from Middelburg to
+Bierlied, in Zealand, for the express purpose of visiting the grave of
+the great fish-dryer. How exquisitely such dishes taste when we are
+familiar with their historical associations."
+
+It is impossible in translation to give Heine's intense ridicule and
+scorn. He was a Frenchman out of place in Germany. He revolted at
+things German, but endeared himself to his people by his wit,
+universality of talent, and sincerity. The world has thanked him for
+his "Reisebilder." Heine gives us new ideas of the horrors of German
+cookery when he talks of Göttingen sausages, Hamburg smoked beef,
+Pomeranian goose-breasts, ox-tongues, calf's brains in pastry, gudgeon
+cakes, and "a wretched pig's-head in a wretcheder sauce, which has
+neither a Grecian nor a Persian flavour, but which tasted like tea and
+soft soap."
+
+He cannot leave Göttingen without this description: "The town of
+Göttingen, celebrated for its sausages and its university, belongs to
+the King of Hanover, and contains nine hundred and ninety-nine
+dwellings, divers chambers, an observatory, a prison, a library, and a
+council chamber where the beer is excellent."
+
+German sausages are very good. Even the great Goethe, in dying,
+remembered to send a sausage to his æsthetic love of a lifetime, the
+Frau Von Stein.
+
+Thackeray, who was keenly alive to the horrors of German cookery, says
+that whatever is not sour is greasy, and whatever is not greasy is
+sour. The curious bill of fare of a middle-class German table is
+something like this: They begin with a pudding. They serve sweet
+preserved fruit with the meat, generally stewed cherries. They go on
+with dreadful dishes of cabbage and preparations of milk, curdled,
+soured, and cheesed.
+
+Dr. Lieber, the learned philologist, was eloquent on the subject of
+the coarseness of the German appetite. He had early corrected his by a
+visit to Italy, and he remarked, with his usual profundity, that it
+was "the more incomprehensible as nature had given Germany the finest
+wines with which to wash down the worst cookery."
+
+A favourite dish is potato pancakes. The raw potatoes are scraped
+fine, mixed with milk, and then treated like flour cakes, served with
+apple or plum sauce.
+
+Sauer-kraut is ridiculed, but it is only cabbage cut fine and pickled.
+There are two delicious dishes in which it plays an important part:
+one is roast pheasant cut fine and cooked with sauer-kraut and
+champagne; the other is sauer-kraut cooked in the _croûte_ of a
+Strasbourg _pâté de foie gras_.
+
+Favourite Austro-Hungarian dishes are _bachhendl_, baked
+spring-chicken,--the chicken rolled into a paste of egg flour and then
+baked. It is rather dry to eat, but just the thing with a bottle of
+Hungarian wine. Also a beefsteak with plenty of _paprika_, or
+Hungarian red pepper, Brinsa cheese, pot cheese, made in the
+Carpathian mountains and baked in a hot oven.
+
+Brook trout is never fried, but boiled in water, and then served
+surrounded by parsley in melted butter.
+
+In eastern Russia grows a pea, the gray pea, which is boiled and eaten
+like peanuts by peeling off the hard skin, or boiled with some sort of
+sour-sweet sauce, which softens the skin. This pea is such a favourite
+with the Lithuanians that it is made the subject of poetry.
+
+Venison, and hare soup, are deliciously gamey bouillons, which are
+made of the soup bone of the roast. The Polish soup _barscz_ is made
+of bouillon with the juice of red beets, little _saucissons_, and
+specially made pastry, with highly spiced forced-meat balls swimming
+in it.
+
+Lettuce salad is prepared in Germany with sour cream.
+
+A favourite drink is warm beer,--beer heated with the yolk of an egg
+in it.
+
+     "Fill me once more the foaming pewter up!
+     Another board of oysters, ladye mine!
+     To-night Lucullus with himself shall sup.
+     Those mute inglorious Miltons are divine;
+     And as I here in slippered ease recline,
+     Quaffing of Perkins's Entire my fill,
+     I sigh not for the lymph of Aganippe's rill."
+
+Beer is the amber inspiration of the Germans, and plays its daily,
+hourly part in their science of entertaining.
+
+And the pea which can be skinned, which is such a favourite with the
+Lithuanians, has also been immortalized by Thackeray:--
+
+     "I give thee all! I can no more,
+     Though poor the offering be;
+     Stewed duck and peas are all the store
+     That I can offer thee!--
+     A duck whose tender breast reveals
+     Its early youth full well,
+     And better still, a pea that peels
+     From fresh transparent shell."
+
+But it must not be supposed that rich German citizens of the United
+States do not know how to give a good dinner. Cosmopolitan in
+everything else, these, the best colonists whom Europe has sent to us,
+make good soldiers, good statesmen, and good entertainers. They do not
+insist that we shall eat pig and prune sauce. No, they give us the
+most affluent bill of fare which the market affords. They give us a
+fine dining-room in which to eat it, and they offer as no other men
+can "a tankard of Assmanschausen."
+
+They give us, as a nation, a valuable present in mineral water. The
+Apollinaris bubbling up near the Rhine seems sent by Heaven to avert
+that gout and rheumatism which are the terrible after-dinner penalties
+of those who like too well the noble Rhine wines.
+
+
+
+
+THE INFLUENCE OF GOOD CHEER ON AUTHORS AND GENIUSES.
+
+     "The ancient poets and their learned rhymes
+     We still admire in these our later times,
+     And celebrate their fames. Thus, though they die
+     Their names can never taste mortality.
+     These had their helps. They wrote of gods and kings,
+     Of temples, battles, and such gallant things.
+     And now we ask what noble meat and drink
+     Can help to make man work, to make him think."
+
+     "Pray, on what meat hath this our Cæsar fed?"
+
+
+We should have a higher estimate of the value of a knowledge of
+cookery and of all the arts of entertaining, did we sufficiently
+realize that the style of Carlyle was owing to dyspepsia! At the age
+of fifteen he entered Edinburgh University in order to fit himself for
+the pulpit. He studied for many months to that end, but his vocation
+refused to be clear. The ministry grew alien to his mind. Finally he
+shut himself up, and as he himself says, wrestled with the Lord and
+all the imps of darkness. Carlyle believed in a personal Devil, not
+tasting food or sleeping for three days and nights, and then
+terminated the struggle by resolving to pursue literature. What mental
+revolution he underwent, he says he never could understand; all that
+he knew was that he came out with that "dommed dyspepsia,"--his Scotch
+way of pronouncing a stronger word.
+
+Some writer says that this anecdote solves the problem of Carlyle. The
+force, earnestness, and eloquence of his writings were born of a fine,
+free intellect. Then came despondency, rage, and bitterness, springing
+from dyspepsia, which had been his haunting demon from the first,
+releasing him at intervals only to assail and torture him the "more
+for each surcease."
+
+Most of his works come under the head of the Literature of Dyspepsia,
+and can be as plainly traced to it as to the growth of his
+understanding or the sincerity of his convictions. Who does not
+recognize, in the oddities of the trials and spiritual agonies of Herr
+Teufelsdröckh, the author himself under a thin disguise, and the
+promotings and promptings, and phenomena of censuring indigestion? All
+through the "Sartor Resartus" it is evident that the gastric juices of
+the illustrious iconoclast are insufficient; that while he is railing
+at humanity he is suffering from gastritis, while he is prophesying
+that the race will come to naught but selfishness and stupidity he is
+undergoing gastrodynia, or, as it is commonly called, stomachic cramp.
+
+I do not know who wrote that masterly criticism, but evidently some
+man who had had a good dinner.
+
+But Carlyle gets better and writes his noble essay on Robert Burns,
+the life of John Sterling, Oliver Cromwell's letters and speeches.
+Then he is at his best; sees man as a brother, handicapped with
+circumstances, riveted to temperament perhaps, but in spite of all
+shortcomings and neglected opportunities, still a brother, demanding
+respect, deserving of help. How different Carlyle would have been, as
+a man and as a writer, with nutritive organs capable of continually
+and regularly performing their functions. Dyspepsia was his worst
+enemy, as it has been that of many of his readers. Every mouthful he
+ate must have been a gastric Nemesis for sins of opinion, and of
+heresies against humanity. His very style is the result of
+indigestion,--an excess of ill-chosen, ill-prepared German fare in a
+British stomach, affording a strange sustenance, which, like some
+diseases, keep a man alive, but which pain while they sustain.
+
+What a different genius was Prescott, who had a good dinner every day
+of his life, who was brought up from boyhood in a luxurious old Boston
+household where was the perfection of cookery!
+
+Sydney Smith sent word to Prescott after he wrote "Ferdinand and
+Isabella,"--
+
+"Tell Prescott to come here and we will drown him in turtle soup."
+
+"Say that I can swim in those seas," was Prescott's witty rejoinder.
+
+Mr. Prescott was fifty-three years of age when he visited England; he
+was extremely handsome, courteous, and very much a man of the world.
+
+     "We grow like what we eat. Bad food depresses,
+     Good food exalts us like an inspiration."
+
+Mr. Prescott had been inspired by good food, as any one can see who
+reads that noble work "Ferdinand and Isabella." In England this
+accomplished man was received by Lady Lyell, to whom he was much
+attached. The account of English hospitality which he gives throws a
+rosy light on the history of the art of entertaining:
+
+"I returned last night from the Horners, Lady Lyell's parents and
+sisters, a very accomplished and happy family circle. They have a
+small house, with a pretty lawn stretching between it and the Thames,
+that forms a silver edging to the close-shaven green. The family
+gather under the old trees on the little shady carpet, which is sweet
+with the perfume of flowery shrubs. And you see sails gliding by and
+stately swans, of which there are hundreds on the river. The next
+Sunday, after dinner, which we took at four o'clock, we strolled
+through Hampton Court and its royal park. The next day we took our
+picnic at Box Hill. On Friday to dinner at Sir Robert Peel's and to an
+evening party at Lady S----'s. I went at eleven and found myself in a
+brilliant saloon filled with people amongst whom I did not recognize a
+familiar face. You may go to ten parties in London, be introduced to a
+score of persons in each, and on going to the eleventh not see a face
+that you have ever seen before, so large is the society of the great
+metropolis. I was soon put at my ease, however, by the cordial
+reception of Lord and Lady C----, who introduced me to a great number
+of persons."
+
+This alone would prove how great was Prescott's popularity, for in
+London, people, as a rule, are not introduced.
+
+"In the crowd I saw an old gentleman, nicely made up, stooping a good
+deal, covered with orders, and making his way easily along, as all,
+young and old, seemed to treat him with deference. It was the Duke of
+Wellington, the old Iron Duke. He likes the attention he receives in
+this social way. He wore round his neck the order of the Golden
+Fleece, on his coat the order of the Garter. He is, in truth, the lion
+of England, not to say of all Europe."
+
+This beautiful little _genre_ picture of the Iron Duke was written in
+the year 1850. Forty years later General Grant was received at Apsley
+House by the son of the great Duke of Wellington, the second Duke,
+who opened the famous Waterloo room and toasted the modest American as
+the greatest soldier of modern times. Mr. Prescott goes on to say,--
+
+"We had a superb dinner at Sir Robert Peel's, four and twenty guests.
+It was served in the long picture-gallery. The windows of the gallery
+look out upon the Thames, its beautiful stone bridges with lofty
+arches, Westminster Abbey with its towers, and the living panorama on
+the water. The opposite windows look on the green gardens behind the
+Palace of Whitehall, which were laid out by Cardinal Wolsey, and near
+the spot where Charles I. lived, and lost his life on the scaffold.
+The gallery is full of masterpieces, especially Dutch and Flemish,
+amongst them the famous _Chapeau de Paille_, which cost Sir Robert
+over five thousand pounds. In his dining-room were also superb
+pictures, the famous one by Wilkie, of John Knox preaching, which did
+not come up to the idea I had formed of it from the engraving. There
+was a portrait of Dr. Johnson by Reynolds, the portrait owned by Mrs.
+Thrale and engraved for the Dictionary; what a bijou!
+
+"We sat at dinner looking out on the moving Thames. We dined at eight,
+but the twilight lingers here until half-past nine at this summer
+season. Sir Robert was exceedingly courteous to his guests, told some
+good stories, showed us his autographs, amongst which was the
+celebrated one written by Nelson, in which he says, 'If I die
+"Frigate" will be found written on my heart.'"
+
+Mr. Prescott's letter to his daughter points out the strange
+difference between the life of a girl in England and a girl here.
+
+"I think on reflection, dear Lizzy, that you did well not to come
+with me. Girls of your age [she was then nineteen] make no great
+figure in society. One never, or very rarely, meets them at dinner
+parties, and they are not so numerous at evening parties as with us,
+unless it be at balls. Six out of seven women you meet are over
+thirty, and many of them over forty or fifty, not to say sixty; the
+older they are, the more they are dressed and diamonded. Young girls
+dress less, and wear very little ornament indeed."
+
+What a commentary this is on our American way of doing things,--where
+young girls rule society, put their mothers in the background, and
+wear too fine clothes.
+
+Dr. Prescott was of course presented at Court, and his account of it
+is delightful:--
+
+"Well! the presentation has come off, and I will give you some account
+of it before going to dine with Lord Fitzwilliam. This morning I
+breakfasted with Mr. Monckton Milnes, where I met Macaulay the third
+time this week. We had also Lord Lyttleton, an excellent scholar,
+Gladstone, and Lord W. Germains, a sensible and agreeable person, and
+two or three others. We had a lively talk, but I left early for the
+Court affair. I was at Mr. Abbott Lawrence's at one in my costume,--a
+_chapeau_ with gold lace, blue coat, and white trowsers, begilded with
+buttons and metal, a sword, and patent-leather-boots. I was a figure
+indeed! but I had enough to keep me in countenance. I spent an hour
+yesterday with Lady M. getting instructions for demeaning myself. The
+greatest danger was that I should be tripped up by my sword. On
+reaching St. James Place we passed upstairs through files of the
+Guard, beefeaters, and were shown into a large saloon richly hung with
+crimson silk, and with some fine portraits of the family of George
+III. It was amusing, as we waited there an hour, to see the arrival of
+the different persons, diplomatic, military, and courtiers, all men
+and women blazing in their stock of princely finery, and such a power
+of diamonds, pearls, emeralds, and laces, the trains of the ladies'
+dresses several yards in length. Some of the ladies wore coronets of
+diamonds, which covered the greater part of the head. I counted on
+Lady D----'s head two strings of diamonds rising gradually from the
+size of a fourpence to the size of an English shilling, and thick in
+proportion. The dress of the Duchess of D---- was studded with
+diamonds as large as nutmegs. The young ladies dressed very plainly. I
+tell this for Lizzy's especial benefit. The company were permitted to
+pass one by one into the presence-chamber, a room of about the same
+size as the other, with gorgeous canopy and throne, at the farther end
+of which stood the little Queen and her Consort, surrounded by her
+Court. She was rather simply dressed, but he was in Field-Marshal's
+uniform, and covered, I should think, with all the orders of Europe.
+He is a good-looking person, but by no means so good-looking as you
+are given to expect from his pictures. The Queen is better looking
+than you might expect. I was presented by our minister, by the order
+of the Chamberlain, as the historian of Ferdinand and Isabella and
+made my profound obeisance to her Majesty who made a dignified
+courtesy. I made the same low bow to his Princeship, and then bowed
+myself out of the circle without my sword tripping up my heels. As I
+was drawing off, Lord Carlisle, who was standing on the outer edge,
+called me to him and kept me by his side telling me the names of the
+different lords and ladies who, after paying their obeisance to the
+Queen, passed out before us."
+
+Mr. Monckton Milnes became Lord Houghton, and I had great pleasure in
+knowing him well many years after this. He told me, what our American
+historian was too modest to tell, how well Mr. Prescott appeared in
+London. Lionized to death, as the English alone can lionize, Mr.
+Prescott never lost his modest self-possession. He was everywhere
+remarked for his beauty, his fine manner, and his knowledge of the
+usages of good society. But then, in 1887 the English went equally
+wild, even more so, over Buffalo Bill, and probably preferred him.
+
+Mr. Prescott was entertained at Cuddeston Palace, the residence of
+Bishop Wilberforce, the famous "Soapy Sam," from the fact, as he said
+himself, that he "was always in hot water, and always came out cleaner
+than he went in." This witty and accomplished prelate was very much
+pleased with our American scholar, and gave him a hearty welcome. It
+will sound curiously enough now, that Mr. Prescott found his Episcopal
+views very high, and says, "The service was performed with a ceremony
+quite Roman Catholic." The Bishop of Oxford would, were he living now,
+be called low church,--so much do terms vary in different ages. Truly
+the world moves!
+
+I was in my youth entertained at the house of Mr. Prescott, at Nahant,
+and allowed to see his workroom and the machinery with which he wrote.
+He gave me, and I have it still, a paper which he wrote for me with
+the wired plate which the blind use, for he could scarcely see at all.
+
+He was master of the art of entertaining. How charming he was at
+dinner at his own house; how pleasantly he made one forget his
+greatness, except that a supreme simplicity seems always to accompany
+true greatness. He had a regularity in his habits which would in a
+less amiable man have interfered with his agreeability, but with him
+it was most fascinating, as it seemed like musical chords set to noble
+words.
+
+It would be pleasant to record the triumphs of Mr Webster, Mr. Motley,
+Mr. Lowell, Mr. Phelps, Mr. Evarts, Mr. Depew, and many another great
+American in England, but that, while a subject for national pride,
+scarcely comes within the scope of this little book.
+
+It would seem, however, that our orators, however fed, have compassed
+the accomplishment of after-dinner speaking, which is so much
+appreciated in England, and it is to be hoped that no "dommed
+dyspepsia" from badly cooked food will dim the oratory of the future.
+
+It is quite true that a witty and full talker will be silenced if he
+is placed before a bad dinner, one which is palpably pretentious but
+not well cooked, and villanously served. It is impossible for the
+really conscientious diner-out, who respects his digestion, whose
+religion is his dinner, to talk much or laugh much, if his gormandize
+is wounded. Even if he wills to talk, in order not to lose his
+reputation, his speech will be a "muddy flood of saponaceous blather,"
+instead of his usual brilliant flow of anecdote and repartee.
+
+Not all great men have, however, felt the influence of food as an
+inspirer. Dr. Johnson was great although he was a horrible feeder; and
+at the other extreme was General Grant, so abstemious that he once
+told me that he did not know the sensation of hunger; that he could go
+three days without food. At the splendid banquets given to him he
+rarely ate much, but noticed the people and the surroundings, great
+hero that he was.
+
+Thackeray, Disraeli, and Dickens have given us the most appreciative
+descriptions of the art of entertaining, and were men deeply sensible
+of the charms of a good dinner.
+
+Charles Lamb has been the poet of the homely and the comfortable side
+of good eating; he records for us in immortal prose and poetry what
+roast pig and tobacco have done for him.
+
+We claim boldly that a part of Webster's greatness, Prescott's charm,
+the genius of Motley and of Lowell, the oratory of Depew, the wit of
+Parke Godwin and Horace Porter, even the magnificent march of Sherman
+to the sea, the great genius of Bryant, the sparkling cup of Anacreon,
+O. W. Holmes, the masterly speech of our lawyers, and the unrivalled
+eloquence of our pulpit orators, are owing to that earlier style of
+domestic American cookery which was, and is, and always shall be,
+deserving of the highest praise,--when meats were cooked with all
+their juices, before a wood fire, when bread was light and feathery,
+when soups were soups, and broils were broils! Oh, vanished
+excellence!
+
+
+
+
+BONBONS.
+
+     Do, child, go to it' grandam, child;
+     Give grandam kingdom! and it' grandam will
+     Give it plumb, a cherry, and a fig.
+                             KING JOHN.
+
+
+They used to call a sugar-plum a plumb in Shakspeare's time. Was it on
+account of its weight? Few ladies, on receiving a box of bonbons from
+Maillards, go into the great question of their antiquity and their
+manufacture. Few, even now, who at a fashionable hotel, receive on
+Sundays after dinner a pretty little paper box filled with candied
+rose-leaves and violets, remember that they are only following the
+fashion of Lucretia Borgia in putting them in their pocket to eat in
+their rooms, or at the theatre. There is nothing new under the sun.
+
+In France, in entertaining a lady, or a party of ladies, at theatre or
+opera, the gentleman host always carries a box of bonbons, within
+which is a little imitation-silver sugar-tongs by which she can help
+herself to a chocolate or a _marron déguisé_, without soiling her
+fingers. This pampered dame does not consider that France makes
+annually sixty million of francs' worth of bonbons; that it exports
+only about one fourth of this, leaving an enormous amount for home
+consumption.
+
+They send over to England alone, cheap sweets manufactured by steam,
+to the amount of three hundred thousand English pounds a year.
+
+The sugar-plum came from Italy, and dates no further back than the
+sixteenth century as an article of commerce. But the skilful
+confectioners in private houses knew how to manufacture not only those
+which were healthful, but those which were very useful in getting rid
+of dreaded rivals, unfaithful lovers, and troublesome friends.
+
+The manufacture of the antique sugar-plum, the antediluvian baked
+almond, and the nauseous coloured abominations whose paint-poisoned
+surface has long been discarded in France, received, as I read in an
+old chronicle, its death-blow from the Aboukir almonds, during the
+period of Napoleon's invasion of Egypt, which killed more people than
+the bullets. Next went down the cracker bonbons, called Cossacks, on
+account of the terror with which they inspired the _grandes dames_ on
+their first advent in 1814.
+
+These latter, however, have come back, in the harmless detonating
+powder-charged bonbons which every one hears at a dinner-party, as the
+fringed papers are pulled. Then come the _primaveras_, a variety of
+sugared bomb. Then the _marquises_, _orangines_, _marron glacé_, or
+sugared chestnut, _cerises pralinée_, burnt cherries, _bowles_,
+_ananas_, _dattes au café_, dates delightfully stuffed and covered
+with sugar, _diables noirs_, _ganaches_, and an ephemeral but
+delicious candy, _bonbons fondants_, with an inscription on the box
+that "these must be eaten within twenty-four hours." They are
+sometimes fruits with a creamy sugar, raspberries, currants,
+strawberries, and are delicious, but quite untransportable, although
+transporting merchandise. Their invention made the fortune of the
+inventor.
+
+Formerly the preparation of bonbons was a tedious affair. Now it is
+almost the work of a day, but they are perishable. If you leave a box
+open they will devour themselves. Kept cool and air-tight, they will
+last for years. About the first of December the great manufacturers in
+the Rue de la Paix, commence their operations for New Year's, when
+everybody, from President Carnot down, sends his friend a box of
+bonbons. They tell of one confectioner who abandoned his sugar-pots to
+turn playwright, about the time that Alphonse Karr forsook literature
+to sell bouquets. The principle remains the same. He wished to sweeten
+the existence of _les Parisiennes_.
+
+In visiting one of these immense establishments one descends a stone
+staircase, and finds one's self in a stifling atmosphere, heavily
+laden with the aroma of vanilla and other essences. Around are scores
+of workmen, in white-paper caps and aprons, their faces red with heat,
+as they plunge particular fruits into large cauldrons, filled with
+boiling syrups. More in the shade are other stalwart men, their faces
+pale with the heated atmosphere, piling up almonds on huge copper
+vessels; and so constant is the sound of metal clashing against metal
+that the visitor might imagine himself in an armour smithy, instead of
+a sugar factory; rather with Vulcan working for the gods, or some
+village blacksmith pounding out horseshoes, than with a party of
+French _ouvriers_ making sugar-plums for children to crunch. On all
+sides one sees sugar, gallons of liqueurs, syrups, and essences, rum,
+aniseed, noyau, maraschino, pineapple, apricot, strawberry, cherry,
+vanilla, chocolate, coffee, and tea, with sacks of almonds, and
+baskets of chestnuts, pistachio nuts, and filberts being emptied into
+machines which bruise their husks, flay them, and blanch them, all
+ready to receive their saccharine coating.
+
+Those bonbons which have liqueur in them are much appreciated by
+gourmets who find other bonbons disagree with them! A sugar-coated
+brandy cherry is relished by the wisest man. Most bonbons are made by
+hand; those only which are flat at the bottom are cast in moulds. In
+the hand-made bonbons, the sugar paste is rolled into shapes by the
+aid of an instrument formed of a stout piece of wire, one end of which
+is twisted, and the other fixed into a wooden handle. With this the
+paste is taken out of the cauldron, and worked into the desired form
+by a rapid _coup de main_. For bonbons of a particular form, such as
+those in imitation of various fruits, models are carved in wood.
+
+Liqueur bonbons are formed of a mixture of some given liqueur and
+liquid sugar, which is poured into moulds, and then placed in a slow
+oven for the day. Long before they are removed a hard crust has formed
+on the outside, while the inside remains in its original liquid state.
+Bonbons are crystallized by being plunged into a syrup heated to
+thirty degrees Reamur; by the time they are dry the crystallization is
+complete and acts as a protection against the atmosphere. The bonbons
+can then be kept a certain time, although their flavour deteriorates.
+
+I think sugar one of the most remarkable of all the gifts of nature.
+It submits itself to all sorts of plastic arts, and to see a
+confectioner pouring it through little funnels, to see him make a
+flower, even to its stamens, of this excellent juice of the cane or of
+the beet,--they use beet sugar almost entirely in France,--is to
+comprehend anew how many of the greatest of all curiosities are hidden
+in the kitchen.
+
+One must go to Chambéry, in Savoy, to taste some of the most
+exquisite _pâtisserie_, to find the most delicious candied fruits; and
+at Montpellier, in the south of France, is another most celebrated
+manufactory of bonbons.
+
+I received once from Montpellier a box holding six pounds of these
+marvellous sweets, which were arranged in layers. Beginning with
+chocolates in every form, they passed upward by strata, until they
+reached the candied fruit, which was to be eaten at once. I think
+there were fifty-five varieties of delicious sweets in that box. Such
+lovely colours, such ineffable flavours, such beauties as they were!
+The only remarkable part of this anecdote is that I survived to tell
+it. I can only account for it by the fact that it was sent me by a
+famous physician, who must have hidden his power of healing in the
+box. Unlike Pandora's box which sent the troop of evils out into the
+world, this famous _cachet_ sent nothing but good-will and pleasure,
+barring perhaps a possible danger.
+
+If, however, we speak of the bonbons themselves, what can we say of
+the _bonbonnières_! Everything that is beautiful, everything that is
+curious, everything that is quaint, everything that is ludicrous,
+everything that is timely, is utilized. I received an immense green
+satin grasshopper--the last _jour de l'an_, in Paris--filled to his
+uttermost _antennæ_ with bonbons. It could be for once said that the
+"grasshopper had not become a burden." The _panier Watteau_, formed of
+satin, pearls, straw, and flowers, may be made to conceal a
+handkerchief worth a thousand francs under the rose-satin lining. The
+boxes are painted by artists, and remain a lovely belonging for a
+toilet table.
+
+Beautiful metal reproductions of some antique _chef d'oeuvre_ are
+made into _bonbonnières_. Some bonbon-boxes have themselves concealed
+in huge bouquets of violets, fringed with lace, or hidden under roses,
+which are skilfully growing out of white satin; beautiful reticules,
+all embroidered, hold the carefully bound up packages, where tinfoil
+preserves the silk and satin from contact with the sugar. If France
+did nothing else but make _bonbonnières_, she would prove her claim to
+being the most ingenious purveyor for the luxury of entertaining in
+all the world. If luxury means, "to freight the passing hour with
+flying happiness," France does her "possible" as she would say
+herself, to help along this fairy packing.
+
+At Easter, when sweetmeats are almost as much in request as at the New
+Year,--the French make very little of Christmas,--these bonbon
+establishments are filled with Easter eggs of the gayest colours.
+There are nests of eggs, baskets of eggs, cradles full of eggs, and
+pretty peasants carrying eggs to market; nests of eggs, with birds of
+brilliant plumage sitting on the nests or hovering over them, while
+their freight of bonbons repose on softest swan's-down, lace, and
+satin; or again, the egg itself of satin, with its yolk of orange
+creams and its white of marshmallow paste. There is no end to this
+felicitous and dulcet strain.
+
+The best candied fruit I have ever eaten, I bought in a railway depot
+at Venice. The Italians understand this art to perfection. They hang
+the fruit by its natural stem on a long straw; and no better
+accompaniment for a long railway journey can be imagined.
+
+The French do not consider bonbons unhealthful. Instead of giving her
+boy a piece of bread and butter as he departs for the _Lycée_ the
+French mamma gives him two or three chocolate bonbons. The hunter
+takes these to the top of the Matterhorn; ladies take them in their
+pockets instead of a lunch-basket; and one assured me that two slabs
+of chocolate sufficed her for breakfast and supper on the road from
+Paris to Rome.
+
+I do not know what Baron Liebig would say to this in his learned
+articles on the "Nutritive Value of Certain Kinds of Food," but the
+French children seem to be the healthiest in the world,--a tribute to
+chocolate of the highest. "By their fruits shall ye know them."
+
+In the times of the Medici, and the St. Bartholomew Massacre, the
+French and Italian nobles had a curious custom of always carrying
+about with them, in the pockets of their silk doublets, costly little
+boxes full of bonbons. Henry IV., Marie de Medici, and all their
+friends and foes, carried about with them little gold and Limoges
+enamelled boxes, very pretty and desirable articles of _vertu_ now;
+and doubtless there was one full of red and white comfits in the
+pocket of Mary Queen of Scots, when she fell dead, poor, ill-used,
+beautiful woman, at the foot of the block, at Fotheringay. Doubtless
+there was one in the pouch of the grisly Duc de Guise, with his
+close-cropped bullet head, and long, spidery legs, when he fell, done
+to death by treacherous Catherine de Medici, dead and bleeding on the
+polished floor of Blois! It was a childish custom, and proved that the
+age had a sweet tooth; but it might have been useful for diplomatic
+purposes, and highly conducive to flirting. As a Lord Chief Justice
+once said that "snuff and snuff-boxes help to develop character," so
+the _bonbonnière_ helps to emphasize manners; and I am always pleased
+when an old or new friend opens for me a little silver box and offers
+me a sugared violet, or a rose leaf conserved in sugar, although I can
+eat neither of them.
+
+A witty writer says that dessert should be "the girandole, or cunning
+tableau of the dinner." It should "surprise, astonish, dazzle, and
+enchant." We may almost decide upon the taste of an age as we read of
+its desserts. The tasteless luxury and coarse pleasures of the reign
+of Charles II.,--that society where Rochester fluttered and Buckingham
+flaunted,--how it is all described in one dessert! At a dinner given
+the father (of a great many) of his subjects by Lady Dormer, was built
+a large gilded ship of confectionery. Its masts, cabins, portholes,
+and lofty poop all smart and glittering, its rigging all taut, its
+bunting flying, its figure-head bright as gold leaf could make it. Its
+guns were charged with actual powder. Its cargo was two turreted pies,
+one full of birds and the other of frogs. When borne in by the gay
+pages, to the sound of music, the guns were discharged, the ladies
+screamed and fainted, so as to "require to be held up and consoled by
+the gallants, who offered them sips of Tokay." Poor little things!
+Such was the Court of Charles.
+
+Then, to sweeten the smell of powder, the ladies threw at each other
+egg-shells filled with fragrant waters; and "all danger being over,"
+they opened the pies. Out of one skipped live frogs; out of the other
+flew live birds who put out the lights; so, what with the screams, the
+darkness, the frogs, and the smell of powder, we get an idea of sports
+at Whitehall, where blackbrowed, swarthy-visaged Charles presided, on
+which grave Clarendon condescended to smile, and which the gentle
+Evelyn and Waller were condemned to approve.
+
+We have not entirely refrained from such sugar emblems at our own
+great feasts; but fortunately, they have rather gone out, excepting
+for some emblem-haunted dinners where we do have sugared Monitors,
+and chocolate torpedos. I have seen the lovely Venus of Milo in frozen
+cream, which gave a wit the opportunity of saying that the home for
+such a goddess should be the temple of Isis; and Bartholdi's immortal
+Liberty lends herself to chocolate and nougat now and then, but very
+rarely at private dinners.
+
+The fashion of our day, with its low dishes for the sweets, is so much
+better, that we cannot help congratulating ourselves that we do not
+live even in the days of the first George, when, as one witty author
+again says, "the House of Brunswick brought over sound protestantism,
+but German taste." Horace Walpole, great about trifles, incomparable
+decider of the width of a shoe-buckle, keen despiser of all meannesses
+but his own, neat and fastidious tripper along a flowery path over
+this vulgar planet, derided the new fashion in desserts. The ambitious
+confectioners, he says, "aspired to positive statuary, spindle-legged
+Venus, dummy Mars, all made of sugar;" and he mentions a confectioner
+of Lord Albemarle's who loudly complained that his lordship would not
+break up the ceiling of his dining-room to admit the heads,
+spear-points and upraised thunderbolts of a middle dish of Olympian
+deities eighteen feet high, all made of sugar.
+
+The dishes known in France as _Les Quatres Mendiants_, one of nuts,
+one of figs or dried fruit, one of raisins, and another of oranges,
+still to be seen on old-fashioned dinner-tables, was, I supposed, so
+called because it is seldom touched,--in fact, goes a-begging.
+
+But I have found this pretty little legend, which proves that it was
+far more poetical in origin. The name in French for aromatic vinegar
+is also connected with it. It is called "The Vinegar of the Four
+Thieves." So runs the legend: "Once four thieves of Marseilles,
+rubbing themselves with this vinegar during the plague, defied
+infection and robbed the dead." Who were these wretches? All that we
+know of them is that they dined beneath a tree on stolen walnuts and
+grapes, and imagined the repast a feast. We can picture them, Holbein
+men with slashed sleeves, as old soldiers of Francis I. who had
+wrestled with the Swiss. We can imagine them as beaten about by
+Burgundian peasants; and we know that they were grim, brown, scarred
+rascals, cutting purses, snatching silken cloaks,--sturdy, resolute,
+heartless, merry, desperate, God-forsaken scoundrels, living only for
+the moment. We can imagine Callot etching their rags, or Rembrandt
+putting in their dark shadows and high lights. We can see Salvator
+Rosa admiring them as they sleep under the green oak-tree, their heads
+on a dead deer, and the high rock above. Or we may get old Teniers to
+draw them for us, gambling with torn and greasy cards for a gold
+crucifix or a brass pot, or revelling at the village inn, swaggering,
+swearing, drunk, or tipsy, playing at shuffle-board. The only point in
+their history worth recording is that they were destined to be asked
+to every dinner party for four hundred years!--simply preceding the
+bonbons, as we see by the following verses:--
+
+     "Once on a time, in the brave Henry's age,
+       Four beggars dining underneath a tree
+     Combined their stores; each from his wallet drew
+       Handfuls of stolen fruit, and sang for glee.
+
+     "So runs the story,--'_Garçon_, bring the _carte_,
+       Soup, cutlets--stay--and mind, a _matelotte_.'
+     And 'Charles,--a pint of Burgundy's best Beanne;
+       In our deep glasses every joy shall float!'
+
+     "And '_Garçon_, bring me from the woven frail
+       That turbaned merchants from fair Smyrna sent,
+     The figs with golden seeds, the honeyed fruit,
+       That feast the stranger in the Syrian tent.
+
+     "'Go fetch us grapes from all the vintage rows
+       Where the brave Spaniards gaily quaff the wine,
+     What time the azure ripple of the waves
+       Laughs bright beneath the green leaves of the vine!
+
+     "'Nor yet, unmindful of the fabled scrip,
+       Forget the nuts from Barcelona's shore,
+     Soaked in Iberian oil from olives pressed,
+       To the crisp kernels adding one charm more.
+
+     "'The almonds last, plucked from a sunny tree,
+       Half way up Lybanus, blanched as snowy white
+     As Leila's teeth, and they will fitly crown
+       The beggars' four-fold dish for us to-night.
+
+     "'Beggars are happy! then let us be so;
+       We've buried care in wine's red-glowing sea.
+     There let him soaking lie--he was our foe;
+       Joy laughs above his grave--and so will we!'"
+
+It was from that love of contrast, then, was it, which is a part of
+all luxury, that the fable of the _Quatre Mendiants_ was made to serve
+like the olives at dessert. Perhaps the fillip which walnuts give to
+wine suggested it. It was a modern French rendering of the skull made
+to do duty as a drinking-cup. It is a part of the five kernels of corn
+at a Pilgrim dinner, without that high conscientiousness of New
+England. It is a part, perhaps, of the more melancholy refrain, "Be
+merry, be merry, for to-morrow ye die!" It is that warmth is warmer
+when we remember cold; it is that food is good when we remember the
+starving; it is that _bringing in_ of the pleasant vision of the four
+beggars under the tree, as a picture perhaps; at any rate there it
+is, moral at your pleasure.
+
+The desserts of the middle ages were heavy and cumbrous affairs, and
+had no special character. There would be a good deal of Cellini cup
+and Limoges plate, and Palissy dish, and golden chased goblet about
+it, no doubt. How glad the collectors of to-day would be to get them!
+And we picture the heavy indigestible cakes, and poisonous bonbons.
+The taste must have been questionable if we can believe Ben Jonson,
+who tells of the beribboned dwarf jester who, at a Lord Mayor's
+dinner, took a flying header into a dish of custard, to the infinite
+sorrow of ladies' dresses; he followed, probably, that dish in which
+the dwarf Sir Geoffrey Hudson was concealed, and they both are after
+Tom Thumb, who was fishing about in a cup of posset a thousand years
+ago.
+
+The dessert is allowed by all French writers to be of Italian origin;
+and we read of the _maîtres d'hotel_, before the Italian dessert
+arrived, probably introduced by Catherine de Medici and the Guises,
+that they gloried in mountains of fruit, and sticky hills of
+sweetmeats. The elegance was clumsy and ostentatious; there was no
+poetry in it. Paul Veronese's picture of the "Marriage of Cana" will
+give some idea of the primeval French dessert. The later fashion was
+of those trees and gardens and puppets abused by Horace Walpole; but
+Frenchmen delighted in seas of glass, flower-beds formed of coloured
+sand, and little sugar men and women promenading in enamelled
+bowling-greens. We get some idea of the magnificent fêtes of Louis
+XIV. at Versailles from the glowing descriptions of Molière.
+
+Dufoy in 1805 introduced "frizzled muslin into a slice of fairyland;"
+that is, he made extraordinary pictures of temples and trees, for the
+centre of his dessert. And these palaces and temples were said to have
+been of perfect proportions; his trees of frizzled muslin were
+admirable. It sounds very much like children's toys just now.
+
+He went further, Dufoy; having ransacked heaven and earth, air and
+water, he thrust his hand into the fire, and made harmless rockets
+shoot from his sugar temples. Sugar rocks were strewn about with
+precipices of nougat, glaciers of vanilla candy, and waterfalls of
+spun sugar. A confectioner in 1805 had to keep his wits about him, for
+after every victory of Napoleon he was expected to do the whole thing
+in sugar. He was decorator, painter, architect, sculptor, and
+florist--icer, yes, until after the Russian campaign, and then--they
+had had enough of ice. Thus we see that the dessert has always been
+more for the eye than for the stomach.
+
+The good things which have been said over the walnuts and the wine!
+The pretty books written about claret and olives! One author says that
+if all the good things which have been said about the gay and smiling
+dessert could be printed, it would make a pleasant anecdotic little
+pamphlet of four thousand odd pages!
+
+We must not forget all the absurdities of the dessert. The Prince
+Regent, whose tastes inclined to a vulgar and spurious Orientalism, at
+one of his costly feasts at Carleton House had a channel of real water
+running around the table, and in this swam gold and silver fish. The
+water was only let on at dessert.
+
+These fancies may be sometimes parodied in our own time, as the bonbon
+makers of Paris now devote their talents to the paper absurdities of
+harlequins, Turks, Chinamen, and all the vagaries of a fancy-dress
+ball with which the passengers of steamships amuse themselves after
+the Captain's dinner. This is not that legitimate dessert at which we
+now find ices disguised as natural fruits, or copying a rose. All the
+most beautiful forms in the world are now reproduced in the frozen
+water or cream, as healthful as it is delicious, in the famous jelly
+with maraschino, or the delicate bonbon with the priceless liqueur,
+or, better still, that _eau de menthe_ cordial, our own green
+peppermint, which, after all, saves as by one mouthful from the
+horrors of indigestion and adds that "thing more exquisite still" to
+the perfect dessert,--a good night's sleep.
+
+
+
+
+FAMOUS MENUS AND RECIPES.
+
+     Gather up the fragments that remain that nothing be lost.
+                                  JOHN vi. 12.
+
+
+This is not intended to be a cookery book; but in order to help the
+young housekeeper we shall give some hints as to _menus_ and a few
+rare recipes.
+
+The great line of seacoast from New York to Florida presents us with
+some unrivalled delicacies, and the negroes of the State of Maryland,
+which was founded by a rich and luxurious Lord Baltimore, knew how to
+cook the terrapin, the canvas-back duck, oysters, and the superb wild
+turkey,--not to speak of the well-fattened poultry of that rich and
+luxurious Lorraine of America, "Maryland, my Maryland," which Oliver
+Wendell Holmes calls the "gastronomical centre of the universe."
+
+Here is an old Virginia recipe for cooking terrapin, which is rare and
+excellent:--
+
+     Take three large, live, diamond-backed terrapin, plunge them
+     in boiling water for three minutes, to take off the skin, wipe
+     them clean, cook them in water slightly salted, drain them,
+     let them get cold, open and take out everything from the
+     shell. In removing the entrails care must be taken not to
+     break the gall. Cut off the head, tail, nails, gall, and
+     bladder. Cut the meat in even-size pieces, put them in a
+     sauce-pan with four ounces of butter, add the terrapin eggs,
+     and moisten them with a half pint of Madeira wine. Let the
+     mixture cook until the moisture is reduced one-half. Then add
+     two spoonfuls of cream sauce. After five minutes add the yolks
+     of four raw eggs diluted with a half-cup of cream. Season with
+     salt and a pinch of red pepper. The mixture should not boil
+     after the yolk of egg is added. Toss in two ounces of butter
+     before serving. The heat of the mess will cook egg and butter
+     enough. Serve with quartered lemon.
+
+This is, perhaps, if well-cooked, the most excellent of all American
+dishes.
+
+A chicken gumbo soup is next:--
+
+     Cut up one chicken, wash and dry it, dip it in flour, salt and
+     pepper it, then fry it in hot lard to a delicate brown.
+
+     In a soup kettle place five quarts of water and your chicken,
+     let it boil hard for two hours, cut up twenty-four okra pods,
+     add them to the soup, and boil the whole another hour. One
+     large onion should be put in with the chicken. Add red pepper
+     to taste, also salt, not too much, and serve with rice. Dried
+     okra can be used, but must be soaked over night.
+
+Another Maryland success was the tomato catsup:--
+
+     Boil one bushel of tomatoes until soft, squeeze through a
+     sieve, add to the juice half a gallon of vinegar, 1½ pints
+     salt, 3 ounces of whole cloves, 1 ounce of allspice, 2 ounces
+     of cayenne pepper, 3 tablespoonfuls of black pepper, 3 heads
+     of garlic, skinned and separated; boil three hours or until
+     the quantity is reduced one-half, bottle without skimming. The
+     spices should be put in a muslin bag, which must be taken out,
+     of course, before bottling. If desired 1 peck of onions can be
+     boiled, passed through a sieve, and the juice added to the
+     tomatoes.
+
+     _Green pepper pickles_: Half a pound of mustard seed soaked
+     over night, 1 quart of green pepper chopped, 2 quarts of
+     onions chopped, 4 quarts of cucumbers also chopped, 8 quarts
+     of green tomatoes chopped, 6 quarts of cabbage chopped; mix
+     and measure. To every gallon of this mixture add one teacup of
+     salt, let it stand until morning, then squeeze perfectly dry
+     with the hands. Then add 8 pounds of sugar, and cover with
+     good vinegar and boil five minutes. After boiling, and while
+     still hot, squeeze perfectly dry, then add 2 ounces of cloves,
+     2 ounces of allspice, 3 ounces of cinnamon and the mustard
+     seed.
+
+     The peppers should be soaked in brine thirty-six or
+     forty-eight hours. After soaking, wipe dry and stuff, place
+     them in glass jars, and cover with fresh vinegar.
+
+This was considered the triumph of the Southern housekeeper.
+
+     _Chicken with spaghetti_: Stir four sliced onions in two
+     ounces of butter till very soft, add one quart of peeled
+     tomatoes; stew chicken in water until tender, and pick to
+     pieces. Add enough of the gravy to make a quart, put with the
+     onions and tomatoes. Let it stew fifteen minutes gently. Put
+     into boiling water 2½ pounds of spaghetti and a handful of
+     salt, boil twenty minutes or until tender; drain this and put
+     in a layer on a platter sprinkled with grated cheese, and pour
+     the stew on it. Fill the platter with these layers, reserving
+     the best of the chicken to lay on top.
+
+The old negro cooks made a delicious confection known as confection
+cake. Those who lived to tell of having eaten it declared that it was
+a dream. It certainly leads to dreams, and bad ones, but it is worth a
+nightmare:--
+
+     1½ cups of sugar, 2½ cups of flour, ½ cup of butter, ½ cup of
+     sweet milk, whites of six eggs, 3 small teaspoons of baking
+     powder. Bake in two or three layers on a griddle.
+
+     _Filling_: 1 small cocoanut grated, 1 pound almonds blanched,
+     and cut up not too fine, 1 teacup of raisins chopped, 1 teacup
+     of citron chopped, 4 eggs, whites only, 7 tablespoonfuls of
+     pulverized sugar to each egg.
+
+Mix this destructive substance well in the froth of egg, and spread
+between the layers of cake when they are hot; set it a few minutes in
+the oven, but do not burn it, and you have a delicious and profoundly
+indigestible dessert. You will be able to write Sartor Resartus, after
+eating of it freely.
+
+     _Walnut Cake_: 1 cup of butter, 2 cups of sugar, 6 eggs, 4
+     cups of flour, 1 cup of milk, 2 teaspoonfuls of yeast powder.
+
+This is also baked in layers, and awaits the dynamite filling which is
+to blow you up:--
+
+     _Walnut Filling_: 2 cups of brown sugar, 1 cup of cream, a
+     piece of butter the size of an egg. Cook twenty minutes,
+     stirring all the time; when ready to take off the stove put in
+     one cup of walnut meats. After this has cooked a few minutes
+     longer, spread between the layers, and while both cake and
+     filling are hot.
+
+Perhaps a few _menus_ may be added here to assist the memory of her
+"who does not know what to have for dinner:"--
+
+                            Tomato Soup.
+     Golden Sherry.      Whitefish broiled.              Claret.
+                          Mashed potatoes.
+                       Round of beef _braisé_,          Madeira.
+                         with glazed onions.
+     Champagne.       Roast plover with cress.    Château Yquem.
+                           Chiccory Salad.
+                   Custard flavoured with vanilla.
+                               Cheese.                 Cordials.
+     Chambertin.               Fruit.
+                               Coffee.
+
+Or a plain dinner:--
+
+     Sherry.                Oxtail Soup.                 Claret.
+                 _Filet_ of lobster _à la Mazarin_.
+               Turkey rings with _purée_ of chestnuts.
+                      Salad of fresh tomatoes.
+         Cream tart with meringue.                Cheese.
+
+This last dinner is perhaps enough for only a small party, but it is
+very well composed. A much more elaborate _menu_ follows:--
+
+                      Oysters on the half-shell.
+                                Soup:
+                          _Consommé royale_.
+                                Fish:               Rudesheimer.
+                     Fried smelts, sauce Tartare,
+                          Duchess potatoes.
+     Sherry.                  _Releves_:
+                             Boned capon.
+                              Roast ham.              Champagne.
+     Madeira,                 _Entreés_:
+                        Sweetbreads _braisé_.
+                               Quails.                   Claret.
+                          _Sorbet au kirsch_.
+                                Game:
+     Port,                 Broiled woodcock,         Chambertin.
+                          Canvas-back duck.
+                             Vegetables:
+             Cauliflower,      Spinach,      French peas,
+                           Stewed tomatoes.       Château Yquem.
+                               Dessert:
+              Frozen pudding,      _Biscuits Diplomats_.
+              _Meringues Chantilly_,     Assorted Cake.
+                                Fruit.
+     Brandy.                   Coffee.                 Cordials.
+
+An excellent bill of fare for eight persons, in the month of October,
+is the following:--
+
+                                Soup.
+                         Bisque of crayfish.
+                                Fish.
+                    Baked smelts, _à la Mentone_,
+                   Potato balls, _à la Rouenaise_,
+            Ribs of beef braised, stewed with vegetables.
+                          Brussels sprouts.
+                   Roast birds, or quail on toast.
+                            Celery salad.
+
+To make a bisque of crayfish is a very delicate operation, but it is
+worth trying:--
+
+     Have three dozen live crayfish, wash them well, and take the
+     intestines out by pinching the extreme end of the centre fin,
+     when with a sudden jerk the gall can be withdrawn. Put in a
+     stewpan two ounces of butter, with a carrot, an onion, two
+     stalks of celery, two ounces of salted pork, all sliced fine,
+     and a bunch of parsley; fry ten minutes, add the crayfish,
+     with a pint of French white wine and a quart of veal broth.
+     Stir and boil gently for an hour, then drain all in a large
+     strainer, take out the bunch of parsley and save the broth;
+     pick the shells off the crayfish tails, trim them neatly and
+     keep until wanted. Cook separately a pint and a half of rice,
+     with three pints of veal broth, pound the rest of the crayfish
+     and vegetables, add the rice, pound again, dilute with the
+     broth of the crayfish, and add more veal broth if too thick.
+     Pass forcibly through a fine sieve with a wooden presser, put
+     the residue in a saucepan, warm without boiling, and stir all
+     the while with a wooden spoon. Finish with three ounces of
+     table butter, a glass of Madeira wine, and a pinch of cayenne
+     pepper; serve hot in soup tureen with the crayfish tails.
+
+     _To prepare baked smelts à la Mentone_: Spread in a large and
+     narrow baking-dish some fish forcemeat half an inch thick,
+     have two dozen large, fresh, well-cleaned smelts, lay them
+     down in a row on the forcemeat, season with salt, pepper, and
+     grated nutmeg, pour over a thick white Italian sauce, sprinkle
+     some bread crumbs on them, put a small pat of butter on each
+     one and bake for half an hour in a pretty hot oven, then
+     squeeze the juice of a lemon over and serve in a baking-dish.
+
+     _To make potato balls à la Rouenaise_: Boil the potatoes and
+     rub them fine, then roll each ball in white of egg, lay them
+     on a floured table, roll into shape of a pigeon's egg, dip
+     them in melted butter, and fry a light brown in clear hot
+     grease. Sprinkle fine salt over and serve in a folded napkin.
+
+     _To prepare braised ribs of beef_: Have a small set of three
+     ribs cut short, cook it as _beef à la mode_, that is, stew it
+     with spices and vegetables, dish it up with carrots, turnips,
+     and onions, pour the reduced gravy over.
+
+     _To prepare Brussels sprouts, demi-glacé_: Trim and wash the
+     sprouts, soak them in boiling salted water about thirty
+     minutes, cool them in cold water, and drain them. Put six
+     ounces of butter in a large frying-pan, melt it and put the
+     sprouts in it, season with salt and pepper, fry on a brisk
+     fire until thoroughly hot, serve in a dish with a rich
+     drawn-butter sauce with chopped parsley.
+
+A diplomatic supper was once served at the White House, of which the
+following _menu_ is an accurate report:--
+
+                       Salmon with green sauce.
+                   Cold boned turkey, with truffles.
+                      _Pâtés_ of game, truffled.
+                     Ham cooked in Madeira sauce.
+                          Aspic of chicken.
+                         _Pâté de foie gras._
+     Salads of chicken and lobster in forms, surrounded by jelly.
+         Pickled oysters.                      Sandwiches.
+                          Scalloped oysters.
+                           Stewed terrapin.
+                    Chicken and lobster croquettes.
+     _Chocolat à la crème._                               Coffee.
+                               Dessert:
+     Ices.             Fancy meringue baskets filled with cream.
+                    Pancakes.           Large cakes.
+             Fancy jellies.                Charlotte Russe.
+                               Fruits.
+     Cake.                     Wafers.                    Nougat.
+
+One could have satisfied an appetite with all this.
+
+General Grant was probably the most _fêted_ American who ever visited
+Europe. He was entertained by every monarch and by many most
+distinguished citizens. The Duke of Wellington opened the famous
+Waterloo Room in Apsley House in his honour, and toasted him as the
+first soldier of the age. But it is improbable that he ever had a
+better dinner than the following:--
+
+It was given to him in New York, in 1880, at the Hotel Brunswick. It
+was for ten people only, in a private parlour, arranged as a
+dining-room _en suite_ with the Venetian parlour. The room was in rich
+olive and bronze tints. The buffet glittered with crystal, and
+Venetian glass. On the side tables were arranged the coffee service
+and other accessories. The whole room was filled with flowers, the
+chandelier hung with smilax, dotted with carnations. The table was
+arranged with roses, heliotrope, and carnations, the deep purple and
+green grapes hanging over gold dishes. The dinner service was of white
+porcelain with heliotrope border, the glass of iridescent crystal. The
+furnishing of the Venetian parlour, the rich carvings, the suits of
+armour, the antique chairs were all mediæval; the dinner was modern
+and American:--
+
+                               Oysters.
+                       Soup, _Consommé Royale_.
+                                Fish:
+                     Fried smelts, sauce Tartare.
+                              _Releves_:
+                             Boned capon.
+                              _Entrées_:
+         Sweetbreads, _braisé_,      Quails, _à la Perigord_.
+                         _Sorbet au kirsch_.
+                                Game.
+               Broiled woodcock,      Canvas-back duck.
+                              Terrapin.
+                             Vegetables:
+     Cauliflower,      Spinach,      Artichokes,      French peas.
+                               Dessert:
+            _Biscuits Diplomatiques_,      Frozen pudding,
+              _Meringue Chantilly_,      Assorted cakes.
+                   Fruit.      Coffee.      Cigars.
+                              Liqueurs.
+
+Probably the last item interested and amused the General, who was no
+_gourmet_, much more than even the terrapin.
+
+This _menu_ for a November dinner cannot be surpassed.
+
+
+
+
+COOKERY AND WINES OF THE SOUTH OF EUROPE.
+
+     Aufidius for his morning beverage used
+     Honey in strong Falernian wine infused;
+     But here methinks he showed his want of brains:
+     Drink less austere best suits the empty veins.
+
+            *       *       *       *       *
+
+     Shell fish afford a lubricating slime!
+     But then you must observe both place and time.
+     They're caught the finest when the moon is new;
+     The Lucrine far excel the Baian too.
+     Misenum shines in cray fish; Circe most
+     In oysters; scollops let Tarentum boast.
+     The culinary critic first should learn
+     Each nicer shade of flavour to discern:
+     To sweep the fish stalls is mere show at best
+
+            *       *       *       *       *
+
+     Unless you know how each thing should be drest.
+     Let boars of Umbrian game replete with mast,
+     If game delights you, crown the rich repast.
+                               SATIRES OF HORACE.
+
+
+Italian cookery is excellent at its best. The same drift of talent,
+the same due sense of proportion which showed itself in all their art,
+which built St. Mark's and the Duomo, the Ducal Palace, the Rialto,
+and the churches of Palladio, comes out in their cookery. Their cooks
+are Michel Angelo and Leonardo da Vinci in a humbler sphere.
+
+They mingle cheese in cookery, with great effect; nothing can be
+better than their cauliflower covered with Parmesan cheese, and
+baked. Macaroni in all its forms is of course admirable. They have
+mastered the use of sweet oil, which in their cookery never tastes
+oily; it is simply a lambent richness.
+
+The great dish, wild boar, treated with a sweet and a sour sauce, with
+pine cones, is an excellent dish. Wild boar is a lean pork with a game
+flavour. All sorts of birds, especially _becafico_, are well cooked,
+they lose no juice or flavour over the fire.
+
+They make a dozen preparations of Indian meal, which are very good for
+breakfast. One little round cake, like a muffin, tastes almost of
+cocoanut; this is fried in oil, and is most delicious.
+
+The _frittala_ is another well-known dish, and is composed of liver,
+bacon, and birds, all pinned on a long stick, or iron pin.
+
+In an Italian palace, if you have the good luck to be asked, the
+dinner is handsome. It is served in twelve courses in the Russian
+manner, and if national dishes are offered they are disguised as
+inelegant. But at an ordinary farmhouse in the hills near Florence, or
+at the ordinary hotels, there will be a good soup, trout fresh from
+the brooks, fresh butter, macaroni with cheese, a fat capon, and a
+delicious omelette, enriched with morsels of kidney or fat bacon, a
+_frittala_, a bunch of grapes, a bottle of Pogio secco, or the sweet
+Italian straw wine.
+
+The Italians are very frugal, and would consider the luxurious
+overflow of American munificent hospitality as vulgar. At parties in
+Rome, Naples, and Florence it is not considered proper to offer much
+refreshment. At Mr. Story's delightful receptions American hospitality
+reigned at afternoon tea, as it did in all houses where the hostess
+was American, but at the houses of the Princes nothing was offered but
+weak wine and water and little cakes.
+
+Many travellers have urged that the cookery of the common Italian
+dinner is too much flavoured with garlic, but in a winter spent in
+travelling through Italy I did not find it so. I remember a certain
+leg of lamb with beans which had a slight taste of onions, but that is
+all. They have learned, as the French have, that the onion is to
+cookery what accent is to speech. It should not be _trop prononcée_.
+The lamb and pistachio nuts of the Arabian Nights is often served and
+is delicious.
+
+They give you in an Italian country house for breakfast, at twelve
+o'clock, a sort of thick soup, very savoury, probably made of chicken
+with an herb like okra, one dish of meat smothered in beans or
+tomatoes, followed by a huge dish of macaroni with cheese, or with
+morsels of ham through it. Then a white curd with powdered cinnamon,
+sugar, and wine, a bottle of _vino santo_, a cup of coffee or
+chocolate, and bread of phenomenal whiteness and lightness.
+
+Alas, for the poor people! They live on the chestnuts, the frogs, or
+nothing. The porter at the door of some great house is seen eating a
+dish of frogs, which are, however, so well cooked that they send up an
+appetizing fragrance more like a stew of crabs than anything else. One
+sees sometimes a massive ancient house, towering up in mediæval
+grandeur, with shafts of marble, and columns of porphyry, lonely,
+desolate, and beautiful, infinitely impressive, infinitely grand. Some
+member of a once illustrious family lives within these ruined walls,
+on almost nothing. He would have to kill his pet falcon to give you a
+dinner, while around his time-honoured house cluster his tenants
+shaking with malaria,--pale, unhappy, starved people. It is not a
+cheerful sight, but it can be seen in southern Italy.
+
+The prosperous Italians will give you a well-cooked meal, an immense
+quantity of bonbons, and the most exquisite candied fruits. Their
+_confetti_ are wonderful, their cakes and ices, their candied fruit,
+their _tutti frutti_, are beyond all others. They crown every feast
+with a Paradise in spun sugar.
+
+But they despise and fear a fire, and foreigners are apt to find the
+old Italian palaces dreary, and very cold. A recent traveller writes
+from Florence: "I have been within the walls of five Italian houses at
+evening parties, at three of them, music and no conversation; all
+except one held in cold rooms, the floors black, imperfectly covered
+with drugget, and no fire; conversation, to me at least, very dull;
+the topics, music, personal slander,--for religion, government, and
+literature, were generally excluded from polite society. In only one
+house, of which the mistress was a German, was tea handed around;
+sometimes not even a cup of water was passed." We learn from the
+novels of Marion Crawford that the Italians do not often eat in each
+others' houses.
+
+Victor Emmanuel, the mighty hunter, had a mighty appetite. He used to
+dine alone, before the hour for the State dinner. Then with sword in
+hand, leaning on its jewelled hilt, in full uniform, his breast
+covered with orders, the King sat at the head of his table, and talked
+with his guests while the really splendid dinner was served.
+
+Royal banquets are said to be dull. The presence of a man so much
+above the others in rank has a depressing effect. The guest must
+console himself with the glorious past of Italy, and fix his eyes on
+the magnificent furniture of the table, the cups of Benvenuto Cellini,
+the vases of Capo di Monti, the superb porcelain, and the Venetian
+glass, or he must devote himself to the lamb and pistachio nuts, the
+_choux fleurs aux Parmesan_, or the truffles, which are nowhere so
+large or so fine as at an Italian dinner. Near Rome they are rooted
+out of the oak forests by the king's dogs, and are large and full of
+flavour.
+
+King Humbert has inherited his father's taste for hunting, and sends
+presents of the game he has shot to his courtiers.
+
+The housekeeping at the Quirinal is excellent; a royal supper at a
+royal ball is something to remember. And what wines to wash them down
+with!--the delicious Lacryma Christi, the Falerno or Capri, the
+Chianti, the Sestio Levante or Asti. Asti is a green wine, rich,
+strong, and sweet. It makes people ill if they drink it before it is
+quite old enough--but perhaps it is not often served at royal
+banquets.
+
+Verdeaux was a favourite wine of Frederic the Great, but Victor
+Emmanuel's wine was the luscious _Monte Pulciano_.
+
+     "Monte Pulciano d'ogni vino e il Re."
+
+The brilliant purple colour, like an amethyst, of this noble wine is
+unlike any other. The aromatic odour is delicious; its sweetness is
+tempered by an agreeable sharpness and astringency; it leaves a
+flattering flavour on the tongue.
+
+These best Italian wines have a deliciousness which eludes analysis,
+like the famous Monte Beni, which old Tommaso produced in a small
+straw-covered flask at the visit of Kenyon to Donatello. This
+invaluable wine was of a pale golden hue, like other of the rarest
+Italian wines, and if carelessly and irreligiously quaffed, might have
+been mistaken for a sort of champagne. It was not, however, an
+effervescing wine, although its delicate piquancy produced a somewhat
+similar effect upon the palate. Sipping, the guest longed to sip
+again, but the wine demanded so deliberate a pause in order to detect
+the hidden peculiarities, and subtile exquisiteness of its flavour,
+that to drink it was more a moral than a physical delight. There was a
+deliciousness in it which eluded description, and like whatever else
+that is superlatively good was perhaps better appreciated by the
+memory than by present consciousness. One of its most ethereal charms
+lay in the transitory life of the wine's richest qualities; for while
+it required a certain leisure and delay, yet if you lingered too long
+in the draught, it became disenchanted both of its fragrance and
+flavour. The lustre and colour should not be forgotten among the other
+good qualities of the Monte Beni wine, for "as it stood in Kenyon's
+glass, a little circle of light glowed on the table around about it as
+if it were really so much golden sunshine."
+
+There are few wines worthy of this beautiful eloquence of Hawthorne.
+The description bears transportation; the wine did not. The
+transportation of even a few miles turned it sour. That is the trouble
+with Italian wines. Monte Pulciano and Chianti do bear transportation.
+Italy sends much of the latter wine to New York. Italy has, however,
+never produced a really good dry wine, with all its vineyards.
+
+The dark Grignolino wine grown in the vineyards of Asterau and
+Monferrato possesses the remarkable quality of keeping better if
+diluted with fresh water.
+
+The Falernian from the Bay of Naples, is the wine of the poets, nor
+need we remind the classical scholar that the hills around Rome were
+formerly supposed to produce it.
+
+The loose, volcanic soil about Mount Vesuvius grows the grapes from
+which Lacryma Christi is produced. It is sometimes of a rich red
+colour, though white and sparkling varieties are produced.
+
+The Italians are supremely fond of _al fresco_ entertainments,--their
+fine climate making out-of-door eating very agreeable. How many a
+traveller remembers the breakfast or dinner in a vine-covered _loggia_
+overhanging some splendid scene! It forms the subject of many a
+picture, from those which illustrate the stories of Boccaccio up to
+the beautiful sketch of Tasso, at the court of the Duc d'Este. The
+dangers of these feasts have been immortalized in verse and prose from
+Dante down, and Shakspeare has touched upon them twice. George Eliot
+describes one in a "_loggia_ joining on a garden, with all one side of
+the room open, and with numerous groups of trees and statues and
+avenues of box, high enough to hide an assassin," in her wonderful
+novel of Romola. In modern days, since the Borgias are all killed, no
+one need fear to eat out-of-doors in Italy.
+
+Not much can be said of the cookery of Spain. In the principal hotels
+of Spain one gets all the evils of both Spanish and Gascon cookery.
+Garlic is the favourite flavour, and the bad oil expressed from the
+olive, skin, seed and all, allowed to stand until it is rancid, is
+beloved of the Spanish, but hated by all other nations. I believe,
+however, that an _olla podrida_ made in a Spanish house is very good.
+It may not be inappropriate here to give two recipes for macaroni. The
+first, _macaroni au gratin_ is very rarely found good in an
+American house:--
+
+     Break two ounces of best Italian macaroni into a pint of
+     highly seasoned stock, let it simmer until very tender. When
+     done, toss it up with a small piece of butter, and add pepper
+     and salt to taste; put in a large meat dish, sift over it some
+     fried bread-crumbs, and serve. It will take about an hour to
+     cook, and should be covered with the stock all the time.
+
+            *       *       *       *       *
+
+     _Macaroni with Parmesan cheese_: Boil two ounces of macaroni
+     in half a pint of water, with an ounce of butter, until
+     perfectly tender. If the water evaporates add a little more,
+     taking care that the macaroni does not stick to the stewpan,
+     or become broken. When it is done, drain away the water and
+     stir in two ounces of good cheese grated, cayenne pepper and
+     salt to taste. Keep stirring until the cheese is dissolved.
+     Pour on to a hot dish and serve. A little butter may be
+     stirred into the macaroni before the cheese, and is an
+     improvement.
+
+Through the Riviera, and indeed in the south of France, one meets with
+many peculiar dishes. No one who has read Thackeray need be reminded
+of _bouillabaise_, that famous fish chowder of Marseilles. It is,
+however, only our chowder with much red pepper. A cook can try it if
+she chooses, and perhaps achieve it after many failures.
+
+There are so many very good dishes awaiting the efforts of a young
+American housewife, that she need not go out of her way to extemporize
+or explore. The best cook-book for foreign dishes is still the old
+Francatelli.
+
+The presence in our midst of Italian warehouses, adds an infinite
+resource to the housewife. Those stimulants to the appetite called
+_hors d'oeuvres_, we call them relishes, are much increased by
+studying the list of Italian delicacies. Anchovy or caviar, potted
+meat, grated tongue, potted cheese, herring salad, the inevitable
+olive, and many other delicacies could be mentioned which aid
+digestion, and make the plainest table inexpensively luxurious. The
+Italians have all sorts of delicate vegetables preserved in bottles,
+mixed and ready for use in a _jardinière_ dressing; also the best of
+cheeses, _gargonzala_, and of course the truffle, which they know how
+to cook so well.
+
+The Italians have conquered the art of cooking in oil, so that you do
+not taste the oil. It is something to live for, to eat their fried
+things.
+
+Speaking of the south of Europe reminds us of that wonderful bit of
+orientalism out of place, which is called Algiers, and which France
+has enamelled on her fabulous and many-coloured shield. Algiers has
+become not only a winter watering-place, high in favour with the
+traveller, but it is a great wine-growing country. The official
+statement of Lieut. Col. Sir R. L. Playfair, her Majesty's
+consul-general, may be read with interest, dated 1889:
+
+"Viticulture in Algeria, was in 1778 in its infancy; now nearly one
+hundred and twenty-five thousand acres are under cultivation with
+vines, and during the last year about nine hundred thousand
+hectolitres of wine were produced. In 1873 Mr. Eyre Ledyard, an
+English cultivator of the vine in Algeria, bought the property of
+Chateau Hydra near Algiers. He found on it five acres of old and badly
+planted vineyards, which produced about seven hogsheads of wine. He
+has extended this vineyard and carried on his work with great
+intelligence and industry. He cultivates the following varieties: the
+Mourvedie, of a red colour resembling Burgundy, Cariguan, giving a
+wine good, dark, and rough, Alicante or Grenache, Petit Bouschet,
+Cabernot and Côt, a Burgundy, Perian Lyra, Aramen, and St. Saux.
+
+Chasselas succeeds well; the grapes are exported to France for the
+table.
+
+Clairette produces abundantly and makes a good dry wine. Ainin Kelb,
+more correctly Ain Kelb, dog's-eye, is an Arab grape which makes a
+good strong wine, but which requires keeping. Muscat is a capricious
+bearer. From the two last-named varieties, sweet as well as dry wines
+are produced by adding large quantities of alcohol to the juice of the
+grape, and thus preventing fermentation. The crops yield quantities
+varying from seven hundred gallons per acre in rich land to four
+hundred on the hillside, except Cariguan which yields more. Aramen
+yields as much, but the quality is inferior.
+
+The red wines are sent to Bordeaux and Burgundy, to give strength and
+quality to the French clarets, as they are very useful for blending.
+The dry, white wine is rather stronger and fuller than that of France
+or Germany, and is much used to give additional value to the thinner
+qualities of Rhine wine.
+
+The cellars of Château Hydra, are now probably the best in the colony.
+They are excavated in the soft rock here incorrectly called tufa, in
+reality an aggregation of minutely pulverized shells; it is soft and
+sandy, and easily excavated. The surface becomes harder by exposure to
+the atmosphere, and it is not subject to crumbling.
+
+Mr. Ledyard has excavated extensive cells in this rock, in which
+extreme evenness of temperature is ensured,--a condition most
+necessary for the proper manufacture of wine.
+
+Mr. Eyre Ledyard's vineyards and cellars of the Chateau Hydra estate
+are now farmed by the _Société Anonyme Viticole et Vinicole d'Hydra_,
+of which Mr. Ledyard is chairman. These wines have been so
+successfully shipped to England and other countries that the company
+now buys grapes largely from the best vineyards, in order to make
+sufficient wines to meet the demand. The Hydra Company supplies wine
+to all vessels of the Ocean Company going to India and China. A very
+carefully prepared quinine white wine is made for invalids, and for
+use in countries where there is fever. I especially recommend a trial
+of this last excellent wine to Americans, as it is most agreeable as
+well as healthful. The postal address is M. Le Gerant, Hydra Caves,
+Birmandreis, Algiers.
+
+All the stories of Algiers read like tales of the Arabian Nights, and
+none is more poetic than the names and the story of these delicious
+wines.
+
+The Greek wines are well spoken of in Europe: Santorin, and Zante, and
+St. Elié, and Corinth, and Mount Hymettus, Vino Santo, and Cyprus,
+while from Magyar vineyards come Visontaè, Badescony, Dioszeg,
+Bakator, Rust, Szamorodni, Oedenburger, Ofner, and Tokay.
+
+The Hungarian wines are very heady. He must be a swashbuckler who
+drinks them. They are said to make the drinker grow fat. To this
+unhappy class Brillat Savarin gives the following precepts:--
+
+"Drink every summer thirty bottles of seltzer water, a large tumbler
+the first thing in the morning, another before lunch, and the same at
+bedtime.
+
+"Drink white wines, especially those which are light and acid, and
+avoid beer as you would the plague. Ask frequently for radishes,
+artichokes with hot sauce, asparagus, celery; choose veal and fowl
+rather than beef and mutton, and eat as little of the crumb of bread
+as possible.
+
+"Avoid macaroni and pea soup, avoid farinaceous food under whatever
+form it assumes, and dispense with all sweets. At breakfast take brown
+bread, and chocolate rather than coffee."
+
+Indeed Brillat Savarin seems to have inspired this later poet:--
+
+     "Talk of the nectar that flowed for celestials
+     Richer in headaches it was than hilarity!
+     Well for us animals, frequently bestials,
+     Hebe destroyed the recipe as a charity!
+     Once I could empty my glass with the best of 'em,
+     Somehow my system has suffered a shock o' late;
+     Now I shun spirits, wine, beer, and the rest of 'em,
+     Fill me, then fill me, a bumper of chocolate.
+
+     "Once I drank logwood, and quassia and turpentine,
+     Liqueurs with coxcubes, aloes, and gentian in,
+     Sure, 't is no wonder my path became serpentine,
+     Getting a state I should blush now to mention in.
+     Farewell to Burgundy, farewell to Sillery,
+     I have not tasted a drop e'en of Hock o' late,
+     Long live the kettle, my dear old distillery,
+     Fill me, oh fill me, a bumper of chocolate."
+
+As we cannot all drink chocolate, I recommend the carefully prepared
+white wine, with quinine in it, which comes from Chateau Hydra in
+Algiers, or some of the Italian wines, Barolo for instance, or the
+excellent native wines which are produced in Savoy.
+
+About Aix les Bains, where the cuisine is the best in Europe, many
+wines are manufactured which are honest wines with no headaches in
+them.
+
+
+
+
+SOME ODDITIES IN THE ART OF ENTERTAINING.
+
+"Comparisons are odorous."
+
+     I prithee let me bring thee where crabs grow;
+       And I with my long nails will dig thee pig nuts;
+     Show thee a jay's nest, and instruct thee how
+       To snare the nimble marmozet; I'll bring thee
+     To clustering filberds, and sometimes I'll get thee
+       Young staniels from the rocks. Wilt thou go with me?
+                                            THE TEMPEST.
+
+
+In the lamb roasted whole we have one of the earliest dishes on record
+in the history of cookery. Stuffed with pistachio nuts, and served
+with pilaf, it illustrates the antiquity of the art, and at the same
+time gives an example of the food upon which millions of our fellow
+creatures are sustained.
+
+At a dinner of the Acclimatization Society in London, all manner of
+strange and new dishes were offered, even the meat of the horse. A
+roast monkey filled with chestnuts was declared to be delicious; the
+fawn of fallow deer was described as good; buffalo meat was not so
+highly commended; a red-deer ham was considered very succulent; a
+sirloin of bear was "tough, glutinous, and had, besides, a dreadful,
+half-aromatic, half-putrescent flavour, as though it had been rubbed
+with assafoetida and then hung for a month in a musk shop."
+
+We will not try bear unless we are put to it. However, at this same
+dinner--we read on--haunch of venison, saddle of mutton, roast beef of
+old England, which is really the roast beef which is of old Normandy
+now, all gave way to a Chinese lamb roasted whole, stuffed with
+pistachio nuts, and served with _consousson_, a preparation of wheat
+used among the Moors, Africans, and other natives of the north of
+Africa littoral, in place of rice. The Moorish young ladies are, it is
+said, fattened into beauty by an enforced meal of this strengthening
+compound. The _consousson_ is made into balls and stuffed into the
+mouths of the marriageable young lady, until she grows as tired of
+balls as a young belle of three seasons.
+
+In Spain, in those damp swamps near Valencia, where the poor are old
+before forty and die before forty-five, the best rice sells at eleven
+farthings, the poorest at eight farthings per pound. This, cooked with
+the ground dust of _pimientos_, or capsicums, is the foundation of
+every stew in the south of Spain. It is of a rich brick-dust hue, and
+is full of fire and flavour. Into this stew the cook puts the
+"reptiles of the sea" known as "spotted cats," "toads" and other oily
+fish, sold at two pence a pound, or the _vogar_, a silvery fish, or
+the _gallina_, a coarse fish, chick peas, garlic, pork, and sausages.
+If rich she will make an _olla podrida_ with bacon, fresh meat,
+potatoes, cabbages, and she will pour off the soup, calling it
+_caldo_, then the lumps of meat and bacon, called _cocida_, will be
+served next. Then the cigarette is smoked. If you are a king she will
+add a quince and an apple to the stew.
+
+Of puddings and pies they know nothing; but what fruit they
+have!--watermelons weighing fifteen pounds apiece; lemon pippins
+called _perillons_; crimson, yellow, and purple plums; purple and
+green figs; tomatoes by the million; carob beans, on which half the
+nation lives; small cucumbers and gourds; large black grapes, very
+sweet; white grapes and quinces; peaches in abundance; and all the
+chestnuts and filberts in the world. In the summer they eat goat's
+flesh; and on All Saints' Day they eat pork and chestnuts and sweet
+_babatas_ of Malaga. In exile, in Mexico and Florida, the Spaniard
+eats alligator, which could scarcely be called a game bird; but the
+flesh of young alligators' tails is very fair, and tastes like chicken
+if the tail is cut off immediately after death, and stewed.
+
+The frost fish of the Adirondacks is seldom tasted, except by those
+who have spent a winter in the North Woods. They are delicious when
+fried. There is a European fish as little known as this, the _Marena_,
+caught in Lake Moris in the province of Pomerania, also in one lake in
+southern Italy, which is very good.
+
+There are two birds known in Prussia, the bustard, and the kammel, the
+former a species of small ostrich, once considered very fine eating,
+the latter very tough, except under unusual conditions.
+
+The Chinese enjoy themselves by night. All their feasts and festivals
+are kept then, generally by moonlight. When a Chinaman is poor he can
+live on a farthing's worth of rice a day; when he gets rich he becomes
+the most luxurious of sybarites, indulges freely in the most
+_recherché_ delicacies of the table, and becomes, like any Roman
+voluptuary, corpulent and phlegmatic. A lady thus describes a Chinese
+dinner:--
+
+"The hour was eleven A. M., the _locale_ a boat. Having heard much of
+the obnoxious stuff I was to eat, I adopted the prescription of a
+friend. 'Eat very little of any dish, and be a long time about it.'
+
+"We commenced with tea, and finished with soup. Some of the
+intermediate dishes were shark's-fin; birds' nests brought from
+Borneo, costing nearly a guinea a mouthful, fricassee of poodle, a
+little dog almost a pig; the fish of the conch-shell, a substance like
+wax or india rubber, which you might masticate but never mash;
+peacock's liver, very fine and _recherché_; putrid eggs, nevertheless
+very good; rice, of course, salted shrimps, baked almonds, cabbage in
+a variety of forms, green ginger, stewed fungi, fresh fish of a dozen
+kinds, onions _ad libitum_, salt duck cured like ham, and pig in every
+form, roast, boiled, and fried, Foo-Chow ham which seemed to me equal
+to Wiltshire. In fact, the Chinese excel in pork, though the English
+there never touch it, under the supposition that the pigs are fed on
+little babies.
+
+"But this is a libel. Of course a pig would eat a baby, as it would a
+rattlesnake if it came across one; but the Chinese are very particular
+about their swine and keep them penned up, rivalling the Dutch in
+their scrubbing and washing. They grow whole fields of taro and herbs
+for their pigs. And I do not believe that one porker in a million ever
+tastes a baby."
+
+This traveller's sympathies appear to be with the pig.
+
+"About two o'clock we arose from the table, walked about, looked out
+of the window. Large brass bowls were brought with water and towels.
+Each one proceeded to perform ablutions, the Chinese washing their
+heads; after which refreshing operation we resumed our seats and
+re-commenced with another description of tea.
+
+"Seven different sorts of Samchou we partook of, made from rice, from
+peas, from mangoes, cocoa-nut, all fermented liquors, and the mystery
+remained,--I was not inebriated. The Samchou was drunk warm in tiny
+cups, during the whole course of the dinner.
+
+"The whole was cooked without salt and tasted very insipid to me. The
+bird's-nest seemed like glue or isinglass, but the coxcombs were
+palatable. The dog-meat was like some very delicate gizzards
+well-stewed, and of a short, close fibre. The dish which I most
+fancied turned out to be rat. Upon taking a second help, after the
+first taste I got the head, which made me rather sick; but I consoled
+myself that when in California we ate ground squirrels which are first
+cousins to the flat-tailed rats; and travellers who would know the
+world must go in for manners and customs. We had tortoise and
+frogs,--a curry of the latter was superior to chicken; we had fowls'
+hearts, and the brains of some birds, snipe, I think. We had a
+chow-chow of mangoes, rambustan preserved, salted cucumber, sweet
+potatoes, yams, taro, all sorts of sweets made of rice sugar, and
+cocoa-nuts; and the soup which terminated the entertainment was
+certainly boiled tripe or some other internal arrangement; and I
+wished I had halted some little time before. The whole was eaten with
+chop-sticks or a spoon like a small spade or shovel. The sticks are
+made into a kind of fork, being held crosswise between the fingers. It
+is not the custom for the sexes to meet at meals; I dined with the
+ladies."
+
+This dinner has one suggestion for our hostesses,--it was in a boat,
+on a river, by torchlight. We can, however, give a better one on a
+yacht at Newport, or at New London, or down on the Florida coast; but
+it would be a pretty fancy to give it on our river. It is curious to
+see what varieties there are in the art of entertaining; and it is
+useful to remember, when in Florida, "that alligators' tails are as
+good, when stewed, as chicken."
+
+The eating of the past included, under the Romans, the ass, the dog,
+the snail, hedge-hogs, oysters, asparagus, venison, wild-boar,
+sea-nettles. In England, in 1272, the hostess offered strange dishes:
+mallards, herons, swans, crane, and peacock. The peacock was, of old,
+a right royal bird which figured splendidly at the banquets of the
+great, and this is how the mediæval cooks dished up the dainty:--
+
+"Flay off the skin, with the feathers, tail, neck, and head thereon.
+Then take the skin and all the feathers and lay it on the table,
+strewing thereon ground cumin; then take the peacock and roast him,
+and baste him with raw yolks of eggs, and when he is roasted take him
+off and let him cool awhile. Then sew him in his skin, and gild his
+comb, and so send him forth for the last course."
+
+Our Saxon ancestors were very fond, like the Spaniards, of putting
+everything into the same pot; and we read of stews that make the blood
+boil. Travellers tell us of dining with the Esquimaux, on a field of
+ice, when tallow candles were considered delicious, or they found
+their plates loaded with liver of the walrus. They vary their dinners
+by helping themselves to a lump of whale-meat, red and coarse and
+rancid, but very toothsome to an Esquimau, notwithstanding.
+
+If they should sit down to a Greenlander's table they would find it
+groaning under a dish of half-putrid whale's tail, which has been
+lauded as a savoury matter, not unlike cream cheese; and the liver of
+a porpoise makes the mouth water. They may finish their repast with a
+slice of reindeer, or roasted rat, and drink to their host in a bumper
+of train oil.
+
+In South America the tongue of a sea-lion is esteemed a great
+delicacy. Fashion in Siam prescribes a curry of ants' eggs as
+necessary to every well-ordered banquet. The eggs are not larger than
+grains of pepper, and to an unaccustomed palate have no particular
+flavour. Besides being curried, they are brought to table rolled in
+green leaves mingled with shreds or very fine slices of pork.
+
+The Mexicans make a species of bread of the eggs of insects which
+frequent the fresh water of the lagoons. The natives cultivate in the
+lagoon of Chalco a sort of carex called _tonte_, on which the insects
+deposit their eggs very freely. This carex is made into bundles and is
+soon covered. The eggs are disengaged, beaten, dried, and pounded into
+flour.
+
+Penguins' eggs, cormorants' eggs, gulls' eggs, the eggs of the
+albatross, turtles' eggs are all made subservient to the table. The
+mother turtle deposits her eggs, about a hundred at a time, in the dry
+sand, and leaves them to be hatched by the genial sun. The Indian
+tribes who live on the banks of the Orinoco procure from them a sweet
+and limpid oil which is their substitute for butter. Lizards' eggs are
+regarded as a _bonne bouche_ in the South Sea Islands, and the eggs of
+the _guana_, a species of lizard, are much favoured by West Indians.
+Alligators' eggs are eaten in the Antilles and resemble hens' eggs in
+size and shape.
+
+We have spoken of horse-flesh as introduced at the dinner of the
+Acclimatization Society, but it is hardly known that the Frenchmen
+have tried to make it as common as beef. Isidore St. Helain says of
+it, that it has long been regarded as of a sweetish, disagreeable
+taste, very tough, and not to be eaten without difficulty; but so
+many different facts are opposed to this prejudice that it is
+impossible not to perceive the slightness of the foundation. The free
+or wild horse is hunted as game in all parts of the world where it
+exists,--Asia, Africa, and America, and perhaps even now in Europe.
+The domestic horse is itself made use of for alimentary purposes in
+all those countries.
+
+"Its flesh is relished by races the most diverse,--Negro, Mongol,
+Malay, American, Caucasian. It was much esteemed until the eighth
+century amongst the ancestors of some of the greatest nations of
+Western Europe, who had it in general use and gave it up with regret.
+Soldiers to whom it has been served out and people who have bought it
+in markets, have taken it for beef; and many people buy it daily in
+Paris for venison."
+
+During the commune many people were glad enough to get horse-flesh for
+the roast.
+
+Locusts are eaten by many tribes of North American Indians, and there
+is no reason why they should not be very good. The bushmen of Africa
+rejoice in roasting spiders; maggots tickle the palates of the
+Australian aborigines; and the Chinese feast on the chrysalis of a
+silk-worm.
+
+If this is what they ate, what then did they drink? No thin potations,
+no half-filled cups for the early English. Wine-bibbers and
+beer-bibbers, three-bottle men they were down to one hundred years
+ago. Provocatives of drink were called "shoeing horses," "whetters,"
+"drawers off and pullers on."
+
+Massinger puts forth a curious test of these provocatives:--
+
+                             "I asked
+     Such an unexpected dainty bit for breakfast
+     As never yet I cooked; 'tis red _botargo_,
+     Fried frogs, potatoes marroned, _cavear_,
+     Carps' tongues, the pith of an English chine of beef,
+     Now one Italian delicate wild mushroom,
+     And yet a drawer on too; and if you show not
+     An appetite, and a strong one, I'll not say
+     To eat it, but devour it, without grace too,
+     For it will not stay a preface. I am shamed,
+     And all my past provocatives will be jeered at."
+
+Ben Jonson affords us many a glimpse of the drinking habits of all
+classes in his day.
+
+After the Restoration, England seems to have abandoned herself to one
+great saturnalia, and men drank deeply, from the king down. The novels
+of Fielding and Smollett are full of the wildest debauchery and
+drunken extravagance. Statesmen drank deep at their councils, ladies
+drank in their boudoirs, the criminal on his way to Tyburn stopped to
+drink a parting glass. Hogarth in his wonderful pictures has held the
+mirror up to society to show how general was the shame, how terrible
+the curse.
+
+In Germany the _Baierisch bier_, drunk out of _biergläschen_
+ornamented as they are with engraved wreaths, "_Zum Andenken_," "_Aus
+Freundschaft_," and other little bits of national harmless sentiment,
+has come down from the remotest antiquity, and has never failed to
+provoke quiet and decorous, if sleepy hilarity.
+
+We are afraid that the "Dew of Ben Nevis" is not so peaceful, nor the
+juice of the juniper, nor New England rum, nor the _aquadiente_ of the
+Mexican, nor the _vodka_ of the Russian. All these have the most
+terrible wild madness in them. To the honour of civilization, it is no
+longer the fashion to drink to excess. The vice of drunkenness rarely
+meets the eye of a refined woman; and let us hope that less and less
+may it be the bane of society, the disgrace of the art of
+entertaining.
+
+
+
+
+THE SERVANT QUESTION.
+
+                                         Verily
+     I swear, 't is better to be lowly born,
+     And range with humble livers in content,
+     Than to be perked up in a glistering grief
+     And wear a golden sorrow.
+                                    HENRY VIII.
+
+
+It is impossible to do much with the art of entertaining without
+servants, and where shall we get them? In a country village, not two
+hundred miles from New York, I have seen well-to-do citizens going to
+a little restaurant in the main street for their dinners during an
+entire summer, because they could not get women to stay in their
+houses as servants. They are willing to pay high wages, they are
+generous livers, but such a thing as domestic service is out of the
+question. If any lady comes from the city bringing two or three maids,
+they are of far more interest in the village than their mistress, and
+are besieged, waited upon, intrigued with, to leave their place, to
+come and serve the village lady.
+
+What is the reason? The American farmer's daughter will not go out to
+service, will not be called a servant, will not work in another
+person's house as she will in her own. The Irish maid prefers the
+town, and dislikes the country, where there is no Catholic church.
+Such a story repeated all over the land is the story of American
+service.
+
+We have, however, every day, ships arriving in New York harbour which
+pour out on our shores the poor of all nations. The men seem to take
+readily enough to any sort of work. Italians shovel snow and work on
+railroads, but their wives and daughters make poor domestic servants.
+
+The best that we can get are the Irish who have been long in the
+country. Then come the Germans, who now outnumber the Irish. French,
+Swedes, Danes, Norwegians, all come in shoals.
+
+Of all these the French are by far the best. Of course, as cooks they
+are unrivalled; as butler, waiter, footman, a well-trained French
+serving-man is the very best. He is neat, economical, and respectful.
+He knows his value and he is very expensive. But if you can afford
+him, take him and keep him.
+
+French maids are admirable as seamstresses, and in all the best and
+highest walks of domestic service, but they are difficult as to the
+other servants. They make trouble about their food; they do not tell
+the truth, as a rule.
+
+A good Irish nurse is the best and most tender, the most to be relied
+on. Children love Irish servants; it is the best recommendation we can
+give them. They are not good cooks as a rule, and are wanting in head,
+management, and neatness; but they are willing; and a wise mistress
+can make of them almost anything she desires.
+
+The Germans surpass them very much in thrift and in concentration, but
+the Germans are stolid, and very far from being as gentle and willing
+as the Irish. If a housekeeper gets a number of German servants in
+training and thinks them perfect, she need not be astonished if some
+fine morning she rises and finds them gone off to parts unknown.
+
+The Swedes are more reliable up to a certain point; they are never
+stupid, they are rather fantastic, and very eccentric. They are also
+full of poetry, and indulge in sublime longings. The Swedish language
+is made up of eloquence and poetry as soft as the Italian; it has also
+something of the flow and the magnificence of the Spanish. It is
+freighted with picturesque and brilliant metaphor, and is richer than
+ours in its expressions of gentleness, politeness, and courtesy. They
+have a great talent for arguing with gentleness and courtesy, and of
+protesting with politeness, and they learn our language with singular
+ease. I once had a Swedish maid who argued me out of my desire to have
+the dining-room swept, in better language than I could use myself. One
+must, in hiring servants, take into account all these national
+characteristics. The Swedes are full of talent, they can do your work
+if they wish to, but ten chances to one they do not wish to.
+
+Gustavus Adolphus and Charles XII. were two types of Swedish
+character. The Swedes of to-day, like them, are full of dignity and
+lofty aspiration; they love brilliant display; they have audacious and
+adventurous spirits; one can imagine them marching to victory; but all
+this makes them, in this country, "too smart" to be servants.
+
+They are excellent cooks. A Swedish woman formerly came to my house to
+cook for dinner parties, and she was equal to any French _chef_. Her
+price was five dollars; she would do all my marketing for me, and
+serve the dinner most perfectly,--that is, render it up to the men
+waiters. I rarely had any fault to find; if I had, it was I who was in
+the wrong. She came often to instruct my Irish cook; but had I
+attempted any further intercourse, I felt that it would have been I
+who would have had to leave the house, and not my excellent cook. They
+have every qualification for service excepting this: they will not
+obey,--they are captains.
+
+The Norwegians are very different. We must again remember that at home
+they are poor, frugal, religious, and capable of all sacrifice; they
+will work patiently here for seven years in order to go back to
+Norway, to that poetical land, whose beauty is so unspeakable. These
+girls who come from the herds, who have spent the summer on the plains
+in a small hut and alone, making butter and cheese, are strong,
+patient, handsome, fresh creatures, with voices as sweet as lutes, and
+most obedient and good,--their thoughts ever of father and mother and
+home. Would there were more of them. If they were a little less
+awkward in an American house they would be perfect.
+
+As for the men, they are the best farm-laborers in the world. They
+have a high, noble, patient courage, a very slow mind, and are fond of
+argument. The Norwegian is the Scotchman of Scandinavia, as the Swede
+is the Irishman. There are no better adopted citizens than the
+Norwegians, but they live here only to go back to Norway when they
+have made enough. Deeply religious, they are neither narrow nor
+ignoble. They would be perfect servants if well trained.
+
+The Danes are not so simple; they are a mercantile people, and are
+desperately fond of bargaining. They are also, however, most
+interesting. Their taste for art is vastly more developed than that of
+either the Swedes or the Norwegians. A Danish parlour-maid will
+arrange the _bric-à-brac_ and stand and look at it. To go higher in
+their home history, they are making great painters. As servants they
+are hardly known enough amongst us to be criticised; those I have seen
+have been neat, faithful, and far more obedient than their cleverer
+Swedish sisters.
+
+Could I have my choice for servants about a country house they should
+be Norwegians, in a city house, French.
+
+In Chicago, the ladies speak highly of the German servants, if they do
+not happen to be Nihilists, which is a dreadful possibility. At the
+South they still have the negro, most excellent when good, most
+objectionable when bad. Certainly freedom has not improved him as to
+manners, and a coloured coachman in Washington can be far more
+disagreeable than an Irishman, or a French cabby during the
+Exposition, which is saying a great deal.
+
+The excellence, the superiority, the respectful manners of English
+servants at home has induced many ladies to bring over parlour maids,
+nurses, cooks, from England, with, however, but small success. I need
+but copy the following from the "London Queen," to show how different
+is the way of speaking of a servant, and to a servant in London from
+that which obtains in New York. It is _verbatim_:--
+
+"The servants should rise at six-thirty, and the cook a little
+earlier; she then lights the kitchen fire, opens the house, sweeps the
+hall, cleans the steps, prepares upstairs and downstairs breakfast.
+Meantime the house parlourmaid does the dining-room, takes up hot
+water to bedrooms, lays the table, and so forth, while the housemaid
+dusts the day nursery and takes up the children's breakfast. Supposing
+the family breakfast is not wanted before eight-thirty, that meal
+should be taken, in both kitchen and nursery, before eight o'clock.
+As soon as this is over the cook must tidy her kitchen, look over her
+stores, contents of pantry, etc., and be ready by nine-thirty to take
+her orders for the day. She will answer the kitchen bell at all times,
+and perhaps the front door in the morning, and will be answerable
+besides for ordinary kitchen work, for the hall, kitchen stairs, all
+the basement, and according to arrangement possibly the dining-room.
+She must have fixed days for doing the above work, cleaning tins, etc.
+The cook also clears away the breakfast. As soon as the housemaid has
+taken up the family breakfast, she, the housemaid, must begin the
+bedrooms, where the second scullery-maid may help her as soon as she
+has done helping the cook. The house parlour-maid will be responsible
+for the drawing-room and sitting-room and all the bedrooms, also
+stairs and landing, having regular days for cleaning out one of each
+weekly, being helped by the second scullery-maid. She should be
+dressed in time for lunch, wait on it, and clear away. She will answer
+the front door in the afternoon, take up five o'clock tea, lay the
+table and wait at dinner. The scullery maid must clear the kitchen
+meals and help in all the washing up, take up nursery tea, help the
+cook prepare late dinner, carry up the dishes for late dinner, clear
+and wash up kitchen supper. The nurse has her dinner in the kitchen.
+Servants' meals should be breakfast, before the family, dinner
+directly after upstairs lunch, tea at five, supper at nine. They
+should go to bed regularly at ten o'clock. Now as to their fare. For
+breakfast a little bacon or an egg, or some smoked fish; for dinner,
+meat, vegetables, potatoes, and pudding. If a joint has been sent up
+for lunch, it is usual for it to go down to the servants' table.
+
+"Allow one pint and a half of beer to each servant who asks for it, or
+one bottle. Tea, butter, and sugar are given out to them. The weekly
+bills for the servants shall be about two dollars and a half."
+
+The neatness of all this careful housekeeping would be delightful if
+it could be carried out with us, or if the servant would accept it.
+But imagine a New York mistress achieving it! The independent voter
+would revolt, his wife would never accept it. English servants lose
+all their good manners when they come over here, and do not appear at
+all as they do in London.
+
+American servants are always expected to eat what goes down from the
+master's table, and there is no such thing as making one servant wait
+upon another in our free and independent country. There are households
+in America where many servants are kept in order by a very clever
+mistress, but it is rarely an order which lasts for long. It is a
+vexed question, and the freedom with which we take a servant, without
+knowing much of her character, must explain a great deal of it.
+Foreign servants find out soon their legal rights, and their
+importance. Here where labour is scarce, it is not so easy to get a
+good footman, parlour maid, or cook; the great variety and antipathy
+of race comes in. The Irishman will not work on a railroad with the
+Italian, and we all know the history of the "Heathen Chinee." That is
+repeated in every household.
+
+Mr. Winans, in Scotland, hires a place which reaches from the North
+Sea to the Atlantic; he spends two hundred thousand dollars a year on
+it. He has perhaps three hundred servants, every one of them perfect.
+Imagine his having such a place here! How many good servants could he
+find; how long would they stay? How long does a French _chef_, at ten
+thousand dollars a year, stay? Only one year. He prefers to return to
+France.
+
+Indeed, French servants, poorly paid and very poorly fed at home, are
+the hardest to keep in this country; they all wish to go back. It is a
+curious fact that they grow impertinent and do not seem to enjoy the
+life. They go back to Europe, and resume their good manners as if
+nothing had happened. It must be in the air.
+
+It is, however, possible for a lady to get good servants and to keep
+them for a while, if she has great executive ability and a natural
+leadership; but the whole question is one which has not yet been at
+all mastered.
+
+There is no "hook and eye" between the ship loaded down with those who
+want work and those who want work done. The great lack of respect in
+the manners of servants in hotels is especially noticeable to one
+returning from Europe. A woman, a sort of care-taker on a third-story
+floor, will sing while a lady is talking to her, not because she
+wishes to sing at all, but to establish her independence. In Europe
+she would say, "Yes, my Lady," or "No, my Lady" when spoken to.
+
+It is to be feared that the Declaration of Independence is between us
+and good service. We must be content if we find one or two amiable
+Irish, or old negroes, who will serve us because of the love they bear
+us, and for our children's sake, whom they love as if they were their
+very own.
+
+This is, however, but taking the seamy side, and the humbler side.
+Many opulent people in America employ thirty servants, and their house
+goes on with much of European elegance. It is not unusual in a fine
+New York house to find a butler and four men in the dining-room; a
+_chef_ and his assistants in the kitchen; a head groom and his men in
+the stables; a coachman, who is a very important functionary; and
+three women in the nursery besides the nursery governess, who acts as
+the amanuensis of the lady; the lady's maid, whose sole duty is to
+wait on her lady, and perhaps her young lady; a parlour maid or two;
+and two chambermaids, a laundress and her assistants.
+
+Of course the men in such a vast establishment do not sleep in the
+house, perhaps with one or two exceptions; the valet and the head
+footman may be kept at home, as they may be needed in the night, for
+errands, etc. But our American houses are not built to accommodate so
+many. One lady, the head of such an establishment, said that she had
+"never seen her laundress." A different staircase led to the servants'
+room; her maid did all the interviewing with this important personage.
+
+If a lady can find a competent housekeeper to direct this large
+household, it is all very well, but that is yet almost impossible, and
+the life of a fashionable woman in New York, who is the head of such a
+house, is apt to be slavery. The housekeeper and the butler are seldom
+friends, therefore the hostess has to reconcile these two conflicting
+powers before she can give a dinner; the head footman walks off
+disgusted and leaves a vacant place, etc.
+
+The households of men of foreign birth, who understand dealing with
+different nationalities, are apt to get on very well with thirty
+servants; doubtless such men import their own servants.
+
+In a household where one man alone is kept, he is expected to open the
+front door and to do all the work of the dining-room, and must have an
+assistant in the pantry. The cook, if a woman, generally demands and
+needs one; if a man, he demands two, for a _chef_ will not do any of
+the menial work of cookery. He is a pampered official.
+
+In England, the housekeeper engages the servants and supervises them.
+She has charge of the stores and the house linen, and in general is
+responsible for the economical and exact management of all household
+details, and for the comfort of guests and the family. She is expected
+to see that her employers are not cheated, and this in our country
+makes her unpopular. A bad housekeeper is worse than none, as of
+course her powers of stealing are endless.
+
+The butler is responsible for the silver and wine. He must be absolute
+over the footman. It is he who directs the carving and passing of
+dishes, and then stands behind the chair of his mistress. All the
+men-servants must be clean shaven; none are permitted to wear a
+mustache, that being the privilege of the gentlemen.
+
+A lady's maid is not expected to do her own washing, or make her own
+bed in Europe; but in this country, being required to do all that, and
+to eat with the other servants, she is apt to complain. A French maid
+always complains of the table. She must dress hair, understand
+dress-making, and clear starching, be a good packer, and always at
+hand to dress her lady and to sit up for her when she returns from
+parties. Her wages are very high and she is apt to become a tyrant.
+
+It is very difficult to define for an American household the duties of
+servants, which are so well defined in England and on the continent.
+Every lady has her own individual ideas on this subject, and servants
+have _their_ individual ideas, which they do not have in Europe. I
+heard an opulent gentleman who kept four men-servants in his house,
+and three in his stable, complain one snowy winter that he had not one
+who would shovel snow from his steps, each objecting that it was not
+his business; so he wrote a note to a friendly black man, who came
+around, and rendered it possible for the master of the house to go
+down to business. This was an extreme case, but it illustrates one of
+the phases of our curious civilization.
+
+The butler is the important person, and it will be well for the lady
+to hold him responsible; he should see to it that the footmen are neat
+and clean. Most servants in American houses wear black dress-coats,
+and white cravats, but some of our very rich men have now all their
+flunkies in livery, a sort of cut-away dress-coat, a waistcoat of
+another colour, small clothes, long stockings, and low shoes. Powdered
+footmen have not yet appeared.
+
+If we were in England we should say that the head footman is to attend
+the door, and in houses where much visiting goes on he could hardly do
+anything more. Ladies, however, simplify this process by keeping a
+"buttons," a small boy, who has, as Dickens says, "broken out in an
+eruption of buttons" on his jacket, who sits the livelong day the
+slave of the bell.
+
+The second man seems to do all the work, such as scrubbing silver,
+sweeping, arranging the fireplaces, and washing dishes; and what the
+third man does, except to black boots, I have never been able to
+discover. I think he serves as valet to the gentlemen and the growing
+boys, runs with notes, and is "Jeames Yellowplush" generally. I was
+once taken over her vast establishment by an English countess, who
+was most kind in explaining to me her domestic arrangements; but I did
+not think she knew herself what that third man did. I noticed that
+there were always several footmen waiting at dinner.
+
+     "They also serve who only stand and wait."
+
+One thing I do remember in the housekeeper's room. There sat a very
+grand dame carving, and giving the servants their dinner. She rose and
+stood while my lady spoke to her, but at a wave of the hand from the
+countess all the others remained seated. The butler was at the other
+end of the table looking very sheepish. The dinner was a boiled leg of
+mutton, and some sort of meat pie, and a huge Yorkshire pudding,--no
+vegetables but potatoes; pitchers of ale, and bread and cheese,
+finished this meal. The third footman, I remember, brought in
+afternoon tea; perhaps he filled that place which is described in one
+of Miss Mulock's novels:--
+
+"Dolly was hired as an off maid, to do everything which the other
+servants would not do."
+
+The etiquette of the stable servants was also explained to me in
+England. The coachman is as powerful a person in the equine realm as
+is the butler in the house. The head groom and his assistants always
+raise their finger to their hats when spoken to by master, or
+mistress, or the younger members of the family, or visitors, and in
+the case of royalty all stand with hats off, the coachman on the box
+slightly raising his, until the Prince of Wales, or his peers, are
+seated.
+
+In some houses I was told that the upper servants had their meals
+prepared by a kitchen maid, and that they had a different table from
+the scullery maids.
+
+The nursery governess was a person to be pitied; she was an educated
+girl, still the servant of the head nurse. She passed her entire life
+with the children, yet ate by herself, unless perhaps with the very
+young children. The head governess ate luncheon with the family, and
+came in to the parlour with the young ladies in the evening. Generally
+this personage was expected to sing and play for the amusement of the
+company. Now, imagine a set of servants thus trained, brought to
+America. The men soon learn that their vote is as good as the
+master's, and if they are Irishmen it is a great deal better. They
+soon cease to be respectful. This is the first break in the chain. A
+man, a Senator, was asked out to dinner in Albany; the lady of the
+house said, "I have a great respect for Senator ----; he used to wait
+on this table."
+
+That is a glorious thing for the flag, for the United States, but
+there is a missing link in the golden chain of household order. It is
+a difficult task to produce here the harmony of an English household.
+Our service at home is like our diplomatic service; we have no trained
+diplomats, no gradation of service, but in the case of our foreign
+ministers, they have risen to be the best in the world. We have plenty
+of talent at top; it is the root of the tree which puzzles us.
+
+We may make up our minds that no longer will the American girl go out
+to service. It is a thousand pities that she will not. It is not
+ignoble to do household work well. The châtelaines of the Middle Ages
+cooked and served the meals with their own fair hands. Training-schools
+are greatly needed; we should follow the nurses' training-school.
+
+Our dinner-tables in America are generally long and narrow, fitted to
+the shape of the dining-room. Once I saw in England, in a great
+house, a table so narrow that one could almost have shaken hands with
+one's opposite neighbour. The ornaments were high, slender vases
+filled with grasses and orchids, far above our heads. One or two
+matchless ornaments of Dresden, the gifts of monarchs, alone
+ornamented the table. This was a very sociable dinner-table and rather
+pleasing. Then came the round table, so vast that the footmen must
+have mounted up on it to place the centre piece, like poor distraught
+Lady Caroline Lamb, whose husband came in to find her walking up and
+down the table, telling the butler to "produce pyramidal effects."
+There is also the fine broad parallelogram, suited to a baronial hall;
+and this is copied in our best country houses. As no conversation of a
+confidential character is ever allowed at an English table until all
+the servants have left the room, so it is not considered good-breeding
+to allow a servant to talk to the mistress or the young ladies of what
+she hears in the servants' hall. The gossip of couriers and maids at a
+foreign watering-place reaches American ears, and unluckily gets into
+American newspapers sometimes. It is a wise precaution on the part of
+the English never to listen to this. As we have conquered everything
+else in America, perhaps we shall conquer the servant question, to the
+advantage of both parties. We should try to keep our servants a longer
+time with us.
+
+There are some houses where the law of change goes on forever, and
+there are some where the domestic machine runs without friction. The
+hostess may be a person with a talent for governing, and may be
+inspired with a sixth sense. If she is she can make her composite
+family respectful, helpful, and happy; but it must be confessed that
+it is as yet a vexed question, one which gives us trouble and will
+give us more. Those people are the happiest who can get on with three
+or four servants, and very many families live well and elegantly with
+this number, while more live well with two.
+
+To mark the difference in feeling as between those who employ and
+those who serve, one little anecdote may apply. At a watering-place in
+Europe I once met an English family, of the middle class. The lady
+said to her maid, "Bromley, your master wishes you to be in at nine
+o'clock this evening."
+
+Bromley said, "Yes, my lady."
+
+An American lady stood near with her maid, who flushed deeply.
+
+"What is the matter, Jane?" asked her lady.
+
+"I never could stand having any one called my master," said the
+American.
+
+This intimate nerve of self-love, this egotism, this false idea of
+independence affects women more than men, and in a country where both
+can go from the humblest position to the highest, it produces a
+"glistering grief." The difficulty of getting good servants prevents
+many families from keeping house. It brings on us the foreign reproach
+that we live in hotels and boarding-houses. It is at this moment the
+great unsolved American Question. What shall we do with it?
+
+
+
+
+SOMETHING ABOUT COOKS.
+
+     "Last night I weighed, quite wearied out,
+     The question that perplexes still;
+     And that sad spirit we call doubt
+     Made the good naught beside the ill.
+
+     "This morning, when with rested mind,
+     I try again the selfsame theme,
+     The whole is altered, and I find
+     The balance turned, the good supreme."
+
+
+What amateur cook has not had these moments of depression and
+exaltation as she has weighed the flour and sugar, stoned the raisins,
+and mixed the cake, or, even worse in her young novitiate, has
+attempted to make a soup and has begun with the formula which so often
+turns out badly:--
+
+"Take a shin of beef and put it in a pot with three dozen carrots, a
+dozen onions, two dozen pieces of celery, twelve turnips, a fowl, and
+two partridges. It must simmer six hours, etc." Yes, and last week and
+the week before her husband said, "it was miserable." How willingly
+would she allow the claim of that glorious old coxcomb, Louis Eustache
+Ude, who had been cook to two French kings and never forgave the world
+for not permitting him to call himself an artist.
+
+"Scrapers of catgut," he says, "call themselves artists, and fellows
+who jump like a kangaroo claim the title; yet the man who has under
+his sole direction the great feasts given by the nobility of England
+to the allied sovereigns, and who superintended the grand banquet at
+Crockford's on the occasion of the coronation of Victoria, was denied
+the title prodigally showered on singers, dancers, and comedians,
+whose only quality, not requiring the microscope to discern, is
+vanity."
+
+Ude was the most eccentric of cooks. He was _maître d'hôtel_ to the
+Duke of York, who delighted in his anecdotes and mimicry. In his book,
+which he claims is the only work which gives due dignity to the great
+art, he says: "The chief fault in all great peoples' cooks is that
+they are too profuse in their preparations. Suppers are after all only
+ridiculous proofs of the extravagance and bad taste of the givers." He
+mentions great wastes which have seared his already seared conscience
+thus:
+
+"I have known balls where the next day, in spite of the pillage of a
+pack of footmen, which was enormous, I have seen thirty hams, one
+hundred and fifty to two hundred carved fowls, and forty or fifty
+tongues given away. Jellies melt on all the tables; pastries, patties,
+aspics, and lobster salads are heaped up in the kitchen and strewed
+about in the passages; and all this an utter waste, for not even the
+footmen would eat this; they do not consider it a legitimate repast to
+dine off the remnants of a last night's feast. Footmen are like cats;
+they only like what they steal, but are indifferent to what is given
+them."
+
+This was written by the cook of the bankrupt Duke of York, noted for
+his extravagance; but how well it would apply to-day to the banquet of
+many a _nouveau riche_, to how many a hotel, to how much of our
+American housekeeping. Ude was a poet and an enthusiast. Colonel Damer
+met him walking up and down at Crockford's in a great rage, and asked
+what was the matter. "Matter! _Ma foi!_" answered he; "you saw that
+man just gone out? Well he ordered red mullet for his dinner. I made
+him a delicious little sauce with my own hand. The mullet was marked
+on the carte two shillings. I added sixpence for the sauce. He refuses
+to pay sixpence for the sauce. The imbecile! He seems to think red
+mullets come out of the sea with my sauce in their pockets."
+
+Carême, one of the greatest of French cooks, became eminent by
+inventing a sauce for fast-days. He then devoted several years to the
+science of roasting in all its branches. He studied design and
+elegance under Robert Lainé. His career was one of victory after
+victory. He nurtured the Emperor Alexander, kept alive Talleyrand
+through "that long disease, his life," fostered Lord Londonderry, and
+delighted the Princess Belgratine. A salary of a thousand pounds a
+year induced him to become _chef_ to the Regent; but he left Carlton
+House, he would return to France. The Regent was inconsolable, but
+Carême was implacable. "No," said the true patriot, "my soul is
+French, and I can only exist in France." Carême, therefore, overcome
+by his feelings, accepted an unprecedented salary from Baron
+Rothschild and settled in Paris.
+
+Lady Morgan, dining at the Baron's villa in 1830, has left us a sketch
+of a dinner by Carême which is so well done that, although I have
+already alluded to it, I will copy _verbatim_: "It was a very sultry
+evening, but the Baron's dining-room stood apart from the house and
+was shaded by orange trees. In the oblong pavilion of Grecian marble
+refreshed by fountains, no gold or silver heated or dazzled the eye,
+but porcelain beyond the price of all precious metals. There was no
+high-spiced sauce in the dinner, no dark-brown gravy, no flavour of
+cayenne and allspice, no tincture of catsup and walnut pickle, no
+visible agency of those vulgar elements of cooking of the good old
+times, fire and water. Distillations of the most delicate viands had
+been extracted in silver, with chemical precision. Every meat
+presented its own aroma,"--it was not cooked in a gas stove,--"every
+vegetable its own shade of verdure. The mayonnaise was fixed in ice,
+like Ninon's description of Sevigné's heart, '_une citronille frité à
+la neige_.' The tempered chill of the _plombière_ which held the place
+of the eternal _fondus_ and _soufflets_ of our English tables,
+anticipated and broke the stronger shock of the exquisite avalanche,
+which, with the hue and odour of fresh-gathered nectarines, satisfied
+every sense and dissipated every coarser flavour. With less genius
+than went to the composition of that dinner, men have written epic
+poems."
+
+Comparing Carême with the great Beauvilliers, the greatest restaurant
+cook in Paris from 1782 to 1815, a great authority in the matter says:
+"There was more _aplomb_ in the touch of Beauvilliers, more curious
+felicity in Carême's. Beauvilliers was great in an _entrée_, Carême
+sublime in an _entremet_; we should put Beauvilliers against the world
+for a _rôti_, but should wish Carême to prepare the sauce were we
+under the necessity of eating an elephant or our great grandfather."
+
+Vatel was the great Condé's cook who killed himself because the turbot
+did not arrive. Madame de Sevigné relates the event with her usual
+clearness. Louis XIV. had long promised a visit to the great Condé at
+Chantilly, the very estate which the Duc d'Aumale has so recently
+given back to France, but postponed it from time to time fearing to
+cause Condé trouble by the sudden influx of a gay and numerous
+retinue. The old château had become a trifle dull and a trifle mouldy,
+but it got itself brushed up. Vatel was cook, and his first
+mortification was that the roast was wanting at several tables. It
+seemed to him that his great master the captain would be dishonoured,
+but the king had brought a larger retinue than he had promised. "He
+had thought of nothing but to make this visit a great success."
+Gourville, one of the prince's household, finding Vatel so excited,
+asked the prince to reassure him, which he did very kindly, telling
+him that the king was delighted with his supper. But Vatel mournfully
+answered: "Monseigneur, your kindness overpowers me, but the roast was
+wanting at two tables." The next morning he arose at five to
+superintend the king's dinner. The purveyor of fish was at the door
+with only two baskets. "And is this all?" asked Vatel. "Yes," said the
+sleepy man. Vatel waited at the gates an hour; no more fish. Two or
+three hundred guests, and only two packages. He whispered to himself,
+"The joke in Paris will be that Vatel tried to save the prince the
+price of two red mullets a month." His hand fell on his rapier hilt,
+he rushed up-stairs, fell on the blade; as he expired the cart loaded
+with turbot came into the yard. Voila!
+
+Times have changed. Cooks now prefer living on their masters to dying
+for them.
+
+The Prince de Loubise, inventor of a sauce the discovery of which has
+made him more glorious than twenty victories, asked his cook to draw
+him up a bill of fare, a sort of rough estimate for a supper.
+Bertrand's first estimate was fifty hams. "What, Bertrand! Are you
+going to feast the whole army of the Rhine? Your brains are surely
+turning." Bertrand was blandly contemptuous. "My brains are surely
+turning? No, Monseigneur, only one ham will appear on the table, but
+the rest are indispensable for my _espagnoles_, my garnishing."
+
+"Bertrand, you are plundering me," stormed the prince. "This article
+shall not pass." The blood of the cook was up. "My lord," said he,
+sternly, "you do not understand the resources of our art. Give the
+word and I will so melt down these hams that they will go into a
+little glass bottle no bigger than my thumb." The prince was abashed
+by the genius of the spit, and the fifty hams were purchased.
+
+The Duke of Wellington liked a good dinner, and employed an artist
+named Felix. Lord Seaforth, finding Felix too expensive, allowed him
+to go to the Iron Duke, but Felix came back with tears in his eyes.
+
+"What is the matter," said Lord Seaforth; "has the Duke turned rusty?"
+
+"No, no, my lord! but I serve him a dinner which would make
+Francatelli or Ude die of envy, and he say nothing. I go to the
+country and leave him to try a dinner cooked by a stupid, dirty
+cook-maid, and he say nothing; that is what hurt my feelings."
+
+Felix lived on approbation; he would have been capable of dying like
+Vatel.
+
+Going last winter to see _le Bourgeoise Gentilhomme_ at the Comédie
+Française, I was struck with the novelty of the dinner served by this
+hero of Molière's who is so anxious to get rid of his money. All the
+dishes were brought in by little fellows dressed as cooks, who danced
+to the minuet.
+
+In a later faithful chronicle I learn that a certain marquis of the
+days of Louis XVI. invented a musical spit which caused all the
+snowy-garbed cooks to move in rhythmical steps. All was melody and
+order. "The fish simmered in six-eight time, the ponderous roasts
+circled gravely, the stews blended their essences to solemn anthems.
+The ears were gratified as the nose was regaled; this was an idea
+worthy of Apecius."
+
+So Molière, true to the spirit of his time, paid this compliment to
+the Marquis.
+
+Béchamel was cook to Louis XIV., and invented a famous sauce.
+
+Durand, who was cook to the great Napoleon, has left a curious record
+of his tempestuous eating. Francatelli succeeded Ude in England, was
+the _chef_ at Chesterfield House, at Lord Kinnaird's, and at the
+Melton Club. He held the post of _maître d'hôtel_ for a while but was
+dismissed by a cabal.
+
+The gay writer from whose pages we have gathered these desultory facts
+winds up with an advice to all who keep French cooks. "Make your
+_chef_ your friend. Take care of him. Watch over the health of this
+man of genius. Send for the physician when he is ill."
+
+Imagine the descent from these poets to the good plain cook,--you can
+depend upon the truth of this description,--with a six weeks'
+reference from her last place. Imagine the greasy soups, the mutton
+cutlets hard as a board, the few hard green peas, the soggy potatoes.
+How awful the recollections of one who came in "a week on trial!"
+Whose trial? Those who had to eat her food. It is bad to be without a
+cook, but ten times worse to have a bad one.
+
+But if Louis Eustache Ude, the cook _par excellence_ of all this
+little study, lamented over the waste in great kitchens, how much more
+should he revolt at that wholesale destruction of food which might go
+to feed the hungry, nourish and sustain the sick, and perhaps save
+many a child's life. What should be done with the broken meats of a
+great household? The cook is too apt to toss all into a tub or basket,
+to swell her own iniquitous profits. The half-tongues, ends of ham,
+roast beef, chicken-legs, the real honest relics of a generous kitchen
+would feed four or five poor families a week. What gifts of mercy to
+hospitals would be the half of a form of jelly, the pudding, the blanc
+mange, which are thrown away by the careless!
+
+In France the Little Sisters of the Poor go about with clean dishes
+and clean baskets, to collect these morsels which fall from the rich
+man's table. It is a worthy custom.
+
+While studying the names of these great men like Ude and Carême, Vatel
+and Francatelli, what shades of dead _pâtissiers_, spirits of extinct
+_confiseurs_, rise around us in savoury streams and revive for us the
+past of gastronomic pleasure! Many a Frenchman will tell you of the
+iced meringues of the Palais Royal and the _salades de fraises au
+marasquin_ of the Grand Seize as if they were things of the past. The
+French, gayer and lighter handed at the moulding of pastry, are apt to
+exceed all nations in this delicate, delicious _entremet_. The _vol au
+vent de volaille_, or chicken pie, with its delicate filling of
+chicken, mushroom, truffles, and its enveloping pastry, is never
+better than at the Grand Hôtel at Aix les Bains, where one finds the
+perfection of good eating. "Aix les Bains," says a resident physician,
+"lies half-way between Paris and Rome, with its famous curative baths
+to correct the good dinners of the one, and the good wines of the
+other." Aix adds a temptation of its own.
+
+The French have ever been fond of the playthings of the kitchen,--the
+tarts, custards, the frothy nothings which are fashioned out of the
+evanescent union of whipped cream and spun sugar. Their politeness,
+their brag, their accomplishments, their love of the external, all
+lead to such dainties. It was observed even so long ago as 1815, when
+the allies were in Paris, that the fifteen thousand _pâtés_ which
+Madame Felix sold daily in the _Passage des Panoramas_ were beginning
+to affect the foreign bayonets; and no doubt the German invasion may
+have been checked by the same dulcet influence.
+
+There is romance and history even about pastry. The _baba_, a species
+of savoury biscuit coloured with saffron, was introduced into France
+by Stanislaus, the first king of Poland, when that unlucky country was
+alternately the scourge and the victim of Russia. The dish was perhaps
+oriental in origin. It is made with _brioche_ paste, mixed with
+madeira, currants, raisins, and potted cream.
+
+French jellies are rather monotonous as to flavour, but they look very
+handsome on a supper-table. A _macédoine_ is a delicious variety of
+dainty, and worthy of the French nation. It is wine jelly frozen in a
+mould with grapes, strawberries, green-gages, cherries, apricots, or
+pineapple, or more economically with slices of pears and apples boiled
+in syrup coloured with carmine, saffron, or cochineal, the flavour
+aided by angelica or brandied cherries. An invention of Ude and one
+which we could copy here is jelly _au miroton de pêche_:--
+
+     Get half a dozen peaches, peel them carefully and boil them,
+     with their kernels, a short time in a fine syrup, squeeze six
+     lemons into it, and pass it through a bag. Add some clarified
+     isinglass and put some of it into a mould in ice; then fill up
+     with the jelly and peaches alternately and freeze it.
+
+Fruit cheeses are very pleasant, rich conserves for dessert. They can
+be made with apricots, strawberries, pineapple, peaches, or
+gooseberries. The fruit is powdered with sugar and rubbed through a
+colander; then melted isinglass and thick cream is added, whipped over
+ice and put into the mould.
+
+The French prepare the most ornamental ices, both water and cream, but
+they do not equal in richness or flavour those made in New York.
+
+Pancakes and fritters, although English dishes, are very popular in
+France and very good. Apple fritters with sherry wine and sugar are
+very comforting things. The French name is _beignet de pomme_.
+Thackeray immortalizes them thus:--
+
+     "Mid fritters and lollypops though we may roam,
+     On the whole there is nothing like _beignet de pomme_.
+     Of flour half a pound with a glass of milk share,
+     A half-pound of butter the mixture will bear.
+     _Pomme! Pomme! Beignet de pomme!_
+     Of _beignets_ there's none like the _beignet de pomme_!
+
+     "A _beignet de pomme_ you may work at in vain
+     If you stir not the mixture again and again.
+     Some beer just to thin it may into it fall,
+     Stir up that with three whites of eggs added to all.
+     _Pomme! Pomme! Beignet de pomme!_
+     Of _beignets_ there's nothing like _beignet de pomme_!
+
+     "Six apples when peeled you must carefully slice,
+     And cut out the cores if you'll take my advice;
+     Then dip them in butter and fry till they foam,
+     And you'll have in six minutes your _beignet de pomme_.
+     _Pomme! Pomme! Beignet de pomme!_
+     Of _beignets_ there's nothing like _beignet de pomme_!"
+
+In the _Almanach de Gourmands_ there appeared a philosophical treatise
+on pastry and pastry cooks, probably by the learned Giedeaud de la
+Reynière himself. Pastry, he says, is to cooking what rhetorical
+metaphors are to oratory,--life and ornament. A speech without
+metaphors, a dinner without pastry, are alike insipid; but, in like
+manner, as few people are eloquent, so few can make perfect pastry.
+Good pastry-cooks are as rare as good orators.
+
+This writer recommends the art of the rolling-pin to beautiful women
+as being at once an occupation, a pleasure, and a sure way of
+recovering embonpoint and freshness. He says: "This is an art which
+will chase _ennui_ from the saddest. It offers varied amusement and
+sweet and salutary exercise for the whole body; it restores appetite,
+strength, and gayety; it gathers around us friends; it tends to
+advance an art known from the most remote antiquity. Woman! lovely and
+charming woman, leave the sofas where _ennui_ and hypochondria prey
+upon the springtime of your life, unite in the varied moulds sugar,
+jasmine, and roses, and form those delicacies that will be more
+precious than gold when made by hands so dear to us." What woman could
+refuse to make a pudding and any number of pies after that?
+
+There seems to be nothing left to eat after all this perilous sweet
+stuff but a devilled biscuit at ten o'clock.
+
+     "'A well devilled biscuit!' said Jenkins, enchanted,
+     'I'll have after dinner,--the thought is divine!'
+     The biscuit was brought and he now only wanted,
+     To fully enjoy it, a glass of good wine.
+     He flew to the pepper and sat down before it,
+     And at peppering the well-buttered biscuit he went;
+     Then some cheese in a paste mixed with mustard spread o'er it,
+     And down to the kitchen the devil was sent.
+
+     "'Oh, how!' said the cook, 'can I thus think of grilling?
+     When common the pepper, the whole will be flat;
+     But here's the cayenne, if my master be willing
+     I'll make if he pleases a devil with that.'
+     So the footman ran up with the cook's observation
+     To Jenkins, who gave him a terrible look;
+     'Oh, go to the devil!'--forgetting his station--
+     Was the answer that Jenkins sent down to the cook."
+
+A slice of _pâté de foie gras_, olives stuffed with anchovy, broiled
+bones, anchovy on toast, Welsh rarebit, devilled biscuit, devilled
+turkey-legs, devilled kidneys, _caviare_, devilled crabs, soft-shell
+crabs, shrimp salad, sardines on toast, broiled sausages, etc., are
+amongst the many appetizers which _gourmets_ seek at ten or twelve
+o'clock, to take the taste of the sweets out of their mouths, and to
+prepare the pampered palate perhaps for punch, whiskey, or brandy and
+soda.
+
+
+
+
+THE FURNISHING OF A COUNTRY HOUSE.
+
+
+The hostess should, in furnishing her house, provide a number of
+bath-tubs. The tin ones, shaped like a hat, are very convenient, as
+are also india-rubber portable baths. If there is not a bath-room
+belonging to every room, this will enable an Englishman to take his
+tub as cold as he pleases, or allow the American to take the warmer
+sponge bath which Americans generally prefer.
+
+The house should also be well supplied with lunch-baskets for picnics
+and for the railway journey. These can be had for a small sum, and are
+well fitted up with drinking-cups, knives, forks, spoons, corkscrews,
+sandwich-boxes, etc. These and a great supply of unbreakable cups for
+the lawn-tennis ground are very useful.
+
+There should be also any number of painted tin pails, and small
+pitchers to carry hot water; several services of plain tea things, and
+Japanese waiters, on which to send tea to the bedrooms; and in every
+room should be placed a table, thoroughly furnished with
+writing-materials, and with all the conveniences for writing and
+sealing a letter.
+
+Shakspeare's bequest to his wife of his second-best bed has passed as
+a bit of post-mortem ungallantry, which has dimmed his fame as a model
+husband; but to-day that second-best bed would be a very handsome
+bequest, not only because it was Shakspeare's, but because it was
+doubtless a "tester," for which there is a craze. All the old
+four-posters, which our grandmothers sent to the garret, are on their
+way back again to the model bedroom. With all our rage for ventilation
+and fresh air, we no longer fear the bed curtains which a few years
+ago were supposed to foster disease and death; because the model
+bedroom can now be furnished with a ventilator for admitting the
+fresh, and one permitting the egress of the foul air. Each gas bracket
+is provided with a pipe placed above it, which pierces the wall and
+through which the product of combustion is carried out of the house.
+This is a late sanitary improvement in London, and is being introduced
+in New York.
+
+As for the bed curtains, they are hung on rods with brass rings, no
+canopy on top, so that the curtains can be shaken and dusted freely.
+This is a great improvement on the old upholstered top, which recalls
+Dickens's description of Mrs. Todger's boarding-house, where at the
+top of the stairs "the odour of many generations of dinners had
+gathered and had never been dispelled." In like manner the unpleasant
+feeling that perhaps whole generations of sleepers had breathed into
+the same upholstery overhead, used to haunt the wakeful, in old
+English inns, to the murdering of sleep.
+
+There is a growing admiration, unfortunately, for tufted bedsteads.
+They are in the long run neither clean nor wholesome, and not easily
+kept free from vermin; but they are undeniably handsome, and recall
+the imperial beds of state apartments, where kings and queens are
+supposed to seek that repose which comes so unwillingly to them, but
+so readily to the plough-boy. These upholstered, tufted, satin-covered
+bedsteads should be fitted with a canopy, and from this should hang a
+baldachin and side curtains. Certain very beautiful specimens of this
+regal arrangement, bought in Italy, are in the Vanderbilt palaces in
+New York. Opulent purchasers can get copies at the great
+furnishing-houses, but it is becoming difficult to get the real
+antiques. Travellers in Brittany find the most wonderful carved
+bedsteads built into the wall, and are always buying them of the
+astonished fisher-folk, who have no idea how valuable is their
+smoke-stained, carved oak.
+
+But as to the making up of the bed. There are nowadays cleanly springs
+and hair mattresses, in place of the old feather-beds; and as to stiff
+white bedcovers, pillowslips and shams, false sheets and valenciennes
+trimmings, monogrammed and ruffled fineries, there is a truce. They
+were so slippery, so troublesome, and so false withal, that the beds
+that have known them shall know them no more forever. They had always
+to be unpinned and unhooked before the sleeper could enter his bed;
+and they were the torment of the housemaid. They entailed a degree of
+washing and ironing which was endless, and yet many a young
+housekeeper thought them indispensable. That idea has gone out
+completely. The bed now is made up with its fresh linen sheets, its
+clean blankets and its Marseilles quilt, with square or long pillow as
+the sleeper fancies, with bolster in plain linen sheath. Then over the
+whole is thrown a light lace cover lined with Liberty silk. This may
+be as expensive or as cheap as the owner pleases. Or the spreads may
+be of satin covered with Chinese embroidery, Turkish Smyrniote, or
+other rare things, or of the patchwork or decorative art designs now
+so fashionable. One light and easily aired drapery succeeds the four
+or five pieces of unmanageable linen. If the bed is a tester and the
+curtains of silk or chintz, the bed-covering should match in tint. In
+a very pretty bedroom the walls should be covered with chintz or silk.
+
+The modern highly glazed tile paper for walls and ceiling is an
+admirable covering, as it refuses to harbour dirt, and the housemaid's
+brush can keep it sweet and clean. Wall papers are so pretty and so
+exquisite in design that it seems hardly necessary to do more than
+mention them. Let us hope the exasperating old rectangular patterns,
+which have confused so many weary brains and haunted so many a
+feverish pillow, are gone forever.
+
+The floors should be of plain painted wood, varnished, than which
+nothing can be cleaner; or perhaps of polished or oiled wood of the
+natural colour, with parquetried borders. If this is impossible cover
+with dark-stained mattings, which are as clean and healthful as
+possible. These may remain down all winter, and rugs may be laid over
+them at the fireplace and near the bed, sofa, etc. Readily lifted and
+shaken, rugs have all the comfort of carpets, and none of their
+disadvantages.
+
+Much is said of the unhealthfulness of gas in bedrooms, but if it does
+not escape, it is not unhealthful. The prettiest illumination is by
+candles in the charming new candlesticks in tin and brass, which are
+as nice as Roman lamps.
+
+On the old bedsteads of Cromwell's time we find a shelf running across
+the head of the bed, just above the sleeper's head,--placed there for
+the posset cup. This is now utilized for a safety lamp, for those who
+indulge in the pernicious practice of reading in bed; but it is even
+better used as a receptacle for the book, the letter-case, the many
+little things which an invalid may need, and it saves calling a
+nurse.
+
+All paint used in a model bedroom should be free from poison. The
+fireplace should be tiled, and the windows made with a deep beading on
+the sill. This is a piece of wood like the rest of the frame, which
+comes up two or three inches in front of the lower part of the window.
+The object of this is to admit of the lower sash being raised without
+causing a draught. The room is thus ventilated by the air which
+filters through the slight aperture between the upper and lower
+sashes. Above all things have an open fireplace in the bedroom.
+Abolish stoves from that sacred precinct. Use wood for fuel if
+possible; if not, the softest of cannel-coal.
+
+Have brass rods placed, on which to hang portières in winter.
+Portières and curtains may be cheaply made of ingrain carpet
+embroidered; or of Turkish or Indian stuffs; splendid Delhi pulgaries,
+a mass of gold silk embroidered, with bits of looking-glass worked in;
+of velvet; camel's-hair shawls; satin, chintz, or cretonne. Costly thy
+portières as thy purse can buy; nothing is so pretty and so
+ornamental.
+
+Glazed chintzes may be hung at the windows, without lining, as the
+light shines through the flowers, making a good effect. Chenille
+curtains of soft rich colours are appropriate for the modern bedroom.
+Madras muslin curtains will do for the windows, but are not heavy
+enough for portières.
+
+There are hangings made of willow bamboo, which can be looped back, or
+left hanging, which give a window a furnished look, without
+intercepting the light. Low wooden tables painted red, tables for
+writing materials, brackets on the walls for vases, candlesticks, and
+photograph screens, a long couch with many pillows, a Shaker
+rocking-chair, a row of hanging book-shelves,--these, with bed and
+curtains in fresh tints, make a pretty room in a country house.
+
+If possible, people who entertain much should have a suite of bedrooms
+for guests, so that no one need be turned out of one's room to make
+way for a guest.
+
+Brass beds are to be recommended as cleanly, handsome, and durable.
+Many ladies have, however, found fault with them because they show the
+under mattress, where the clothes are tucked in over the upper one.
+This can be remedied by making a valance which is finished with a
+ruffle at the top, which can be fluted, the whole tied on by tapes.
+Two or three of these in white will be all that a housekeeper needs,
+and if made of pretty coloured merino to match the room, they will
+last clean a long time.
+
+Every bedroom should have, if possible, a dressing-room, where the
+wash-stand, wardrobe, bath-tub, box for boots and shoes, box for
+soiled clothes, and toilet-table, perhaps, can be kept. In the new
+sanitary houses in London, the water cistern is placed in view behind
+glass in these rooms, so that if anything is the matter with the water
+supply, it can be remedied immediately. However, in old fashioned
+houses, where dressing-rooms cannot be evoked, screens can be so
+placed as to conceal the unornamental objects.
+
+A toilet-table should be ornamental and not hidden, with its curtains,
+pockets, looking-glasses, little bows, shelves for bottles, devices
+for secret drawers for love letters, and so on. Ivory brushes with the
+owner's monogram, all sorts of pretty Japanese boxes, and
+dressing-cases, silver-backed brushes and mirrors, buttonhooks,
+knives, scissors can be neatly laid out.
+
+A little table for afternoon tea should stand ready, with a tray of
+Satsuma or old Worcester, with cups and tea equipage, and a copper
+kettle with alcohol lamp should stand on a bracket on the wall. In the
+heating of water, a trivet should be attached to the grate, and a
+little iron kettle might sing forever on the hob. Ornamental ottomans
+in plush covers, which open and disclose a wood box, should stand by
+the fireplace. Chameleon glass lamps with king-fisher stems are pretty
+on the mantel-piece, which can be upholstered to match the bed; and
+there may be vases in amber, primrose, cream-colour, pale blue, and
+ruby. No fragrant flowers or growing plants should be allowed in a
+bedroom. There should be at least one clock in the room, to strike the
+hour with musical reiteration.
+
+As for baths, the guest should be asked if he prefers hot or cold
+water, and the hour at which he will have it. If a tin hat-bath, or an
+india-rubber tub is used, the maid should enter and arrange it in this
+manner: first lay a rubber cloth on the floor and then place the tub
+on it. Then bring a large pail of cold water, and a can of hot. Place
+near the tub a towel-rack hung with fresh towels, both damask and
+Turkish, and if a full-length Turkish towel be added it will be a
+great luxury. If the guest be a gentleman, and no man-servant be kept,
+this should all be arranged the night before, with the exception of
+course of the hot water, which can be left outside the door at any
+hour in the morning when it is desired. If it is a stationary tub, of
+course the matter is a simple one, and depends on the turn of a couple
+of faucets.
+
+Some visitors are very fussy and dislike to be waited on; to such the
+option must be given: "Do you prefer to light your own fire, to turn
+on your bath, to make your own tea, or shall the maid enter at eight
+o'clock and do it for you?" Such questions are often asked in an
+English country house. Every facility for doing the work would of
+course be supplied to the visitor.
+
+The bedroom being nowadays made so very attractive, the guest should
+stay in it as much as possible, if he or she find that the hostess
+likes to be alone; in short, absent yourself occasionally. Do your
+letter-writing and some reading in your room. Most people prefer this
+freedom and like to be let alone in the morning.
+
+At a country house, gentlemen should be very particular to dress for
+dinner. If not in the regulation claw-hammer, still with a change of
+garment. There is a very good garment called a smokee, which is worn
+by gentlemen in the summer, a sort of light jacket of black cloth,
+which goes well with either black or white cravat; but with all the
+_laisser aller_ of a country visit, inattention to the proprieties of
+dress is not included.
+
+A guest must go provided with a lawn-tennis costume, if he plays that
+noble game which has become the great consolation of our rising
+generation. No doubt the hostess blesses the invention of this great
+time killer, as she sees her men and maidens trooping out to the
+ground, under the trees. This suggests the subject of out-of-door
+refreshment, the claret cup, the champagne cup, the shandy gaff, the
+fresh cider, and the thousand and one throat-coolers, for which our
+American genius seems to have been inspired to meet the drain of a
+very dry climate, and which we shall consider elsewhere.
+
+
+
+
+ENTERTAINING IN A COUNTRY HOUSE.
+
+     We who love the country salute you who love the town. I praise
+     the rivulets, the rocks overgrown with moss, and the groves of
+     the delightful country. And do you ask why? I live and reign
+     as soon as I have quitted those things which you extol to the
+     skies with joyful applause, and like a priest's fugitive-slave
+     I reject luscious wafers; I desire plain bread, which is more
+     agreeable than honied cakes.--HORACE, _Ode_ X.
+
+
+Poets have been in the habit of praising a country life since the days
+of Homer, but Americans have not as a people appreciated its joys. As
+soon as a countryman was able to do it, he moved to the largest city
+near him, presumably New York, or perhaps Paris. The condition of
+opulence, much desired by those who had been bred in poverty,
+suggested at once the greater convenience of a town life, and the busy
+work-a-day world, to which most Americans are born, necessitates the
+nearness to Wall Street, to banks, to people, and to the town.
+
+City people were content formerly to give their children six weeks of
+country air, and old New Yorkers did not move out of the then small
+city, even in the hot months. The idea of going to the country to live
+for pleasure, to find in it a place in which to spend one's money and
+to entertain, has been, to the average American mind, a thing of
+recent growth. Perhaps our climate has much to do with this. People
+bred in the country feared to meet that long cold winter of the
+North, which even to the well-to-do was filled with suffering. Who
+does not remember the ice in the pitcher of a morning, which must be
+broken before even faces were washed?
+
+Therefore the furnace-heated city house, the companionship, the
+bustle, the stir, and convenience of a city has been, naturally
+enough, preferred to the loneliness of the country. As Hawthorne once
+said, Americans were not yet sufficiently civilized to live in the
+country. When he went to England, and saw a different order of things,
+he understood why.
+
+England, a small place with two thousand years of civilization, with
+admirable roads, with landed estates, with a mild winter, with a taste
+for sport, with dogs, horses, and well-trained servants, was a very
+different place.
+
+It may be years before we make our country life as agreeable as it is
+in England. We have to conquer climate first. But the love of country
+life is growing in America. Those so fortunate as to be able to live
+in a climate like that of southern California can certainly quote
+Horace with sympathy. Those who live so near to a great city as to
+command at once city conveniences and country air and freedom, are
+amongst the fortunate of the earth. And to hundreds, thousands of
+such, in our delightfully prosperous new country, the art of
+entertaining in a country house assumes a new interest.
+
+No better model for a hostess can be found than an Englishwoman. There
+is, when she receives her guests, a quiet cordiality, a sense of
+pleasurable expectancy, an inbred ease, grace, suavity, composure, and
+respect for her visitors, which seems to come naturally to a
+well-bred Englishwoman; that is to say, to the best types of the
+highest class. To be sure they have had vast experience in the art of
+entertaining; they have learned this useful accomplishment from a long
+line of well-trained predecessors. They have no domestic cares to
+worry them. At the head of her own house, an Englishwoman is as near
+perfection as a human being can be.
+
+There is the great advantage of the English climate, to begin with. It
+is less exciting than ours. Nervous women are there almost unknown.
+Their ability to take exercise, the moist and soft air they breathe,
+their good appetite and healthy digestion give English women a
+physical condition almost always denied to an American.
+
+Our climate drives us on by invisible whips; we breathe oxygen more
+intoxicating than champagne. The great servant question bothers us
+from the cradle to the grave; it has never entered into an English
+woman's scheme of annoyance, so that in an English hostess there is a
+total absence of fussiness.
+
+English women spend the greater part of the year in travelling, or at
+home in the country. Town life is with them a matter of six weeks or
+three months at the most. They are fond of nature, of walking, of
+riding; they share with the men a more vigorous physique than is given
+to any other race. A French or Italian woman dreads a long walk, the
+companionship of a dozen dogs, the yachting and the race course, the
+hunting-field and the lawn tennis pursued with indefatigable
+vigilance; but the fair English girl, with her blushing cheeks, her
+dog, her pony, and her hands full of wild flowers, is a character
+worth crossing the ocean to see. She is the product of the highest
+civilization, and as such is still near the divine model which nature
+furnishes. She has the underlying charm of simplicity, she is the
+very rose of perfect womanhood. She may seem shy, awkward, and
+reserved, but what the world calls pride or coldness may turn out to
+be hidden virtue, or reserve, or modesty.
+
+English home education is a seminary of infinite importance; a girl
+learns to control her speech, to be always calm and well-bred. She has
+been toned down from her youth. She has been carefully taught to
+respect the duties of her high position; she has this advantage to
+counterbalance the disadvantage which we freeborn citizens think may
+come with an overpride of birth,--she has learned the motto _noblesse
+oblige_. The English fireside is a beacon light forever to the soldier
+in the Crimea, to the colonist in Australia, to the grave official in
+India, to the missionary in the South Seas, to the English boy
+wherever he may be. It sustains and ennobles the English woman at home
+and abroad.
+
+As a hostess, the English woman is sure to mould her house to look
+like home. She has soft low couches for those who like them,
+high-backed tall chairs for the tall, low chairs for the lowly. She
+has her bookcases and pretty china scattered everywhere, she has
+work-baskets and writing-tables and flowers, particularly wild ones,
+which look as if she had tossed them in the vases herself. Her house
+looks cheerful and cultivated.
+
+I use the word advisedly, for all taste must be cultivated. A state
+apartment in an old English house can be inexpressibly dreary. High
+ceilings, stiff old girandoles, pictures of ancestors, miles of
+mirrors, and the Laocoön or other specimens of Grecian art, which no
+one cares for except in the Vatican, and the ceramic and historical
+horrors of some old collector, who had no taste,--are enough to
+frighten a visitor. But when a young or an experienced English
+hostess has smiled on such a house, there will be some delightful
+lumber strewn around, no end of pretty brackets and baskets and
+curtains and screens, and couches piled high with cushions; and then
+the quaint carvings, the rather affected niches, the mantelpiece
+nearly up to the ceiling, as in Hogarth's picture,--all these become
+humanized by her touch. The spirit of a hostess should aim at the
+combination of use and beauty. Some finer spirits command both, as
+Brunelleschi hung the dome at Florence high in air, and made a thing
+of beauty, which is a joy forever, but did not forget to build under
+it a convenient church as well. As for the bedrooms in an English
+country house, they transcend description, they are the very
+apotheosis of comfort.
+
+The dinners are excellent, the breakfast and lunch comfortable,
+informal, and easy, the horses are at your disposal, the lawn and
+garden are yours for a stroll, the chapel lies near at hand, where you
+can study architecture and ancient brass. There are pleasant people in
+the house, you are let alone, you are not being entertained. That most
+dreadful of sensations, that somebody has you on his mind, and must
+show you photographs and lift off your _ennui_ is absent; you seem to
+be in Paradise.
+
+English people will tell you that house parties are dull,--not that
+all are, but some are. No doubt the jaded senses lose the power of
+being pleased. A visit to an English house, to an American who brings
+with her a fresh sense of enjoyment, and who remembers the limitations
+of a new country, one who loves antiquity, history, old pictures, and
+all that time can do, one who is hungry for Old World refinements, to
+such an one a visit to an English country house is delightful. To a
+worn-out English set whose business it has been for a quarter of a
+century to go from one house to another, no doubt it is dull. Some
+unusual distraction is craved.
+
+"To relieve the monotony and silence and the dull, depressing cloud
+which sometimes settles on the most admirably arranged English
+dinner-party, even an American savage would be welcomed," says a
+modern novel-writer. How much more welcome then is a pretty young
+woman who, with a true enthusiasm and a wild liberty, has found her
+opportunity and uses it, plays the banjo, tells fortunes by the hand,
+has no fear of rank, is in her set a glacier of freshness with a heart
+of fire, like Roman punch.
+
+How much more gladly is a young American woman welcomed, in such a
+house, and how soon her head is turned. She is popular until she
+carries off the eldest son, and then she is severely criticised, and
+by her spoiled caprices becomes a heroine for Ouida to rejoice in, and
+the _fond_ of a society novel.
+
+But the glory is departing from many a stately English country house.
+Fortune is failing them; they are, many of them, to rent. Rich
+Americans are buying their old pictures. The Gainsboroughs, the Joshua
+Reynoldses, the Rembrandts, which have been the pride of English
+country houses, are coming down, charmed by the silver music of the
+almighty dollar; the old fairy tale is coming true,--even the
+furniture dances.
+
+We have the money and we have the vivacity, according to even our
+severest critics; we have now to cultivate the repose of an English
+hostess, if we would make our country houses as agreeable as she does.
+
+We cannot improvise the antiquity, or the old chapel, or the brasses;
+we cannot make our roads as fine as those which enable an English
+house party to drive sixteen miles to a dinner; in fact we must admit
+that they have been nine hundred years making a lawn even. But we must
+try to do things our own way, and use our own advantages so that we
+can make our guests comfortable.
+
+The American autumn is the most glorious of seasons for entertaining
+in a country house. Nature hangs our hillsides then with a tapestry
+that has no equal even at Windsor. The weather, that article which in
+America is so apt to be good that if it is bad we apologize for it, is
+more than apt to be good in October, and makes the duties of a hostess
+easy then, for Nature helps to entertain.
+
+It is to be feared that we have not yet learned to be guests. Trusting
+to that boundless American hospitality which has been apt to say,
+"Come when you please and stay as long as you can," we decline an
+invitation for the 6th, saying we can come on the 9th. This cannot be
+done when people begin to give house-parties. We must go on the 6th or
+not at all.
+
+We should also define the limits of a visit, as in England; one is
+asked on Wednesday to arrive at five, to leave at eleven on Saturday.
+Then one does not overstay one's welcome. Host and hostess and guest
+must thoroughly understand one another on this point, and then
+punctuality is the only thing to be considered.
+
+The opulent, who have butler, footman, and French cooks, need read no
+further in this chapter, the remainder of which will be directed to
+that larger class who have neither, and who have to help themselves.
+No lady should attempt to entertain in the country who has not a good
+cook, and one or two attendant maids who can wait well and perform
+other duties about the house. With these three and with a good deal of
+knowledge herself, a hostess can make a country house attractive.
+
+The dining-room should be the most agreeable room in the house, shaded
+in the morning and cool in the afternoon,--a large room with a
+hard-wood floor and mats, if possible, as these are clean and cool.
+
+Carving should be done by one of the servants at a side table. There
+is nothing more depressing on a warm evening than a smoking joint
+before one's plate. A light soup only should be served, leaving the
+more substantial varieties for cold weather.
+
+Nowadays the china and glass are so very pretty, and so very cheap,
+that they can be bought and used and left in the house all winter
+without much risk. If people are living in the country all winter a
+different style of furnishing, and a different style of entertaining
+is no doubt in order.
+
+It is well to have very easy laws about breakfast, and allow a guest
+to descend when he wishes. If possible give your guest an opportunity
+to breakfast in his room. So many people nowadays want simply a cup of
+tea, and to wait until noon before eating a heavy meal; so many desire
+to eat steaks, chops, toast, eggs, hot cakes, and coffee at nine
+o'clock, that it is difficult for a hostess to know what to do. Her
+best plan, perhaps, is to have an elastic hour, and let her people
+come down when they feel like it. In England the maid enters the
+bedroom with tea, excellent black tea, a toasted muffin, and two
+boiled eggs at eight o'clock, a pitcher of hot water for the
+wash-stand, and a bath. No one is obliged to appear until luncheon,
+nor even then if indisposed so to do. Dinner at whatever hour is a
+formal meal, and every one should come freshly dressed and in good
+form, as the English say.
+
+The Arab law of hospitality should be printed over every lintel in a
+country house: "Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest;" "He who
+tastes my salt is sacred; neither I nor my household shall attack him,
+nor shall one word be said against him. Bring corn, wine, and fruit
+for the passing stranger. Give the one who departs from thy tents the
+swiftest horse. Let him who would go from thee take the fleet
+dromedary, reserve the lame one for thyself." If these momentous hints
+were carried out in America, and if these children of the desert, with
+their grave faces, composed manners, and noble creed, could be
+literally obeyed, we fear country-house visiting would become almost
+too popular.
+
+But if we cannot give them the fleet dromedary, we can drive them to
+the fast train, which is much better than any dromedary. We can make
+them comfortable, and enable them to do as they like. Unless we can do
+that, we should not invite any one.
+
+Unless a guest has been rude, it is the worst taste to criticise him.
+He has come at your request. He has entered your house as an altar of
+safety, an ark of refuge. He has laid his armour down. Your kind
+welcome has unlocked his reserve. He has spoken freely, and felt that
+he was in the presence of friends. If in this careless hour you have
+discovered his weak spot, be careful how you attack it. The intimate
+unreserve of a guest should be respected.
+
+And upon the guest an equal, nay, a superior conscientiousness should
+rest, as to any revelation of the secrets he may have found out while
+he was a visitor. No person should go from house to house bearing
+tales. We do not go to our friend's house to find the skeleton in the
+closet. No criticisms of the weaknesses or eccentricities of any
+member of the family should ever be heard from the lips of a guest.
+"Whose bread I have eaten, he is henceforth my brother," is another
+Arab proverb.
+
+Speak well always of your entertainers, but speak little of their
+domestic arrangements. Do not violate the sanctity of the fireside, or
+wrong the shelter of the roof-tree which has lent you its protection
+for even a night.
+
+The decorations for a country ballroom, in a rural neighbourhood, have
+called forth many an unknown genius in that art which has become the
+well-known profession of interior decoration. The favourite place in
+Lenox, and at many a summer resort, has been the large floor of a new
+barn. Before the equine tenants begin to champ their oats, the youths
+and maids assume the right to trip the light fantastic toe on the
+well-laid hard floor. The ornamentations at such a ball at Lenox were
+candles put in pine shields, with tin holders, and decorations of corn
+and wheat sheaves, tied with scarlet ribbons, surrounding pumpkins
+which were laid in improvised brackets, hastily cut out of pine, with
+hatchets, by the young men. Magnificent autumn leaves were arranged
+with ferns as garlands, and many were the devices for putting candles
+and kerosene lamps behind these so as to give almost the effect of
+stained glass, without causing a general conflagration.
+
+The effect of a pumpkin surrounded by autumn leaves recalls the
+Gardens of the Hesperides. No apple like those golden apples which we
+call pumpkins was ever seen there. To be sure they are rather large to
+throw to a goddess, and might bowl her down, but they look very
+handsome when tranquilly reposing.
+
+A sort of Druidical procession might be improvised to help along this
+ball, and the hostess would amuse her company for a week with the
+preparations.
+
+First, get a negro fiddler to head it, dressed like Browning's Pied
+Piper in gay colours, and playing his fiddle. Then have a procession
+of children, dressed in gay costumes; following them, "two milk-white
+oxen garlanded" with wreaths of flowers and ribbons, driven by a boy
+in Swiss costume; then a goat-cart with the baby driving two goats,
+also garlanded; next a lovely Alderney cow, also decorated,
+accompanied by a milkmaid, carrying a milking-stool; then another long
+line of children, followed by the youths and maids, bearing the
+decorations for the ballroom. Let all these parade the village street
+and wind up at the ballroom, where the cow can be milked, and a
+surprise of ice cream and cake given to the children. This is a
+Sunday-school picnic and a ball decoration, all in one, and the
+country lady who can give it will have earned the gratitude of
+neighbours and friends. It has been done.
+
+In the spring the decorations of a ballroom might be early wild
+flowers and the delicate ground-pine, far more beautiful than smilax,
+and also ferns, the treasures of the nearest wood.
+
+Wild flowers, ferns, and grasses, the ground-pine, the checkerberry,
+and the partridge berry make the most exquisite garlands, and it is
+only of late--when a few great geniuses have discovered that the field
+daisy is the prettiest of flowers, that the best beauty is that which
+is at our hands wherever we are, that the greatest rarity is the grass
+in the meadow--that we have reached the true meaning of interior
+decoration.
+
+Helen Hunt, in one of her prettiest papers, describes the beauty of
+kinnikinick, a lovely vine which grows all over Colorado. Although we
+have not that, we can even in winter find the hemlock boughs, the
+mistletoe, the holly, for our decorations. Of course, hot-house
+flowers and smilax, if they can be obtained, are very beautiful and
+desirable, but they are not within the reach of every purse, or of
+every country house.
+
+Sheaves of wheat, tied with fine ribbons and placed at intervals
+around a room, can be made to have the beauty of an armorial bearing.
+These, alternating with banners and hemlock boughs, are very
+effective. All these forms which Nature gives us have suggested the
+Corinthian capital, the Ionic pillar, the most graceful of Greek
+carvings. The acanthus leaf was the inspiration of the architect who
+built the Acropolis.
+
+Vine leaves, especially after they begin to turn, are capable of
+infinite suggestion, and we all remember the recent worship of the
+sunflower. Hop vines and clematis, especially after the last has gone
+to seed, remain long as ornaments.
+
+As for the refreshments to be served,--the oyster stew, the ice cream,
+the good home-made cake, coffee, and tea are within the reach of every
+country housekeeper, and are in their way unrivalled. Of course, if
+she wishes she can add chicken salad, boned turkey, _pâté de foie
+gras_, and punch, hot or cold.
+
+If it is in winter, the coachmen outside must not be forgotten. Some
+hot coffee and oysters should be sent to these patient sufferers, for
+our coachmen are not dressed as are the Russians, in fur from head to
+foot. If possible, there should be a good fire in the kitchen, to
+which these attendants on our pleasure could be admitted to thaw out.
+
+
+
+
+A PICNIC.
+
+     "Come hither, come hither, the broom was in blossom all over
+         yon rise,
+     There went a wild murmur of brown bees about it with songs from
+         the wood.
+     We shall never be younger, O Love! let us forth to the world
+         'neath our eyes--
+     Ay! the world is made young, e'en as we, and right fair is her
+         youth, and right good."
+
+
+Appetites flourish in the free air of hills and meadows, and after
+drinking in the ozone of the sea, one feels like drinking something
+else. There is a very good story of a reverend bishop who with a
+friend went a-fishing, like Peter, and being very thirsty essayed to
+draw the cork of a claret bottle. In his zeal he struck his bottle
+against a stone, and the claret oozed out to refresh the thirsty
+earth, instead of that precious porcelain of human clay of which the
+bishop was made. His remark to his friend was, "James, you are a
+layman, why don't you say something?"
+
+Now to avoid having our layman or our reverend wish to say something,
+let us try to suggest what they should eat and what they should drink.
+
+There are many kinds of picnics,--fashionable ones at Newport and
+other watering-places, where the French waiters of the period are told
+to get up a repast as if at the Casino; there are clam-bakes which are
+ideal, and there are picnics at Lenox and at Sharon, where the hotel
+keeper will help to fill the baskets.
+
+But the real picnic, which calls for talent and executive ability,
+should emanate from some country house, where two or three other
+country houses co-operate and help. Then what jolly drives in the
+brakes, what queer old family horses and antediluvian wagons, what
+noble dog-carts, and what prim pony phaetons can join in the
+procession. The day should be fine, and the place selected a hillside
+with trees, commanding a fine view. This is at least desirable. The
+necessity for a short walk, a short scramble after leaving the horses,
+should not be disregarded.
+
+The night before the picnic, which presumably starts early, the lady
+of the house should see to it that a boiled ham of perfect flavour is
+in readiness, and she may flank it with a boiled tongue, four roasted
+chickens, a game pie, and any amount of stale bread to cut into
+sandwiches.
+
+Now a sandwich can be at once the best and the worst thing in the
+world, but to make it the best the bread should be cut very thin, the
+butter, which must be as fresh as a cowslip, should be spread with
+deft fingers, then a slice of ham as thin as a wafer with not too much
+fat must be laid between, with a _soupçon_ of mustard. The prepared
+ham which comes in cans is excellent for making sandwiches. Cheese
+sandwiches, substituting a thin slice of American fresh cheese for the
+ham, are delicious, and some rollicking good-livers toast the cheese.
+
+Tongue, cold beef, and even cold sausages make excellent varieties of
+sandwich. To prevent their becoming the "sand which is under your
+feet" cover them over night with a damp napkin.
+
+Chicken can be eaten for itself alone, but it should be cut into very
+convenient fragments, judiciously salted and wrapped in a very white
+napkin.
+
+The game or veal pie must be in a strong earthen dish, and having been
+baked the day before, its pieces will have amalgamated with the crust,
+and it will cut into easily handled slices.
+
+All must be packed in luncheon baskets with little twisted cornucopias
+holding pepper and salt, hard-boiled eggs, the patty by itself,
+croquettes, if they happen to be made, cold fried oysters, excellent
+if in batter and well-drained after cooking; no article must be
+allowed to touch another.
+
+If cake and pastry be taken, each should have a separate basket. Fruit
+also should be carefully packed by itself, for if food gets mixed and
+mussy, even a mountain appetite will shun it.
+
+A bottle of olives is a welcome addition, and pickles and other
+relishes may be included. Sardines are also in order.
+
+Now what to drink? Cold tea and iced coffee prepared the night before,
+the cream and sugar put in just before starting, should always be
+provided. They are capital things to climb on, to knit up the
+"ravelled sleeve of care," and if somewhat exciting to the nerves,
+will be found the best thirst-quenchers.
+
+These beverages should be carefully bottled and firmly corked,--and
+don't forget the corkscrew. Plenty of tin cups, or those strong glass
+beer-mugs which you can throw across the room without breaking, should
+also be taken.
+
+Claret is the favourite wine for picnics, as being light and
+refreshing. Ginger ale is excellent and cheap and compact.
+"Champagne," says Walter Besant in his novel "By Celia's Arbour" is a
+wine as Catholic as the Athanasian Creed, because it goes well with
+chicken and with the more elaborate _pâté de foie gras_.
+
+Some men prefer sherry with their lunch, some take beer. If you have
+room and a plentiful cellar, take all these things. But tea and coffee
+and ginger ale will do for any one, anywhere.
+
+It has been suggested by those who have suffered losses from
+mischievous friends, that a composite basket containing everything
+should be put in each carriage, but this is refining the matter.
+
+Arrived at the picnic-ground, the whole force should be employed by
+the hostess as an amiable body of waiters. The ladies should set the
+tables, and the men bring water from the spring. The less ceremony the
+better.
+
+Things have not been served in order, they never are at a picnic, and
+the cunning hostess now produces some claret cup. She has made it
+herself since they reached the top of the mountain. Two bottles of
+claret to one of soda water, two lemons, a glass of sherry, a cucumber
+sliced in to give it the most perfect flavour, plenty of sugar and
+ice; and where had she hidden that immense pitcher, a regular brown
+toby, in which she has brewed it?
+
+"I know," said an _enfant terrible_; "I saw her hiding it under the
+back seat."
+
+There it is, filled with claret cup, the most refreshing drink for a
+warm afternoon. Various young persons of opposite sexes, who have been
+looking at each other more than at the game pie, now prepare to
+disappear in the neighbouring paths, under a pretence but feebly made
+of plucking blackberries,--artless dissemblers!
+
+Mamma shouts, "Mary, Caroline, Jane, Tom, Harry, be back before five,
+for we must start for home." May she get them, even at half-past six.
+From a group of peasants over a bunch of sticks in the Black Forest,
+to a queen who delighted to picnic in Fontainebleau, these _al fresco_
+entertainments are ever delicious. We cannot put our ears too close to
+the confessional of Nature. She has always a new secret to tell us,
+and from the most artificial society to that which is primitive and
+rustic, they always carry the same charm. It is the Antæus trying to
+get back to Mother Earth, who strengthens him.
+
+In packing a lunch for a fisherman, or a hunter, the hostess often has
+to explain that brevity is the soul of wit. She must often compress a
+few eatables into the side pocket, and the bottle of claret into the
+fishing-basket. If not, she can palm off on the man one of those tin
+cases which poor little boys carry to school, which look like books
+and have suggestive titles, such as "Essays of Bacon," "Crabbe's
+Tales," or "News from Turkey," on the back. If the fisherman will take
+one of these his sandwiches will arrive in better order.
+
+The Western hunter takes a few beans and some slices of pork, some say
+in his hat, when he goes off on the warpath. The modern hunter or
+fisher, if he drive to the meet or the burn, can be trusted with an
+orthodox lunch-basket, which should hold cold tea, cold game-pie, a
+few olives, and a bit of cheese, and a large reserve of sandwiches.
+When we grow more celestial, when we achieve the physical theory of
+another life, we may know how to concentrate good eating in a more
+portable form than that of the sandwich, but we do not know it yet.
+
+Take an egg sandwich,--hard-boiled eggs chopped, and laid between the
+bread and butter. Can anything be more like the sonnet?--complete in
+only fourteen lines, and yet perfection! Only indefinite chicken,
+wheaten flour, the milk of the cow, all that goes to make up our daily
+food in one little compact rectangle! Egg sandwich! It is immense in
+its concentration.
+
+Some people like to take salads and apple pies to picnics. There are
+great moral objections to thus exposing these two delicacies to the
+rough experiences of a picnic. A salad, however well dressed, is an
+oily and slippery enjoyment. Like all great joys, it is apt to escape
+us, especially in a lunch basket. Apple pie, most delicate of pasties,
+will exude, and you are apt to find the crust on the top of the
+basket, and the apple in the bottom of the carriage.
+
+If you will take salad, and will not be taught by experience, make a
+perfect _jardinière_ of all the cold vegetables, green peas, beans,
+and cauliflower, green peppers, cucumbers, and cold potatoes, and take
+this mixture dry to the picnic. Have your mayonnaise in a bottle, and
+dress the salad with it after sitting down, on a very slippery, ferny
+rock, at the table. Truth compels the historian to observe, that this
+is delicious with the ham, and you will not mind in the least, until
+the next day, the large grease-spot on the side breadth of your gown.
+
+As for the apple pie, that is taken at the risk of the owner. It had
+better be left at home for tea.
+
+Of course, _pâté de foie gras_, sandwiches, boned turkey, jellied
+tongue, the various cold birds, as partridges, quails, pheasant, and
+chicken, and raw oysters, can be taken to a very elaborate picnic near
+a large town. Salmon dressed with green sauce, lobster salad, every
+kind of salad, is in order if you can only get it there, and
+"_caviare_ to the general." Cold terrapin is not to be despised; eaten
+on a bit of bread it is an excellent dainty, and so is the cold fried
+oyster.
+
+Public picnics, like Sunday-school picnics, fed with ice cream and
+strawberries; or the clam bake, a unique and enjoyable affair by the
+sea, are in the hands of experts, and need no description here. The
+French people picnic every day in the _Bois de Boulogne_, the woods of
+Versailles, and even on their asphalt, eating out of doors when they
+can. It is a very strange thing that we do not improve our fine
+climate by eating our dinners and breakfasts with the full draught of
+an unrivalled ozone.
+
+
+
+
+PASTIMES OF LADIES.
+
+     Her feet beneath her petticoat,
+       Like little mice, stole in and out,
+     As if they feared the light;
+       But oh, she dances such a way!
+       No sun upon an Easter day
+         Is half so fine a sight.
+                        SIR JOHN SUCKLING.
+
+
+The "London Times" says that the present season has seen "driving jump
+to a great height of favour amongst fashionable women."
+
+It is a curious expression, but enlightens us as to the liberty which
+even so great an authority takes with our common language. There is no
+doubt of the fact that the pony phaeton and the pair of ponies are
+becoming a great necessity to an energetic woman. The little pony and
+the Ralli cart, as a ladies' pastime, is a familiar figure in the
+season at Newport, at a thousand country places, at the seaside, in
+our own Central Park, and all through the West and South.
+
+It has been much more the custom for ladies in the West and South to
+drive themselves, than for those at the North; consequently they drive
+better. Only those who know how to drive well ought ever to attempt
+it, for they not only endanger their own lives, but a dozen other
+lives. Whoever has seen a runaway carriage strike another vehicle, and
+has beheld the breaking up, can realize for the first time the
+tremendous force of an object in motion. The little Ralli cart can
+become a battering-ram of prodigious force.
+
+No form of recreation is so useful and so becoming as horseback
+exercise. No English woman looks so well as when turned out for
+out-of-door exercise. And our American women, who buy their habits and
+hats in London, are getting to have the same _chic_. Indeed, so
+immensely superior is the London habit considered, that the French
+circus-women who ride in the Bois, making so great a sensation, go
+over to London to have their habits made, and thus return the
+compliment which English ladies pay to Paris, in having all their
+dinner gowns and tea gowns made there. Perhaps disliking this sort of
+copy, the Englishwomen are becoming careless of their appearance on
+horseback, and are coming out in a straw hat, a covert coat, and a
+cotton skirt.
+
+The soft felt hat has long been a favourite on the Continent, at
+watering-places for the English; and it is much easier for the head.
+Still, in case of a fall it does not save the head like a hard,
+masculine hat.
+
+We have not yet, as a nation, taken to cycling for women; but many
+Englishwomen go all over the globe on a tricycle. A husband and wife
+are often seen on a tricycle near London, and women who lead sedentary
+lives, in offices and schools, enjoy many of their Saturday afternoons
+in this way.
+
+Boating needs to be cultivated in America. It is a superb exercise for
+developing a good figure; and to manage a punt has become a common
+accomplishment for the riverside girls. Ladies have regattas on the
+Thames.
+
+Fencing, which many actresses learn, is a very admirable process for
+developing the figure. The young Princesses of Wales are adepts in
+this. It requires an outfit consisting of a dainty tunic reaching to
+the knees, a fencing-jacket of soft leather with tight sleeves,
+gauntlet gloves, a mask, a pair of foils, and costing about fifteen
+dollars.
+
+American women as a rule are not fond of walking. There must be
+something in the nature of an attraction or a duty to rouse our
+delicate girls to walk. They will not do it for their health alone.
+Gymnastic teaching is, however, giving them more strength, and it
+would be well if in every family of daughters there were some
+calisthenic training, to develop the muscles, and to induce a more
+graceful walk.
+
+To teach a girl to swim is almost a duty, and such splendid physical
+exercises will have a great influence over that nervous distress which
+our climate produces with its over-fulness of oxygen.
+
+If girls do not like to walk, they all like to dance, and it is not
+intended as a pun when we mention that "a great jump" has been made
+back to the old-fashioned dancing, in which freedom of movement is
+allowed. Those who saw Mary Anderson's matchless grace in the Winter's
+Tale all tried to go and dance like her, and to see Ellen Terry's
+spring, as the pretty Olivia, teaches one how entirely beautiful is
+this strong command of one's muscles. From the German cotillion, back
+to the Virginia reel, is indeed a bound.
+
+Our grandfathers knew how to dance. We are fast getting back to them.
+The traditions of Taglioni still lingered fifty years ago. The
+earliest dancing-masters were Frenchmen, and our ancestors were taught
+to _pirouette_ as did Vestris when he was so obliging as to say after
+a royal command, "The house of Vestris has always danced for that of
+Bourbon."
+
+The galop has, during the long langour of the dance, alone held its
+own, in the matter of jollity. The glide waltz, the redowa, the
+stately minuet, give only the slow and graceful motions. The galop has
+always been a great favourite with the Swedes, Danes, and Russians,
+while the redowa reminds one of the graceful Viennese who dance it so
+well. The mazourka, danced to wild Polish music, is a poetical and
+active affair.
+
+The introduction of Hungarian bands and Hungarian music is another
+reason why dancing has become a "hop, skip and a bound," without
+losing dignity or grace. Activity need not be vulgar.
+
+The German cotillion, born many years ago at Vienna to meet the
+requirements of court etiquette, is still the fashionable dance with
+which the ball closes. Its favours, beginning with flowers and ribbons
+and bits of tinsel, have now ripened into fans, bracelets, gold
+scarf-pins and pencil-cases, and many things more expensive. Favours
+may cost five thousand dollars for a fashionable ball, or dance, as
+they say in London.
+
+The German is a dance of infinite variety, and to lead it requires a
+man of head. One such leader, who can construct new figures, becomes a
+power in society. The waltz, galop, redowa, and polka step can all be
+utilized in it. There is a slow walk in the quadrille figure, a
+stately march, the bows and courtesies of the old minuet, and above
+all, the _tour de valse_, which is the means of locomotion from place
+to place. The changeful exigencies of the various figures lead the
+forty or fifty, or the two hundred to meet, exchange greetings, dance
+with each other, and change their geographical position many times.
+Indeed no army goes through more evolutions.
+
+A pretty figure is _La Corbeille, l'Anneau, et la Fleur_. The first
+couple performs a _tour de valse_, after which the gentleman presents
+the lady with a basket, containing a ring and a flower, then resumes
+his seat. The lady presents the ring to one gentleman, the flower to
+another, and the basket to the third. The gentleman to whom she
+presents the ring selects a partner for himself, the gentleman who
+receives the flower dances with the lady who presents it, while the
+other gentleman holds the basket in his hand and dances alone.
+
+The kaleidoscope is one of the prettiest figures. The four couples
+perform a _tour de valse_, then form as for a quadrille; the next four
+couples in order take positions behind the first four couples, each of
+the latter couples facing the same as the couples in front. At a
+signal from the leader, the ladies of the inner couples cross right
+hands, move entirely round and turn into places by giving left hands
+to their partners. At the same time the outer couples waltz half round
+to opposite places. At another signal the inner couples waltz entirely
+round, and finish facing outward. At the same time the outer couples
+_chassent croisé_ and turn at corners with right hands, then
+_dechassent_ and turn partners with left hands. Valse _générale_ with
+_vis à vis_.
+
+_La Cavalier Trompé_ is another favourite figure. Five or six couples
+perform a _tour de valse_. They afterwards place themselves in ranks
+of two, one couple behind the other. The lady of the first gentleman
+leaves him and seeks a gentleman of another column. While this is
+going on the first gentleman must not look behind him. The first lady
+and the gentleman whom she has selected separate and advance on
+tip-toe on each side of the column, in order to deceive the gentleman
+at the head, and endeavour to join each other for a waltz. If the
+first gentleman is fortunate enough to seize his lady, he leads off in
+a waltz; if not, he must remain at his post until he is able to take a
+lady. The last gentleman remaining dances with the last lady.
+
+To give a German in a private house, a lady has all the furniture
+removed from her parlours, the floor covered with crash over the
+carpet, and a set of folding-chairs for the couples to sit in. A bare
+wooden floor is preferable to the carpet and crash.
+
+It is considered that all taking part in a German are introduced to
+one another, and on no condition whatever must a lady, so long as she
+remains in the German, refuse to speak or to dance with any gentleman
+whom she may chance to receive as a partner. Every American should
+learn that he can speak to any one whom he meets at a friend's house.
+The roof is an introduction, and, for the purpose of making his
+hostess comfortable, the guest should, at dinner-party and dance,
+speak to his next neighbour.
+
+The laws of the German are so strict, and to many so tiresome, that a
+good many parties have abjured it, and merely dance the round dances,
+the lancers and quadrilles, winding up with the Sir Roger de Coverley
+or the Virginia Reel.
+
+The leader of the German must have a comprehensive glance, a quick ear
+and eye, and a great belief in himself. General Edward Ferrero, who
+made a good general, declared that he owed all his success in war to
+his training as a dancing-master. With all other qualities, the leader
+of the German must have tact. It is no easy matter to get two hundred
+people into all sorts of combinations and mazes and then to get them
+out again, to offend nobody, and to produce that elegant kaleidoscope
+called the German.
+
+The term _tour de valse_ is used technically, meaning that the couple
+or couples performing it execute the round dance designated by the
+leader once round the room. Should the room be small, they make a
+second tour. After the introductory _tour de valse_ care must be taken
+by those who perform it not to select ladies and gentlemen who are on
+the floor, but from among those who are seated. When the leader claps
+his hands to warn those who are prolonging the valse, they must
+immediately cease dancing.
+
+The favours for the German are often fans, and this time-honoured,
+historic article grows in beauty and expense every day. And what
+various memories come in with the fan! It was created in primeval
+ages. The Egyptian ladies had fans of lotus leaves; and lately a
+breakfast was given all in Egyptian fashion, except the eating. The
+Roman ladies carried immense fans of peacocks' feathers. They did not
+open and shut like ours, opening and shutting being a modern
+invention. The _flabilliferaor_ or fan-bearer, was some young
+attendant, generally female, whose common business it was to carry her
+mistress's fan. There is a Pompeian painting of Cupid as the
+fan-bearer of Ariadne, lamenting her desertion by Theseus. In Queen
+Elizabeth's day the fan was usually made of feathers, like that still
+used in the East. The handle was richly ornamented and set with
+stones. A fashionable lady was never without her fan, which was held
+to her girdle by a jewelled chain. That fashion, with the large
+feathers, has returned in our day. Queen Elizabeth dropped a
+silver-handled fan into the moat at Arnstead Hall, which occasioned
+many madrigals. Sir Francis Drake presented to his royal mistress a
+fan of feathers, white and red, enamelled with a half-moon of
+mother-of-pearl. Poor Leicester gave her, as his New Year's gift in
+1574, a fan of white feathers set in a handle of gold, adorned on one
+side with two very fair emeralds, and fully garnished with rubies and
+diamonds, and on each side a white bear,--his cognizance,--and two
+pearls hanging, a lion rampant and a white, muzzled bear at his foot.
+Just before Christmas in 1595 Elizabeth went to Kew, and dined at my
+Lord Keeper's house, and there was handed her a fine fan with a handle
+garnished with diamonds.
+
+Fans in Shakspeare's time seem to have been composed of ostrich and
+other feathers, fastened to handles. Gentlemen carried fans in those
+days, and in one of the later figures of the German they now carry
+fans. According to an old manuscript in the Ashmolean Museum, Sir
+Edward Cole rode the circuit with a prodigious fan, which had a long
+stick with which he corrected his daughters. Let us hope that that
+custom will not be reintroduced.
+
+The vellum fans painted by Watteau, and the lovely fans of Spain
+enriched with jewels are rather too expensive for favours for the
+German; one very rich entertainer gave away tortoise-shell fans with
+jewelled sticks, two years ago, at Delmonico's. Fans of silk,
+egg-shaped, and painted with birds, were used for an Easter German.
+
+Ribbons were used for a cotillon dinner with very good effect. "From
+the chandelier in the centre of the dining room," we read, "depended
+twenty scarfs of grosgrain ribbon, each three and a half yards long
+and nine inches wide, heavily fringed and richly adorned at both ends
+with paintings of flowers and foliage. These scarfs were so arranged
+that an end of each came down to the place one of the ladies was to
+occupy at the table, and care was taken in their selection to have
+colours harmonizing with the ladies' dress and complexion."
+
+These cotillion dinners have been a pretty fashion for two or three
+winters, as they enable four or five young hostesses to each give a
+dinner, the whole four to meet with their guests at one house for a
+small German, after the dinner. Each hostess compares her list with
+that of her neighbour, that there shall be no confusion. It is
+believed that this device was the invention of the incomparable Mr.
+McAllister, to whom society owes a great deal. Fashionable society
+like the German must have a leader, some one who will take trouble,
+and think out these elaborate details. Nowhere in Europe is so much
+pains taken about such details as with us.
+
+The _menus_ of these cotillion dinners are often water-colour
+paintings, worthy of preservation; sometimes a scene from one of
+Shakspeare's plays, sometimes a copy of some famous French
+picture,--in either case something delightfully artistic.
+
+For a supper after a dance the dishes are placed on the table, and it
+is served _en buffet_; but for a sit-down supper, served at little
+tables, the service should be exactly like a dinner except that there
+is no soup or fish.
+
+The manner of using flowers in America at such entertainments is
+simply bewildering. A climbing rose will seem to be going everywhere
+over an invisible trellis; delicate green vines will depend from the
+chandelier, dropping roses; roses cover the entire table-cloth; or
+perhaps the flowers are massed, all of yellow, or of white, or red, or
+pink.
+
+Nothing could exceed the magnificence of the great baskets of white
+and yellow chrysanthemums, roses, violets, and carnations, at a
+breakfast given to the Comte de Paris, at Delmonico's on October 20th,
+and at the subsequent dinner given him by his brother officers of the
+Army of the Potomac. His royal arms were in white flowers, the _fleur
+de lis_ of Joan of Arc, on a blue ground of flowers. Jacqueminot Roses
+went up and down the table, with the words "Grand Army of the Potomac"
+in white flowers.
+
+The orchid, that most regal and expensive of all flowers, a single
+specimen often costing many dollars, was used by a lady to make an
+imitation fire, the wood, the flames, and all consisting of flowers
+placed in a most artistic chimney-piece.
+
+Indeed, the cost of the cut flowers used in New York in one winter for
+entertaining is said to be five millions of dollars. Orchids have this
+advantage over other flowers--they have no scent; and that in a mixed
+company and a hot room is an advantage, for some people cannot bear
+even the perfume of a rose.
+
+A large lump of ice, with flowers trained over it, is a delightfully
+refreshing adornment for a hot ballroom. In grand party decorations,
+like one given by the Prince of Wales to the Czarina of Russia, ten
+tons of ice were used as an ornamental rockery. In smaller rooms the
+glacier can be cut out and its base hidden in a tub, lights put behind
+it and flowers and green vines draped over it. The effect is magical.
+The flowers are kept fresh, the white column looks always well, and
+the coolness it diffuses is delicious. It might, by way of contrast
+to the Dark Continent, be a complimentary decoration for a supper to
+be given to Mr. Stanley, to ornament the ballroom with Arctic
+bowlders, around which should be hung the tropical flowers and vines
+of Africa.
+
+
+
+
+PRIVATE THEATRICALS.
+
+     A poor thing, my masters, not the real thing at all, a base
+     imitation, but still a good enough mock-orange, if you cannot
+     have the real thing.--OLD PLAY.
+
+
+Some of our opulent citizens in the West, particularly in that
+wondrous city Chicago, which is nearer to Aladdin's Lamp than anything
+else I have seen, have built private theatres in their palaces. This
+is taking time by the forelock, and arranging for a whole family of
+coming histrionic geniuses.
+
+When all the arrangements for private theatricals must be
+improvised,--and, indeed, it is a greater achievement to play in a
+barn than on the best stage,--the following hints may prove
+serviceable.
+
+Wherever the amateur actor elects to play, he must consider the
+extraneous space behind the acting arena necessary for his exits and
+entrances, and his theatrical properties. In an ordinary house the
+back parlour, with two doors opening into the dining-room, makes an
+ideal theatre, for the exits can be masked and the space is especially
+useful. At least one door opening into another room is absolutely
+necessary, if no better arrangement can be made. The best stage, of
+course, is like that of a theatre, raised, with space at the back and
+sides, for the players to retire to, and issue from. But if nothing
+better can be managed, a pair of screens and a curtain will do.
+
+It is hardly necessary to say that all these arrangements depend on
+the requirements of the play and its legitimate business, which may
+demand a table, a bureau, a piano, or a bed. That very funny piece
+"Box and Cox" needs nothing but a bed, a table, and a fireplace. And
+here we would say to the youthful actor, Select your play at first
+with a view to its requiring little change of scene, and not much
+furniture. A young actor needs space. He is embarrassed by too many
+chairs and tables. Then choose a play which has so much varied
+incident that it will play itself.
+
+The first thing is to build the stage. Any carpenter will lay a few
+stout boards on end pieces, which are simply squared joists, and for
+very little money will take away the boards and joists afterwards, so
+that a satisfactory stage can be built for a few dollars. Sometimes,
+ingenious boys build their own stage with a few boxes, but this is apt
+to be dangerous. Very few families are without an old carpet which
+will serve for a stage covering; and if this is lacking, green baize
+is very cheap. A whole stage fitting, curtains and all, can be made of
+green baize.
+
+Footlights may be made of tin, with bits of candle put in; or a row of
+old bottles of equal height, with candles stuck in the mouth, make a
+most admirable and cheap set of footlights.
+
+The curtain is always difficult to arrange, especially in a parlour. A
+light wooden frame should be made by the carpenter,--firm at the
+joints, and as high as the room allows. Attached to the stage, at the
+foot, this frame forms three sides of a square. The curtain must be
+firmly nailed to the top piece. A stiff wire should be run along the
+lower edge of the curtain, and a number of rings attached to the back
+of it, in squares,--three rows, of four rings each, extending from top
+to bottom. Three cords are now fastened to the wire, and passing
+through the rings are run over three pulleys on the upper piece of the
+frame. It is well for all young managers of garret theatres to get up
+one of these curtains, even with the help of an upholsterer, as the
+other draw-curtain never works so securely, and often hurts the
+_dénouement_ of the play. When the drop curtain above described is
+used, one person holds all the strings, and it pulls together.
+
+Now for the stage properties. They are easily made. A boy who can
+paint a little will indicate a scene, with black paint, on a white
+ground; tinsel paper, red flannel, and old finery will supply the
+fancy dresses.
+
+A stage manager who is a natural born leader is indispensable. Certain
+ambitious amateurs performed the opera of "Patience" in New York. It
+would have been a failure but for the musical talent of the two who
+took the title _rôles_, and the diligent six weeks' training which the
+players received at the hand of the principal actor in the real
+operetta. This seems very dear for the whistle, when one can go and
+hear the real tune. It is in places where the real play cannot be
+heard, that amateur theatricals are of importance.
+
+Young men at college get up the best of all amateur plays, because
+they are realistic, and stop at nothing to make strong outlines and
+deep shadows. They, too, buy many properties like wigs and dresses,
+and give study and observation to the make-up of the character.
+
+If they need a comic face they have an artist from the theatre put it
+on with a camel's-hair pencil. An old man's face, or a brigand's is
+only a bit of water-colour. A pretty girl can be made out of a heavy
+young man by rouge, chalk, and a blond wig. For a drunkard or a
+villain, a few purple spots are painted on chin, cheek, forehead and
+nose, judiciously.
+
+Young girls are apt, in essaying private theatricals, to sacrifice too
+much to prettiness. This is a fatal mistake; one must even sacrifice
+native bloom if the part requires it, or put on rouge, if necessary.
+
+As amusement is the object, the plays had better be comedy than
+tragedy; and no such delicate wordy duels as the "Scrap of Paper,"
+should be attempted, as that requires the highest skill of two great
+actors.
+
+After reading the part and committing the lines to memory, young
+actors must submit to many and long rehearsals. After many of these
+and much study, they must not be discouraged if they grow worse
+instead of better. Perseverance conquers all things, and at last they
+reach the dress rehearsal. This is generally a disappointment, and
+time should be allowed for two dress rehearsals. It is a most
+excellent and advantageous discouragement, if it leads the actors to
+more study.
+
+The stage manager has a difficult _rôle_ to play, for he may discover
+that his actors must change parts. This nearly always excites a
+wounded self-love, and ill-feeling. But each one should bear in mind
+that he is only a part of a perfect whole, and be willing to sacrifice
+himself.
+
+If, however, plays are not successful and cease to amuse, the amateur
+stage can be utilized for _tableaux vivants_, which are always pretty,
+and may be made very artistic. The principle of a picture, the
+pyramidal form, should be closely observed in a tableau.
+
+There should be a square of black tarletan or gauze nailed before the
+picture, between the players and the footlights. The drop curtain
+must be outside of this, and go up and down very carefully, at a
+concerted signal.
+
+Although the pure white light of candles, or lime light, is the best
+for such pictures, very pretty effects can be easily made by the
+introduction of coloured lights, such as are produced by the use of
+nitrate of strontia, chlorate of potash, sulphuret of antimony,
+sulphur, oxymuriate of potassa, metallic arsenic, and pulverized
+charcoal. Muriate of ammonia makes a bluish-green fire, and many
+colours can be obtained by a little study of chemistry.
+
+To make a red fire, take five ounces of nitrate of strontia dry, and
+one and a half ounces finely powdered sulphur; also five drachms
+chlorate of potash, and four drachms sulphuret of antimony. Powder the
+last two separately in a mortar, then mix them on paper and having
+mixed the other ingredients, previously powdered, add these last and
+rub the whole together on paper. To use, mix a little spirits of wine
+with the powder, and burn in a flat iron plate or pan; the effect is
+excellent on the picture.
+
+Sulphate of copper when dissolved in water turns it a beautiful blue.
+The common red cabbage gives three colours. Slice the cabbage and pour
+boiling water on it. When cold add a small quantity of alum, and you
+have purple. Potash dissolved in the water will give a brilliant
+green. A few drops of muriatic acid will turn the cabbage water into
+crimson. Put these various coloured waters in globes, and with candles
+behind them they will throw the light on the picture.
+
+Again, if a ghastly look be required, and a ghost scene be in order,
+mix common salt with spirits of wine in a metal cup, and set it upon
+a wire frame over a spirit lamp. When the cup becomes heated, and the
+spirits of wine ignites, the other lights in the room should be
+extinguished, and that of the spirit lamp hidden from the observer. A
+light will be produced that will make the players seem like the
+witches in Macbeth, "that look not like the inhabitants of the earth,
+but yet are of it."
+
+The burning of common salt produces a very weird effect; for salt has
+properties other than the conservative, preserving, hospitable
+qualities which legend and the daily needs of mankind have ascribed to
+it.
+
+A very pretty effect for Christmas Eve may be made by throwing these
+lights on the highly decorated tree. A set of Christmas tableaux can
+be arranged, giving groups of the early Christians going into the
+Catacombs as the Pagans are going out, with a white shaft of light
+making a cross between them. A picture representing the Christmas of
+each nationality can be made, as for instance the Russian, the
+Norwegian, the Dane, the Swede, the German, the English of three
+hundred years ago. These are all possible to a family in which are
+artistic boys and girls.
+
+The grotesque is lost in a tableau where there seems to be an æsthetic
+need of the heroic, the refined, and the historic. A double action may
+be represented with good effect, and here can be used the coloured
+lights. Angels above, for instance, can well be in another colour than
+sleeping children below.
+
+To return for a moment to the first use of the stage, the play. It is
+a curious thing to see the plays which amateurs act well. The "Rivals"
+is one of these, and so is "Everybody's Friend." "The Follies of a
+Night" plays itself, and "The Happy Pair" goes very well. "A Regular
+Fix," one of Sothern's plays, is exceptionally funny, as is "The
+Liar," in which poor Lester Wallack was so very good. "Woodcock's
+Little Game," too, is excellent.
+
+Cheap and unsophisticated theatricals, such as schoolboys and girls
+can get up in the garret or the basement, are those which give the
+most pleasure. But so strong is the underlying love of the drama that
+youth and maid will attempt the hard and sometimes discouraging work,
+even in cities where professional work is so very much better.
+
+The private amateur player should study to be accurate as to costume.
+Pink-satin Marie Antoinette slippers must not be worn with a Greek
+dress; classic sandals are easily made.
+
+It is an admirable practice to get up a play in French. It helps to
+conquer the _délicatesse_ of the language. The French _répertoire_ is
+very rich in easily acted plays, which any French teacher can
+recommend.
+
+Imitation Negro minstrels are funny, and apt to be better than the
+original. A funny man, a mimic, one who can talk in various dialects,
+is a precious boon to an amateur company. Many of Dion Boucicault's
+Irish characters can be admirably imitated.
+
+In this connection, why not call in the transcendent attraction of
+music? Now that we have lady orchestras, why not have them on the
+stage, or let them be asked to play occasional music between the acts,
+or while the tableaux are on? It adds a great charm.
+
+The family circle in which the brothers have learned the key bugle,
+cornet, trombone, and violoncello, and the sisters the piano and harp,
+and the family that can sing part songs are to be envied. What a
+blessing in the family is the man who can sing comic songs, and who
+does not sing them too often.
+
+A small operetta is often very nicely done by amateurs. We need not
+refer to the lamented "Pinafore," but that sort of thing. Would that
+Sir Arthur would write another "Pinafore!" but, alas! there was never
+but one.
+
+A private theatre is a great addition to a large country house, and it
+can be made cheaply and well by a modern architect. It can be used as
+a ballroom on off evenings, as a dining-room, or for any other
+gathering.
+
+Nothing can be more improving for young people than to study a play.
+Observe the expressions of the Oberammergau peasants, their
+intellectual and happy faces, "informed with thought," and contrast
+them with the faces of the German and Bavarian peasants about them.
+Their old pastor, Deisenberg, by training them in poetry and
+declamation, by founding his well-written play on their old
+traditions, by giving them this highly improving recreation for their
+otherwise starved lives, made another set of human beings of them.
+They have a motive in life besides the mere gathering in of a
+livelihood.
+
+So it would be in any country neighbourhood, however rustic and
+remote, if some bright woman would assemble the young people at her
+house and train them to read and recite, lifting their young souls
+above vulgar gossip, and helping them to understand the older
+dramatists, to even attempt Shakspeare. Funny plays might be thrown in
+to enliven the scene, but there should be a good deal of earnest work
+inculcated as well. Music, that most divine of all the arts, should be
+assiduously cultivated. All the Oberammergau school-masters must be
+musicians, and all the peasants learn how to sing. What a good thing
+it would be if our district school-teachers should learn how to teach
+their scholars part songs.
+
+When the art of entertaining has reached its apotheosis, we feel
+certain that we can have this influence emanating from every opulent
+country house, and that there will be no more complaint of dulness.
+
+
+
+
+HUNTING AND SHOOTING.
+
+     My love shall hear the music of my hounds:
+     Uncouple in the western valley; let them go,--
+     Dispatch, I say, and find the Forester.
+     We will, fair Queen, up to the mountain's top.
+                           MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.
+
+
+Fashion is at her best when she makes men and women love horses, dogs,
+boating, swimming, and all out-of-door games,--when she preaches
+physical culture. It is a good thing to see a man play lawn-tennis
+under a hot sun for hours; you feel that such a man could storm a
+battery. Nothing is more encouraging to the lover of all physical
+culture than the hunting, shooting, boating, and driving mania in the
+United States.
+
+"Hunting" and "shooting" are sometimes used as synonymous terms in
+America; in England they mean quite different things. Hunting is
+riding to hounds without firearms, letting the dogs kill the fox;
+while shooting is to tramp over field, mountain, and through forest
+with dogs and gun, to kill deer, grouse, or partridge. The 12th of
+August is the momentous day, the first of the grouse shooting. Every
+one who can afford it, or who has a friend who can afford it, is off
+for the moors on the 11th, hoping to fill his bag. The 1st of
+September, partridge, and the 1st of October, pheasant shooting, are
+gala days, and the man is little thought of who cannot handle a gun.
+
+In August inveterate fox-hunters meet at four or five o'clock in the
+morning for cub-hunting, which amusement is over by eleven or twelve.
+As the winter comes on the real hunting begins, and lasts until late
+in March. In the midland counties it is the special sport. Melton, in
+Leicestershire, is a noted hunting rendezvous. People, many Americans
+among them, take boxes there for the season, with large stables, and
+beguile the evenings with dinners, dancing, and card-parties. It is a
+sort of winter watering-place without any water, where the wine flows
+in streams every night, and where the brandy flask is filled every
+morning, "in case of accidents" while out with the hounds. An
+enthusiast in riding can be in the saddle ten or twelve hours out of
+every day, except Sunday, which is a dull day at Melton.
+
+All the houses within such a neighbourhood are successively made the
+rendezvous or meet of the hunt. People come from great distances and
+send their horses by rail; others drive or ride in, and send their
+valuable hunters by a groom, who walks them the whole way. The show of
+"pink" is generally good. "Pink" means the scarlet hunting-coat worn
+by the gentlemen, the whippers-in, etc. The weather fades these coats
+to a pale pink very much esteemed by the older men. They suggest the
+scars of a veteran warrior, hence the name. Some men hunt in black,
+but always in top boots. These boots are a cardinal point in a
+sportsman's dandyism.
+
+Once or twice during the season a hunt breakfast is given in the house
+where the meet takes place. This is a pretty scene. All sorts of neat
+broughams, dog-carts, and old family chariots bring the ladies, who
+wear as much scarlet as good taste will allow.
+
+Ladies, with their children, come to these breakfasts, which are
+sumptuous affairs. Great rounds of cold beef, game patties, and salads
+are spread out. All sorts of drinks, from beer up to champagne, are
+offered. One of the ladies of the house sits at the head of the table,
+with a large antique silver urn before her, and with tea and coffee
+ready for those who wish these beverages.
+
+Some girls come on horseback, and look very pretty in their habits.
+These Dianas cut slices of beef and make impromptu sandwiches for
+their friends outside who have not dismounted. The daughters of the
+house stand on the steps while liveried servants hand around cake and
+wine, and others carry foaming tankards of ale, and liberal slices of
+cheese, among the farmers and attendants of the kennel.
+
+It is an in-door and an out-door feast. The hounds are gathered in a
+group, the huntsman standing in the centre cracking his whip, and
+calling each hound by his name. Two or three masters of neighbouring
+packs are talking to the master of the hounds, a prominent gentleman
+of the county, who holds fox-hunting as something sacred, and the
+killing of a fox otherwise than in a legitimate manner as one of the
+seven deadly sins.
+
+Twelve o'clock strikes, and every one begins to move. Generally the
+throw off is at eleven, but in honour of this breakfast a delay has
+been allowed. The huntsman mounts his horse and blows his horn; the
+hounds gather around him, and the whole field starts out. They are
+going to draw the covers at some large plantation above the park. The
+earths, or fox-holes, have been stopped for miles around, so that the
+fox once started has no refuge to make for, and is compelled to give
+the horses a run. It is a fine, manly sport, for with all the odds
+against him, the fox often gets away.
+
+It is a pretty sight. The hounds go first, with nose to the ground,
+searching for the scent. The hunters and whippers-in, professional
+sportsmen, in scarlet coats and velvet jockey caps, ride immediately
+next to them, followed by the field. In a little while a confusion of
+rumours and cries is heard in the wood, various calls are blown on the
+horn, and the frequent cracking of high whips, which sound is used to
+keep the hounds in order, has all the effect of a succession of pistol
+shots. Hark! the fox has broken cover, and a repeated cry of "Tally
+Ho!" bursts from the wood. Away go the hounds, full cry, and what
+sportsmen call their music, something between a bay and a yelp, is
+indeed a pleasant sound, heard as it always is under circumstances
+calculated to give it a romantic character. Many ladies and small boys
+are amongst the followers of the chase. As soon as a boy can sit on
+his pony he begins to follow the hounds. A fox has no tail and no feet
+in hunting parlance, he has only a brush and pads. The lady who is in
+at the death receives the brush, and the man the pads, as a rule.
+
+The hunt is a privileged institution in England, and can make gaps in
+hedges and break down walls with impunity. The farmer never complains
+if his wheat and turnip fields are ruined by the sport, nor does a
+lady complain if her flower garden and ornamental arbour be laid in
+ruins. The wily fox who has made such a skilful run must be followed
+at any cost.
+
+Shooting is, however, the favourite sport of all Englishmen. Both
+pheasants and partridges are first carefully reared; the eggs
+generally purchased in large quantities, hatched by hens, and the
+birds fed through the summer with meal and other appropriate food. The
+gamekeepers take the greatest pride in the rearing of these birds.
+The pheasant is to the Englishman what the ibis was to the Egyptian.
+
+They are let loose in the woods only when nearly full-grown. When the
+covers are full, and a good bag is to be expected, the first of
+October is a regular feast-day; a large party is asked, and a variety
+of costumes makes the scene picturesque. Red or purple stockings,
+knickerbockers of stout cloth or velveteen, a shooting-jacket of rough
+heavy material, and stout shoes make up the costume. The ladies
+collect after breakfast to see the party start out, a rendezvous is
+agreed upon, and luncheon or tea brings them together at either two or
+five o'clock, under a sheltering hedge on the side of a wood. The
+materials for an ample meal are brought to the appointed place, and a
+gay picnic ensues.
+
+Though shooting is a sport in which more real personal work is done by
+those who join in it, and in which skill is a real ingredient, still
+it is neither so characteristic nor so picturesque as fox-hunting.
+There, a firm seat in the saddle, a good horse, and a determination to
+ride straight across country, are all that is needed for the majority
+of the field. In shooting much patience is required, besides accuracy
+of aim, and a judicious knowledge of when and how to shoot.
+
+When we consider that hunting is the fashion which Americans are
+trying to follow, in a country without foxes, we must concede that
+success must be the result of considerable hard study. The fox is an
+anise-seed bag, but stone walls and high rail fences often make a
+stiffer country to ride over than any to be found abroad. In England
+there are no fences.
+
+As an addition to the art of entertaining, hunting is a very great
+boon, and a hunt breakfast at the Westchester Hunting Club is as
+pretty a sight as possible.
+
+In America, the sport began in Virginia in the last century, and no
+doubt in our great West and South it will some day become as
+recognized an institution as in England. We have room enough for it,
+too much perhaps. Shooting should become, from the Adirondacks to the
+Mississippi, a recognized sport, as it was once a necessity. If
+Americans could devote five months of the year to sport, as the
+Englishmen do, they might rival Great Britain. Unfortunately,
+Americans are bringing down other kinds of game. We cannot help
+thinking, however, that shooting a buck in the Adirondacks is a more
+manly sport than shooting one in England.
+
+No one who has ever had the privilege will forget his first drive
+through the delights of an English park. The herds of fallow deer that
+haunt the ferny glades beneath the old oaks and beeches, are kept both
+for show and for the table; for park-fed venison is a more delicious
+morsel than the flesh of the Scotch red deer, that runs wild on the
+moor. White, brown, and mottled, with branching antlers which serve
+admirably for offensive and defensive weapons, the deer browse in
+groups; the does and fawns generally keeping apart from the more
+lordly bucks. The park-keeper knows them all, and when one is shot,
+the hides, hoofs, and antlers become his perquisites.
+
+The method of shooting a buck is, however, this: The keeper's
+assistant drives the herd in a certain direction previously agreed
+upon. The sight is a very pretty one. The keeper stations himself,
+rifle in hand, in the fork of some convenient tree along the route. He
+takes aim at the intended victim, and at the ominous report the
+scared herd scampers away faster than ever, leaving their comrade to
+the knives of the keeper. It is very much like going out to shoot a
+cow. There is occasionally an attempt to renew the scenes of Robin
+Hood and Sherwood Forest, and the hounds are let out, but it is a sham
+after all, as they are trained not to kill the deer. The stag in this
+instance is given a start, being carried bound in a cart to a certain
+point, whence he is released and the chase commences. Thus the same
+stag may be hunted a number of times and be none the worse for
+it,--which is not the way they do it in the Adirondacks.
+
+American venison is a higher flavoured meat than English, and should
+be only partly roasted before the fire, then cut in slices half-raw,
+placed on a chafing-dish with jelly and gravy, and warmed and cooked
+before the guest to ensure perfection.
+
+A Polish officer of distinction has sent me the following account of
+hunting in his province:--
+
+"We do not hunt the fox as in England. He is shot when met in a drive,
+or worried out of his subterranean castle by a special breed of dogs,
+the Dachshund, or Texel; or if young cubs are suspected to be in the
+hole the exits so far as known are closed, a shaft sunk to the centre,
+and the whole brood extinguished.
+
+"We ride to hounds after hare, and the speed of a fox-hunt is nothing
+when compared with a cruise of the hare; for the greyhound, used for
+the latter, can beat any fox hound in racing. No one would ever think
+of water-killing deer as is done in the Adirondacks, and woe unto him
+who kills a doe!
+
+"The old-fashioned way to kill the wild boar is to let him run at you,
+then kneel on one knee holding a hunting knife, or cutlass,
+double-edged. The boar infuriated by the dogs rushes at you. If well
+directed, the knife enters his breast and heart; if it does not, then
+look out. This is what is called pig-sticking in India. Old Emperor
+William hunted the boar in the Royal Forests near Berlin, and King
+Humbert does the same in the mountains near Rome.
+
+"Bird hunting, that of snipe, woodcock, partridge, quail, and
+waterfowl, is done in the same way as here, excepting the use of duck
+batteries.
+
+"There is very little big game to be found in Europe, that is, in the
+civilized parts of it, but in some forests belonging to royalty and
+that ilk, the elk, the stag, the bear, and the wild boar, present
+themselves as a target, and bison are to be found in Russia. The elk
+is purely royal game in Prussia.
+
+"Southern or Upper Silesia is called the Prussian Ireland, and was
+famous for hunting-parties; ladies would join, and we would drive home
+with lighted torches attached to our sleighs."
+
+These accounts of hunting-parties are introduced into the Art of
+Entertaining as they each and all contain hints which may be of use to
+the future American entertainer.
+
+
+
+
+THE GAME OF GOLF.
+
+
+As an addition to one's power of entertaining one's self, "golf
+affords a wide field of observation for the philosopher and the
+student of human nature. To play it aright requires nerve, endurance,
+and self-control, qualities which are essential to success in all
+great vocations; on the other hand, golf is peculiarly trying to the
+temper, although it must be said that when the golfer forgets himself
+his outbursts are usually directed against inanimate objects, or
+showered upon his own head." How it may take possession of one is well
+described in this little poem from the "St. James Gazette:"--
+
+     "Would you like to see a city given over,
+       Soul and body, to a tyrannizing game?
+     If you would, there's little need to be a rover,
+       For St. Andrews is that abject city's name.
+
+     "It is surely quite superfluous to mention,
+       To a person who has been here half an hour,
+     That Golf is what engrosses the attention
+       Of the people, with an all-absorbing power.
+
+     "Rich and poor alike are smitten with the fever;
+       'Tis their business and religion both to play;
+     And a man is scarcely deemed a true believer
+       Unless he goes at least a round a day.
+
+     "The city boasts an old and learned college,
+       Where you'd think the leading industry was Greek;
+     Even there the favoured instruments of knowledge
+       Are a driver, and a putter, and a cleek.
+
+     "All the natives and the residents are patrons
+       Of this royal, ancient, irritating game;
+     All the old men, all the young men, maids and matrons,
+       With this passion burn in hard and gem-like flame.
+
+     "In the morning, as the light grows strong and stronger,
+       You may see the players going out in shoals;
+     And when night forbids their playing any longer,
+       They will tell you how they did the different holes.
+
+     "Golf, golf, golf, and golf again, is all the story!
+       Till despair my overburdened spirit sinks;
+     Till I wish that every golfer was in glory,
+       And I pray the sea may overflow the links.
+
+     "Still a slender, struggling ray of consolation
+       Comes to cheer me, very feeble though it be;
+     There are two who still escape infatuation,
+       One's my bosom friend McFoozle, t'other's me.
+
+     "As I write the words McFoozle enters blushing,
+       With a brassy and an iron in his hand;
+     And this blow, so unexpected and so crushing,
+       Is more than I am able to withstand.
+
+     "So now it but remains for me to die, sir.
+       Stay! There is another course I may pursue.
+     And perhaps, upon the whole, it would be wiser,
+       I will yield to fate and be a golfer, too!"
+
+"The game of golf," says Andrew Lang, its gifted poet and its
+historian, "has been described as putting little balls into holes
+difficult to find, with instruments which are sadly inadequate and
+illy adapted to the purpose." Its learned home is St. Andrews, in
+Scotland, although its advocates give it several classic
+starting-points. Learned antiquarians seem to think that the name
+comes from a Celtic word, meaning club. It is certainly an ancient
+game, and some variation of it was known on the Continent under
+various names.
+
+The game requires room. A golf-course of nine holes should be at least
+a mile and a half long, and a hundred and twenty feet wide. It is
+usual to so lay out the course that the player ends where he began.
+All sorts of obstructions are left, or made artificially,--running
+water, railway embankments, bushes, ditches, etc.
+
+The game is played with a gutta-percha ball, about an inch and a
+quarter in diameter, and a variety of clubs, with wooden or iron
+heads, whose individual use depends on the position in which the ball
+lies. It is usual for each player to be followed by a boy, who carries
+his clubs and watches his ball, marking it down as it falls. Games are
+either singles,--that is, when two persons play against one another,
+each having a ball,--or fours, when there are two on each side,
+partners playing alternately on one ball.
+
+The start is made near the club house at a place called the tee. Down
+the course, anywhere from two hundred and fifty to five hundred yards
+distant, is a level space, fifty feet square, called a putting-green,
+and in its centre is a hole about four and a half inches in diameter
+and of the same depth. This is the first hole, and the contestant who
+puts his ball into it in the fewest number of strokes wins the hole.
+As the score is kept by strokes, the ball that is behind is played
+first. In this way the players are always together.
+
+For his first shot from the tee, the player uses a club called the
+driver. It has a wooden head and a long, springy, hickory handle. With
+this an expert will drive a ball for two hundred yards. It is needless
+to say that the beginner is not so successful. After the first shot a
+cleek is used; or if the ball is in a bad hole, a mashie; if it is
+necessary to loft it, an iron, and so on,--the particular club
+depending, as we have said, on the position in which the ball lies.
+
+The first hole won, the contestants start from a teeing-ground close
+by it, and fight for the second hole, and so on around the
+course,--the one who has won the most holes being the winner.
+
+"A fine day, a good match, and a clear green" is the paradise of the
+golfer, but it still can be played all the year and even, by the use
+of a red ball, when snow is on the ground. In Scotland and athletic
+England it is a game for players of all ages, though in nearly all
+clubs children are not allowed. It can be played by both sexes.
+
+A beginner's inclination is to grasp a golf club as he would a cricket
+bat, more firmly with the right hand than with the left, or at times
+equally firm with both hands. Now in golf, in making a full drive, the
+club when brought back must be held firmly with the left hand and more
+loosely with the right, because when the club is raised above the
+shoulder, and brought round the back of the neck, the grasp of one
+hand or the other must relax, and the hand to give way must be the
+right hand and not the left. The force of the club must be brought
+squarely against the ball.
+
+The keeping of one's balance is another difficulty. In preparing to
+strike, the player bends forward a little. In drawing back his club he
+raises, or should raise, his left heel from the ground, and at the end
+of the upward swing stands poised on his right foot and the toe or
+ball of the left foot. At this point there is danger of his losing his
+balance, and as he brings the club down, falling either forward or
+backward, and consequently either heeling or toeing the ball, instead
+of hitting it with the middle of the face. Accuracy of hitting
+depends greatly on keeping a firm and steady hold of the ground with
+the toe of the left foot, and not bending the left knee too much.
+
+To "keep your eye on the ball" sounds an injunction easy to be obeyed,
+but it is not always so. In making any considerable stroke, the
+player's body makes or should make a quarter turn, and the difficulty
+is to keep the head steady and the eye fixed upon the ball while doing
+this.
+
+Like all other games, golf has its technical terms; the
+"teeing-ground," "putting," the "high-lofting stroke," the "approach
+shot," "hammer-hurling," "topping," "slicing," "hooking," "skidding,"
+and "foozling" mean little to the uninitiated, but everything to the
+golfer.
+
+Let us copy _verbatim_ the following description of the Links of St.
+Andrews, the Elysium of the braw Scots:
+
+"The Links occupy a crook-necked stretch of land bordered on the east
+by the sea and on the left by the railway and by the wide estuary of
+the Eden. The course, out and in, is some two miles and a half in
+length, allowing for the pursuit of balls not driven quite straight.
+Few pieces of land have given so much inexpensive pleasure for
+centuries. The first hole is to some extent carpeted by grass rather
+longer and rougher than the rest of the links. On the left lie some
+new houses and a big hotel; they can only be 'hazards' on the outward
+tack to a very wild driver indeed."
+
+These "hazards" mean, dear reader, that if you and I are stopping at
+that big hotel, we may have our eyes put out by a passing ball; small
+grief would that be to a golfer!
+
+"On the right it is just possible to 'heel' the ball over heaps of
+rubbish into the sea sand. The natural and orthodox hazards are few.
+Everybody should clear the road from the tee; if he does not the ruts
+are tenacious. The second shot should either cross or fall short of
+the celebrated Swilcan Burn. This tributary of ocean is extremely
+shallow, and meanders through stone embankments, hither and thither,
+between the tee and the hole. The number of balls that run into it, or
+jump in from the opposite bank, or off the old stone footbridge is
+enormous! People 'funk' the burn, top their iron shots, and are
+engulfed. Once you cross it, the hole whether to right or left is
+easily approached.
+
+"The second hole, when the course is on the left, is guarded near the
+tee by the 'Scholar's Bunker,' a sand face which swallows a topped
+ball. On the right of the course are whins, much scantier now than of
+old; on the left you may get into long grass, and thence into a very
+sandy road under a wall, a nasty lie. The hole is sentinelled by two
+bunkers and many an approach lights in one or the other. The
+putting-green is nubbly and difficult.
+
+"Driving to the third hole, on the left you may alight in the railway,
+or a straight hit may tumble into one of three little bunkers, in a
+knoll styled 'the Principal's Nose.' There are more bunkers lying in
+wait close to the putting-green.
+
+"The driver to the fourth hole has to 'carry' some low hills and
+mounds; then comes a bunker that yawns almost across the course, with
+a small outpost named Sutherlands, which Englishmen profanely desired
+to fill up. This is impious.
+
+"The long bunker has a buttress, a disagreeable round knoll; from
+this to the hole is open country if you keep to the right, but it is
+whinny. On the left, bunkers and broken ground stretch, and there is a
+convenient sepulchre of hope here, and another beyond the hole.
+
+"As you drive to the fifth hole you may have to clear 'hell,' but
+'hell' is not what it was. The first shot should carry you to the
+broken spurs of a table land, the Elysian fields, in which there yawn
+the Beardies, deep, narrow, greedy bunkers. Beyond the table land
+there is a gorge, and beyond it again a beautiful stretch of land and
+the putting-green. To the right is plenty of deep bent grass and
+gorse. This is a long hole and full of difficulties, the left side
+near the hole being guarded by irregular and dangerous bunkers.
+
+"The sixth or heathery hole has lost most of its heather, but is a
+teaser. A heeled ball from the tee drops into the worst whins of the
+course in a chaos of steep, difficult hills. A straight ball topped
+falls into 'Walkinshaw's Grave,' or if very badly topped into a little
+spiteful pitfall; it is the usual receptacle of a well-hit second ball
+on its return journey. Escaping 'Walkinshaw's Grave' you have a
+stretch of very rugged and broken country, bunkers on the left, bent
+grass on the right, before you reach the sixth hole.
+
+"The next, the high hole, is often shifted. It is usually placed
+between a network of bunkers with rough grass immediately beyond it.
+The first shot should open the hole and let you see the uncomfortable
+district into which you have to play. You may approach from the left,
+running the ball up a narrow causeway between the bunkers, but it is
+usually attempted from the front. Grief, in any case, is almost
+unavoidable."
+
+It is evident the Scotch pleasure in "contradeectin'" is emphasized in
+golf.
+
+One gets a wholesome sense of invigorating sea air, healthy exercise,
+and that delightful smell of the short, fresh grass. One sees "the
+beauty of the wild aerial landscape, the delicate tints of sand, and
+low, far-off hills, the distant crest of Lochnager, the gleaming
+estuary, and the black cluster of ruined towers above the bay, which
+make the charm of St. Andrews Links."
+
+Golf has come to our country, and is becoming a passion. There is a
+club at Yonkers and one at Cedarhurst, but that on the Shinnecock
+Hills, on Long Island, will probably be the great headquarters of golf
+in the United States, as this club owns eighty acres beautifully
+adapted to the uses of the game, and has a large club-house, designed
+by Stanford White.
+
+So we may expect an American historian to write an account of this
+fine vigorous game, in some future Badminton Library of sports and
+pastimes; and we shall have our own dear "fifth hole, which offers
+every possible facility to the erratic driver for coming to grief," if
+we can be as "contradeectin'" as a Scot. You never hear one word about
+victory; this golf literature is all written in the minor key,--but it
+is a gay thing to look at.
+
+The regular golf uniform is a red jacket, which adds much to the
+gayety of a green, and has its obvious advantages.
+
+"Ladies' links should be laid out on the model, though on a smaller
+scale, of the long round, containing some short putting-holes, some
+larger holes admitting of a drive or two of seventy or eighty yards,
+and a few suitable hazards. We venture to suggest seventy or eighty
+yards as the average limit of a drive, advisedly not because we doubt
+a lady's power to make a longer drive, but because that cannot be well
+done without raising the club above the shoulder. Now we do not
+presume to dictate, but we must observe that the posture and gestures
+requisite for a full swing are not particularly graceful when the
+player is clad in female dress.
+
+"Most ladies put well, and all the better because they play boldly for
+the hole, without considering too much the lay of the ground; and
+there is no reason why they should not practise and excel in wrist
+shots with a lofting-iron or cleek. Their right to play, or rather the
+expediency of their playing, the long round is much more doubtful. If
+they choose to play at times when the male golfers are feeding or
+resting, no one can object; but at other times, must we say it? they
+are in the way, just because gallantry forbids to treat them exactly
+as men. The tender mercies of the golfer are cruel. He cannot afford
+to be merciful, because, if he forbears to drive into the party in
+front he is promptly driven into from behind. It is a hard lot to
+follow a party of ladies with a powerful driver behind you, if you are
+troubled with a spark of chivalry or shyness.
+
+"As to the ladies playing the long round with men as their partners,
+it may be sufficient to say, in the words of a promising young player
+who found it hard to decide between flirtation and playing the game,
+'It is mighty pleasant, but it is not business.'"
+
+To learn this difficult game requires months of practice, and great
+nerve and talent for it. I shall not attempt to define what is meant
+by "dormy," "divot," "foozle," "gobble," "grip," or "gully." "_Mashy_,
+a straight-faced niblich," is one of these definitions.
+
+Horace G. Hutchinson's book on golf is a most entertaining work,--if
+for no other reason than that its humour, the pleasant out-of-door
+atmosphere, the true enthusiasm for the game, and the illustrations,
+which are very well drawn, all make it an addition to one's knowledge
+of athletic sports.
+
+That golf has taken its place amongst the arts of entertaining, we
+have no better proof than the very nice description of it in Norris's
+novel of "Marcia." This clever writer introduces a scene where "Lady
+Evelyn backs the winner" in the following sprightly manner:--
+
+"Not many years ago all golfers who dwelt south of the Tweed were
+compelled, when speaking of their favourite relaxation, to take up an
+apologetic tone; they had to explain with humility, and with the
+chilling certainty of being disbelieved, that an immense amount of
+experience, dexterity, and self-command are requisite in order to make
+sure of hitting a little ball across five hundred yards of broken
+ground, and depositing it in a small hole in four or five strokes; but
+now that golf links have been established all over England there is no
+longer any need to make excuses for one of the finest games that human
+ingenuity or the accident of circumstances have ever called into
+existence. The theory of the game is simplicity itself,--you have only
+to put your ball into a hole in one or less strokes than your
+opponent; but the practice is full of difficulty, and what is better
+still, full of endless variety, so that you may go on playing golf
+from the age of eight to that of eighty, and yet never grow tired of
+it. Indeed, the circumstance that gray-haired enthusiasts are to be
+seen enjoying themselves thoroughly, and losing their tempers
+ludicrously, wherever 'the royal and ancient sport' has taken root,
+has caused certain ignorant persons to describe golf contemptuously as
+the old gentleman's game. Such criticisms, however, come only from
+those who have not attempted to acquire the game."
+
+We advise all incipient golfers to read "Marcia," and to see how well
+golf and love-making can go together.
+
+Golf has its poetic and humoristic literature; and as we began with
+its poetic side we may end with its broadest, latest joke:--
+
+Two well-known professional golfers were playing a match. We will call
+them Sandy and Jock. On one side of the golf course was a railway,
+over which Jock drove his ball, landing it in some long grass. They
+both hunted for a long while for the missing ball. Sandy wanted Jock
+to give in and say that the ball was lost; but Jock would not consent,
+as a lost ball meant a lost hole. They continued to look round, and
+Jock slyly dropped another ball, and then came back and cried, "I've
+found the ba', Sandy."
+
+"Ye're a leear," said Sandy, "for here it's in ma pooch."
+
+We commend also "Famous Golf Links," by Hutchinson as clear and
+agreeable reading.
+
+
+
+
+OF GAMES.
+
+     Come, thou complaisant cards, and cheat me
+     Of a bad night, and miserable dreams.
+                                    SHAKSPEARE.
+
+     'Tis pleasant, through the loopholes of retreat,
+     To peep at such a world,--to see the stir
+     Of the great Babel, and not feel the crowd.
+                                         COWPER.
+
+
+There is no amusement for a town or country-house, where people like
+to stay at home, so perfectly innocent and amusing as games which
+require a little brain.
+
+It is a delightful feature of our modern civilization that books are
+cheap, and that the poets are read by every one. That would be a
+barren house where we did not find Scott, Byron, Goldsmith,
+Longfellow, Tennyson, Browning, Bret Harte, and Jean Ingelow.
+
+Therefore, there would be little embarrassment should we ask the
+members of the circle around the evening lamp to write a parody on
+"Evangeline," "Lady Clara Vere de Vere," "Hervé Riel," or "The Heathen
+Chinee." The result is amusing.
+
+Amongst games requiring memory and attention, we may mention Cross
+Purposes, The Horned Ambassador, I Love my Love with an A, the Game of
+the Ring, which is arithmetical, The Deaf Man, The Goose's History,
+Story Play, which consists in putting a word into a narrative so
+cleverly that it will not readily be guessed, although several may
+tell different stories with the word repeated. The best way to play
+this is to have some word which is not the word, like "ambassador," if
+the word be "banana" for instance, so by thus repeating "ambassador"
+the listener maybe baffled. The Dutch Conceit, My Lady's Toilette,
+Scheherazade's Ransom are also very good. This last deserves a
+description. Three of the company sustain the parts of the Sultan, the
+Vizier, and the Princess. The Sultan takes his seat at the end of the
+room, and the Vizier then leads the Princess before him with her hands
+bound behind her. The Vizier then makes an absurd proclamation that
+the Princess, having exhausted all her stories is about to be
+punished, unless a sufficient ransom be offered. All the rest of the
+company then advance in turn, and propose enigmas which must be solved
+by the Sultan or Vizier; sing the first verse of a song, to which the
+Vizier must answer with the second verse; or recite any well-known
+piece of poetry in alternate lines with the Vizier. Forfeits must be
+paid, either by the company when successfully encountered by the
+Sultan and Vizier, or by the Vizier when unable to respond to his
+opponents; and the game goes on till the forfeits amount to any
+specified number on either side. Should the company be victorious and
+obtain the greater number of forfeits, the Princess is released and
+the Vizier has to execute all the penalties that may be imposed upon
+him. If otherwise, the Princess is led to execution. For this purpose
+she is seated on a low stool. The penalties for the forfeits, which
+should be previously prepared, are written on slips of paper and put
+in a basket, which she holds in her hands, tied behind her. The owners
+of the forfeits advance, and draw each a slip of paper. As each
+person comes forward the Princess guesses who it is, and if right, the
+person must pay an additional forfeit, the penalty for which is to be
+exacted by the Princess herself. When all the penalties have been
+distributed, the hands and eyes of the Princess are released, and she
+then superintends the execution of the various punishments that have
+been allotted to the company.
+
+Another very good game is to send one of the company out, and as he
+comes in again to address him in the supposed character of General
+Scott, the Duke of Wellington, or of some Shakspearean hero. This,
+amongst bright people, can be very amusing. The hero thus addressed
+must find out who he is himself,--a difficult task for any one to
+discover, even with leading questions.
+
+The Echo is another nice little game. It is played by reciting some
+story, which Echo is supposed to interrupt whenever the narrator
+pronounces certain words which recur frequently in his narrative.
+These words relate to the profession or trade of him who is the
+subject of the story. If, for example, the story is about a soldier
+the words which would recur most frequently would naturally be
+uniform, gaiters, _chapeau bras_, musket, plume, pouch, sword, sabre,
+gun, knapsack, belt, sash, cap, powder-flask, accoutrements, and so
+on. Each one of the company, with the exception of the person who
+tells the story, takes the name of soldier, powder-flask, etc., except
+the name accoutrements. When the speaker pronounces one of these
+words, he who has taken it for his name, ought, if the word has been
+said only once, to pronounce it twice; if it has been said twice, to
+pronounce it once. When the word "accoutrements" is uttered the
+players, all except the soldier, ought to repeat the word
+"accoutrements" either once or twice.
+
+These games are amusing, as showing how defective a thing is memory,
+how apt it is to desert us under fire. It is very interesting to mark
+the difference of character exhibited by the players.
+
+Another very funny game is Confession by a Die, played with cards and
+dice. It would look at first like a parody on Mother Church, but it
+does not so offend. A person takes some blank cards, and counting the
+company, writes down a sin for each. The unlucky sinner when called
+upon must not only confess, but, by throwing the dice, also confess as
+many sins as they indicate, and do penance for them all. These can,
+with a witty leader, be made very amusing.
+
+The Secretary is another good game. The players sit at a table with
+square pieces of paper and pencils, and each one writes his own name,
+handing the paper, carefully folded down, to the secretary, who
+distributes them, saying, "Character." Then each one writes out an
+imaginary character, hands it to the secretary, who says, "Future."
+The papers are again distributed, and the writers forecast the future.
+Of course the secretary throws in all sorts of other questions, and
+when the game is through, the papers are read. They form a curious and
+heterogeneous piece of reading; sometimes such curious bits of
+character-reading crop out that one suspects complicity. But if
+honestly played it is amusing.
+
+The Traveller's Tour is interesting. One of the party announces
+himself as the traveller. He is given an empty bag, and counters, with
+numbers on, are distributed amongst the players. Thus if twelve
+persons are playing the numbers must count up to twelve,--a set of
+ones to be given to one, twos to two, and so on. Then the traveller
+asks for information about the places to which he is going. The first
+person gives it if he can; if not, the second, and so on. If the
+traveller considers it correct information or worthy of notice he
+takes from the person one of his counters as a pledge of the
+obligation he is under to him. The next person in order takes up the
+next question, and so on. After the traveller reaches his destination
+he empties his bag and sees to whom he has been indebted for the
+greatest amount of information. He then makes him the next traveller.
+Of course this opens the door for all sorts of witty rejoinders,
+according as the players choose to exaggerate the claims of certain
+hotels, and to invent hits at certain watering-places.
+
+The rhyming game is amusing. "I have a word that rhymes with game."
+
+_Interlocutor._--"Is it something statesmen crave?"
+
+_Speaker._--"No, it is not fame."
+
+_Interlocutor._--"Is it something that goes halt?"
+
+_Speaker._--"No, it is not lame."
+
+_Interlocutor._--"Is it something tigers need?"
+
+_Speaker._--"No, it is not to tame."
+
+_Interlocutor._--"Is it something we all would like?"
+
+_Speaker._--"No, it is not a good name."
+
+_Interlocutor._--"Is it to shoot at duck?"
+
+_Speaker._--"Yes, and that duck to maim." Such words as "nut,"
+"thing," "fall," etc., which rhyme easily, are good choices. The two
+who play it must be quick-witted.
+
+The game of Crambo, in which each player has to write a noun on one
+piece of paper, and a question on another, is curious. As, for
+instance, the drawer gets the word "Africa" and the question "Have you
+an invitation to my wedding?" He must write a poem in which he answers
+the question and brings in the other word.
+
+The game of Preferences has had a long and successful career. It is a
+very good addition to the furniture of a country parlour to possess a
+blank-book which is left lying on the table, in which each guest
+should be asked to write out answers to the following questions:
+
+Who is your favourite hero in history?
+
+Who is your favourite heroine?
+
+Who is your favourite king?
+
+Who is your favourite queen?
+
+What is your favourite Christian name for a man?
+
+What is your favourite Christian name for a woman? etc.
+
+The game of Authors, especially when created by the persons who wish
+to play it, is very interesting. The game can be bought and is a very
+common one, as perhaps every one knows, but it can be rendered
+uncommon by the preparation of the cards among the members of the
+family. There are sixty-four cards to be prepared, each bearing the
+name of a favourite author and any three of his works. The entire set
+is numbered from one to sixty-four. Any four cards containing the name
+and works of the same author form a book.
+
+Or the names of kings and queens and the learned men of their reigns
+may be used, instead of authors; it is a very good way to study
+history. The popes can be utilized, with their attendant great men,
+and after playing the game for a season one has no difficulty in
+fixing the environment of the history of an epoch.
+
+As the numbers affixed to the cards may be purely arbitrary, the
+count at the end will fluctuate with great impartiality. The Dickens
+cards may count but one, while Tupper will be named sixteen. Carlyle
+will only count two, while Artemas Ward will be sixty. King Henry
+VIII., who set no small store by himself, may be No. I in the kingly
+game, while Edward IV. will be allowed a higher numeral than he was
+allotted in life.
+
+Now we come to a game which interests old and young. None are so
+apathetic but they relish a peep behind the dark curtain. The
+apple-paring in the fire, the roasted chestnut and the raisin, the
+fire-back and the stars, have been interrogated since time began. The
+pack of cards, the teacup, the dream-book, the board with mystic
+numbers, the Bible and key, have been consulted from time immemorial.
+The makers of games have given in their statistics, and they declare
+there are no games so popular as those which foretell the future.
+
+Now this tampering with gruesome things which may lead to bad dreams
+is not recommended, but so long as it is done for fun and an evening's
+amusement it is not at all dangerous. The riches which are hidden in a
+pack of fortune-telling cards are very comforting while they last.
+They are endless, they are not taxed, they have few really trying
+responsibilities attached, they bring no beggars. They buy all we
+want, they are gained without headache or backache, they are inherited
+without stain, and lost without regret. Of what other fortune can we
+say so much?
+
+Who is not glad to find a four-leaved clover, to see the moon over his
+right shoulder, to have a black cat come to the house? She is sure to
+bring good fortune!
+
+The French have, however, tabularized fortune-telling for us. Their
+peculiar ability in arranging ceremonials and _fêtes_, and their
+undoubted genius for tactics and strategy, show that they might be
+able to foresee events. Their ingenuity, in all technical
+contrivances, is an additional testimony in the right direction, and
+we are not surprised that they have here, as is their wont, given us
+the practical help which we need in fortune-telling.
+
+Mademoiselle Lenormand, the sorceress who foretold Napoleon's
+greatness and to many of the great people of France their downfall and
+misfortunes, has left us thirty-six cards in which we can read the
+decrees of fate. Lenormand was a clever sybil. She knew how to mix
+things, and throw in the inevitable bad and the possible good so as at
+least to amuse those who consulted her.
+
+In this game, which can be bought at any bookstore, the _cavalier_,
+for instance, is a messenger of good fortune, the clover leaf a
+harbinger of good news, but if surrounded by clouds it indicates great
+pain, but if No. 2 lies near No. 26 or 28 the pain will be of short
+duration, and so on.
+
+Thus Mlle. Lenormand tells fortunes still, although she has gone to
+the land of certainty, and has herself found out whether her symbols
+and emblems and her combinations really did draw aside the curtain of
+the future with invisible strings. Amateur sybils playing this game
+can be sure that they add to the art of entertaining.
+
+The cup of tea, and the mysterious wanderings of the grounds around
+the cup, is used for divination by the old crone in an English
+farmhouse, while the Spanish gypsy uses chocolate grounds for the same
+purpose. That most interesting of tragic sybils, Norna of the Fitful
+Head, used molten lead.
+
+Cards from the earliest antiquity have been used to tell fortunes.
+Fortuna, courted by all nations, was in Greek Tyche, or the goddess of
+chance. She differed from Destiny, or Fate, in so far as that she
+worked without law, giving or taking at her own good pleasure. Her
+symbols were those of mutability, a ball, a wheel, a pair of wings, a
+rudder. The Romans affirmed that when she entered their city she threw
+off her wings and shoes, determined to live with them forever. She
+seems to have thought better of it, however. She was the sister of the
+Parcae, or Fates, those three who spin the thread of life, measure it,
+and cut it off. The power to tell fortunes by the hand is easily
+learned from Desbarolles' book, is a very popular accomplishment, and
+never fails to amuse the company and interest the individual.
+
+It must not be made, however, of too much importance. It never amuses
+people to be warned that they may expect an early and violent death.
+
+Then comes Merelles, or Blind Men's Morris, which can be played on a
+board or on the ground, but which now finds itself reduced to a
+parlour game. This takes two players. American Bagatelle can be played
+alone or with an antagonist. Chinese puzzles, which are infinitely
+amusing, and all the great family of the Sphinx, known as puzzles, are
+of infinite service to the retired, the invalid, and weary people for
+whom the active business of life is at an end.
+
+We may describe one of these games as an example. It is called The
+Blind Abbot and his Monks. It is played with counters. Arrange eight
+external cells of a square so that there may be always nine in each
+row, though the whole number may vary from eighteen to thirty-six. A
+convent in which there were nine cells was occupied by a blind abbot
+and twenty-four monks, the abbot lodging in the centre cell and the
+monks in the side cells, three in each, giving a row of nine persons
+on each side of the building. The abbot suspecting the fidelity of his
+brethren often went out at night and counted them. When he found nine
+in each row, the old man counted his beads, said an _Ave_, and went to
+bed contented. The monks, taking advantage of his failing sight,
+contrived to deceive him, so that four could go out at night, yet have
+nine in a row. How did they do it?
+
+The next night, emboldened by success, the monks returned with four
+visitors, and then arranged them nine in a row. The next night they
+brought in four more belated brethren, and again arranged them nine in
+a row, and again four more. Finally, when the twelve clandestine monks
+had departed, and six monks with them, the remainder deceived the
+abbot again by presenting a row of nine. Try it with the counters, and
+see how they so abused the privileges of conventual seclusion!
+
+Then try quibbles: "How can I get the wine out of a bottle if I have
+no corkscrew and must not break the glass or make a hole in it or the
+cork?"
+
+The _raconteur_, or story-teller, is a potent force. Any one who can
+memorize the stories of Grimm, or Hans Christian Anderson, or
+Browning's "Pied Piper," or Ouida's "Dog of Flanders," or Dr. Holmes'
+delightful "Punch Bowl," and tell these in a natural sort of way is a
+blessing. But this talent should never be abused. The man who, in cold
+blood, fires off a long poetical quotation at a dinner, or makes a
+speech when he is not asked, in defiance of the goose-flesh which is
+creeping down his neighbours' backs, is a traitor to honour and
+religion, and should be dragged to execution with his back to the
+horses, like a Nihilist. It is only when these extempore talents can
+be used without alarming people that they are useful or endurable.
+
+Perhaps we might make our Christmas Holidays a little more gay. There
+are old English and German customs beyond the mistletoe, and the tree,
+and the rather faded legend of Santa Claus. There are worlds of
+legendary lore. We might bring back the Leprechaun, the little
+fairy-man in red, who if you catch him will make you happy forever
+after, and who has such a strange relationship to humanity that at
+birth and death the Leprechaun must be tended by a mortal. To follow
+up the Banshee and the Brownie, to light the Yule log, to invoke the
+Lord of Misrule, above all to bring back the waits or singing-boys who
+come under the window with an old carol, and the universal study of
+symbolism,--all this is useful at Christmastide, when the art of
+entertaining is ennobled by the song "Glory to God in the highest, and
+on earth peace, good-will toward men."
+
+The supper-table has unfortunately fallen into desuetude, probably on
+account of our exceedingly late dinners. We sup out, we sup at a ball,
+but rarely have that informal and delightful meal which once wound up
+every evening.
+
+Mrs. Elizabeth Montague, in her delightful letters, talks about the
+"Whisk, and the Quadrille parties, with a light supper," which amused
+the ladies of her day. We still have the "Whisk," but what has become
+of _lansquenet_, quadrille basset, piquet, those pretty and courtly
+games?
+
+Whist! Who shall pretend to describe its attractions? What a relief to
+the tired man of affairs, to the woman who has no longer any part in
+the pageant of society! What pleasure in its regulating, shifting
+fortunes. We have seen, in its parody on life, that holding the best
+cards, even the highest ones, does not always give us the game. We
+have noticed that with a poor hand, somebody wins fame, success, and
+happiness. We have all felt the injustice of the long suit, which has
+baffled our best endeavours. We play our own experience over again,
+with its faithless kings and queens. The knave is apt to trip us up,
+on the green cloth as on the street.
+
+So long as cards do not lead to gambling, they are innocent enough.
+The great passion for gambling is behind the game of boaston, played
+appropriately for beans. We all like to accumulate, to believe that we
+are fortune's favourite. What matter if it be only a few more beans
+than one's neighbour?
+
+That is a poorly furnished parlour which has not a chess table in one
+corner, a whist table properly stocked, and a little solitaire table
+for Grandma. Cribbage and backgammon boards, cards of every variety,
+bezique counters and packs, and the red and white champions for the
+hard-fought battle-field of chess, should be at hand.
+
+Playing cards made their way through Arabia from India to Europe,
+where they first arrived about the year 1370. They carried with them
+the two rival arts, engraving and painting. They were the _avants
+couriers_ of engraving on wood and metal, and of the art of printing.
+
+Cards, begun as the luxuries of kings and queens, became the necessity
+of the gambler, the solace of all who like games. They have been one
+of the worst curses and one of the greatest blessings of poor human
+nature.
+
+     "When failing health, or cross event,
+     Or dull monotony of days,
+     Has brought us into discontent
+     Which darkens round us like a haze"--
+then the arithmetical progression of a game has sometimes saved the
+reason. They are a priceless boon to failing eyesight.
+
+Piquet, a courtly game, was invented by Etienne Vignoles, called La
+Hire, one of the most active soldiers of the reign of Charles VII.
+This brave soldier was an accomplished cavalier, deeply imbued with a
+reverence for the manners and customs of chivalry. Cards continued
+from his day to follow the whim of the court, and to assume the
+character of the period, through the regency of Marie de Medicis, the
+time of Anne of Austria and of Louis XIV. The Germans were the first
+people to make a pack of cards assume the form of a scholastic
+treatise; the king, queen, knight, and knave tell of English customs,
+manners, and nomenclature.
+
+The highly intellectual game of Twenty Questions can be played by
+three or four people or by a hundred. It is an unfailing delight by
+the wood fire in the remote house in the wood, or by the open window
+looking out on the lordly Hudson of a summer's night. It only needs
+that one bright mind shall throw the ball, and half a dozen may catch.
+Mr. Lowell once said there was no subject so erudite, no quotation so
+little known, that it could not be reached in twenty questions.
+
+But we are not all as bright as James Russell Lowell. We can, however,
+all ask questions and we can all guess; it is our Yankee privilege.
+The game of Twenty Questions has led to the writing of several books.
+The best way to begin is, however, to choose a subject. Two persons
+should be in the secret. The questioner begins: Is it animal,
+vegetable or mineral? Is it a manufactured object? Ancient or modern?
+What is its shape, size and colour? What is its use? Where is it now?
+The object of the answerer is of course to baffle, to excite
+curiosity; it is a mental battledore and shuttlecock.
+
+It is strange that the pretty game of croquet has gone out of favour.
+It is still, however, to be seen on some handsome lawns. Twenty years
+ago it inspired the following lines:--
+
+CROQUET.
+
+     "A painter must that poet be
+     And lay with brightest hues his palette
+     Who'd be the bard of Croquet'rie
+     And sing the joys of hoop and mallet.
+
+     "Given a level lawn in June
+     And six or eight, enthusiastic,
+     Who never miss their hoops, or spoon,
+     And are on duffers most sarcastic;
+
+     "Given the girl whom you adore--
+     And given, too, that she's your side on,
+     Given a game that's not soon o'er,
+     And ne'er a bore the lawn espied on;
+
+     "Given a claret cup as cool
+     As simple Wenham Ice can make it,
+     Given a code whose every rule
+     Is so defined that none can break it;
+
+     "Given a very fragrant weed--
+     Given she doesn't mind your smoking,
+     Given the players take no heed
+     And most discreetly keep from joking;
+
+     "Given all these, and I proclaim,
+     Be fortune friendly or capricious,
+     Whether you win or lose the game,
+     You'll find that croquet is delicious."
+
+
+
+
+ARCHERY.
+
+     "The stranger he made no muckle ado,
+     But he bent a right good bow,
+     And the fattest of all the herds he slew
+     Forty good yards him fro:
+     'Well shot! well shot!' quoth Robin Hood."
+
+     "Aim at the moon, if you ambitious are,
+     And failing that, you may bring down a star."
+
+
+Fashion has brought us again this pretty and romantic pastime, which
+has filled the early ballads with many a picturesque figure. Now on
+many a lawn may be seen the target and the group in Lincoln green.
+Indeed, it looks as if archery were to prove a very formidable rival
+to lawn tennis.
+
+The requirements of archery are these: First, a bow; secondly, arrows;
+thirdly, a quiver, pouch, and belt; fourthly, a grease pot, an
+arm-guard or brace, a shooting-glove, a target and a scoring-card.
+
+The bow is the most important article in archery, and also the most
+expensive. It is usually from five to six feet in length, made of a
+simple piece of yew or of lance-wood and hickory glued together back
+to back. The former is better for gentlemen, the latter for ladies, as
+it is adapted for the short, sharp, pull of the feminine arm. The wood
+is gradually tapered, and at each end is a tip of horn; the one from
+the upper end being longer than the other or lower end. The strength
+of bows is marked in pounds, varying from twenty-five to forty pounds
+in strength for ladies, for gentlemen from fifty to eighty pounds. One
+side of the bow is flat, called the back, the other, called the belly,
+is rounded. Nearly in the middle, where the hand should take hold, it
+is lapped round with velvet, and that part is called the handle. In
+each of the tips of the horns is a notch for the string, called the
+nock.
+
+Bow strings are made of hemp or flax, the former being the better
+material, for though at first they stretch more, yet they wear longer
+and stand a harder pull, and are, as well, more elastic in the
+shooting. In applying a fresh string to a bow, be careful in opening
+it not to break the composition that is on it. Cut the tie, take hold
+of the eye which will be found ready worked at one end, let the other
+part hang down, and pass the eye over the upper end of the bow. If for
+a lady, it may be held from two to two and a half inches below the
+nock; if for a gentleman, half an inch lower, varying it according to
+the length and strength of the bow. Then run your hand along the side
+of the bow and string to the bottom nock. Turn it around that and fix
+it by the noose, called the timber noose, taking care not to untwist
+the string in making it. This noose is simply a turn back and twist,
+without a knot. When strung a lady's bow will have the string about
+five inches from the belly, and a gentleman's about half an inch more.
+The part opposite the handle is bound round with waxed silk in order
+to prevent its being frayed by the arrow. As soon as a string becomes
+too soft and the fibres too straight, rub it with beeswax and give it
+a few turns in the proper direction, so as to shorten it, and twist
+its strands a little tighter. A spare string should always be provided
+by the shooter.
+
+Arrows are differently shaped by various makers; some being of uniform
+thickness throughout, while others are protuberant in the middle; some
+again are larger at the point than at the feather end. They are
+generally made of white deal, with joints of iron or brass riveted on,
+and have a piece of heavy wood spliced to the deal, between it and the
+point, by which their flight is improved. At the other end a piece of
+horn is inserted, in which is a notch for the string. They are armed
+with three feathers glued on, one of which is a different colour from
+the others, and is intended to mark the proper position of the arrow
+when placed on the string, this one always pointing from the bow.
+These feathers, properly applied, give a rotary motion to the arrow,
+which causes its flight to be straight. They are generally from the
+wing of the turkey or the goose. The length and weight of the arrows
+vary, the latter in England being marked in sterling silver coin and
+stamped in the arrow in plain figures. It is usual to paint a crest or
+a monogram or distinguishing rings on the arrow, just between the
+feathers by which they may be known in shooting at the target.
+
+The quiver is merely a tin case painted green, intended for the
+security of the arrows when not in use. The pouch and belt are worn
+round the waist, the latter containing those arrows which are actually
+being shot. A pot to hold grease for touching the glove and string,
+and a tassel to wipe the arrows are hung at the belt. The grease is
+composed of beef suet and wax melted together. The arm is protected
+from the blow of the string by the brace, a broad guard of strong
+leather buckled on by two straps. A shooting-glove, also of thin tubes
+of leather, is attached to the wrist by three flat pieces, ending in
+a circular strap buckled around it. This glove prevents the soreness
+of the fingers, which soon comes after using the bow without it.
+
+The target consists of a circular mat of straw, covered with canvas
+painted in a series of circles. It is usually from three feet six
+inches to four feet in diameter, the centre is gilt, and called the
+gold; the ring about it is called the red, after which comes the inner
+white, then the black, and finally the outer white. These targets are
+mounted on triangular stands, from fifty to a hundred yards apart;
+sixty being the usual shooting distance.
+
+A scoring-card is provided with columns for each colour, which are
+marked with a pin. The usual score for a gold hit, or the bull's-eye,
+is 9, the red 7, inner white 5, black 3, and outer white, 1.
+
+To string the bow properly it should be taken by the handle in the
+right hand. Place one end on the ground, resting in the hollow of the
+right foot, keeping the flat side of the bow, called the back, toward
+your person. The left foot should be advanced a little, and the right
+placed so that the bow cannot slip sideways. Place the heel of the
+left hand upon the upper limb of the bow, below the eye of the string.
+Now while the fingers and thumb of the left hand slide the eye towards
+the notch in the horn, and the heel pushes the limb away from the
+body, the right hand pulls the handle toward the person and thus
+resists the action of the left, by which the bow is bent, and at the
+same time the string is slipped into the nock, as the notch is termed.
+Take care to keep the three outer fingers free from the string, for if
+the bow should slip from the hand, and the string catch them, they
+will be severely pinched. In shooting in frosty weather, warm the bow
+before the fire or by friction with a woollen cloth. If the bow has
+been lying by for a long time, it should be well rubbed with boiled
+linseed oil before using it.
+
+To unstring the bow hold it as in stringing, then press down the upper
+limb exactly as before, and as if you wished to place the eye of the
+string in a higher notch. This will loose the string and liberate the
+eye, when it must be lifted out of the notch by the forefinger, and
+suffered to slip down the limb.
+
+Before using the bow hold it in a perpendicular direction, with the
+string toward you, and see if the line of the string cuts the middle
+of the bow. If not, shift the eye and noose of the string to either
+side, so as to make the two lines coincide. This precaution prevents a
+very common cause of defective shooting, which is the result of an
+uneven string throwing the arrow on one side. After using it unstring
+it, and at a large shooting-party unloose your bow after every round.
+Some bows get bent into very unmanageable shapes.
+
+The general management of the bow should be on the principle that damp
+injures it, and that any loose floating ends interfere with its
+shooting. It should therefore be kept well varnished, and in a
+waterproof case, and it should be carefully dried after shooting in
+damp weather. If there are any ends hanging from the string cut them
+off close, and see that the whipping, in the middle of the string, is
+close and well-fitting. The case should be hung up against a dry,
+internal wall, not too near the fire. In selecting your bow be careful
+that it is not too strong for your power, and that you can draw the
+arrow to its head without any trembling of the hand. If this cannot be
+done after a little practice, the bow should be changed for a weaker
+one; for no arrow will go true, if it is discharged by a trembling
+hand. If an arrow has been shot into the target on the ground, be
+particularly careful to withdraw it by laying hold close to its head,
+and by twisting it around as it is withdrawn, in the direction of its
+axis. Without this precaution it may be easily bent or broken.
+
+In shooting at the target the first thing is to nock the arrow, that
+is, to place it properly on the string. In order to effect this, take
+the bow in the left hand, with the string toward you, the upper limb
+being toward the right. Hold it horizontally while you take the arrow
+by the middle; pass it on the under side of the string and the upper
+side of the bow, till the head reaches two or three inches past the
+left hand. Hold it there with the forefinger or thumb, while you
+remove the right hand down to the neck; turn the arrow till the cock
+feather comes uppermost, then pass it down the bow, and fix it on the
+working part of the string. In doing this all contact with the
+feathers should be avoided, unless they are rubbed out of place, when
+they may be smoothed down by passing them through the hand.
+
+The body should be at right angles with the target, but the face must
+be turned over the left shoulder, so as to be opposed to it. The feet
+must be flat on the ground, with the heels a little apart, the left
+foot turned toward the mark. The head and chest inclined a little
+forward so as to present a full bust, but not bent at all below the
+waist. Draw the arrow to the full length of the arm, till the hand
+touches the shoulder, then take aim. The loosing should be quick, and
+the string must leave the fingers smartly and steadily. The bow-head
+must be as firm as a vise, no trembling allowed.
+
+The rules of an Archery Club are usually that a Lady Paramount be
+annually elected; that there be a President, Secretary, and Treasurer;
+that all members intending to shoot shall appear in the uniform of the
+club, and that a fine shall be imposed for non-attendance.
+
+The Secretary sends out cards at least a week before each day of
+meeting, acquainting members with the place and hour.
+
+There are generally four prizes for each meeting, two for each sex,
+the first for numbers, the second for hits. No person is allowed to
+take both on the same day. A certain sum of money is voted to the Lady
+Paramount, for prizes for each meeting.
+
+In case of a tie for hits, numbers decide, and in case of a tie for
+numbers, hits decide. The decision of the Lady Paramount is final.
+
+There is also a challenge prize, and a commemorative ornament is
+presented to the winner of this prize.
+
+The distance for shooting is sixty or one hundred yards, and five-feet
+targets are used.
+
+The dress or uniform of the club is decided by the Lady Paramount.
+
+The expenses of archery are not great, about the same as lawn tennis,
+although a great many arrows are lost in the course of the season.
+Bows and other paraphernalia last a long time. The lady archers are
+apt to feel a little lame after the first two or three essays, but
+they should practise a short time every morning, and always in a loose
+waist or jacket. It will be found a very healthy and strengthening
+practice and pastime.
+
+We must not judge of the merits of ancient bowmen from the practice of
+archery in the present day. There are no such distances now assigned
+for the marks as we find mentioned in old histories or poetic legends,
+nor such precision, even at short lengths, in the direction of the
+arrow. Few, if any, modern archers in long shooting reach four hundred
+yards; or in shooting at a mark exceed eighty or a hundred. Archery
+has been since the invention of gunpowder followed as a pastime only.
+It is decidedly the most graceful game that can be practised, and the
+legends of Sherwood Forest, of Maid Marion, Little John, Friar Tuck,
+and the Abbot carry us back into the fragrant heart of the forest, and
+bring back memories which are agreeable to all who have in them a drop
+of Saxon blood.
+
+The usual dress is the Lincoln green of Robin Hood and his merry men,
+and at Auburn in New York they have a famous club and shooting ground,
+over the gate of which is painted this motto:--
+
+     "What is hit is history,
+     And what is missed is mystery."
+
+The traveller still sees in the Alpine Tyrol, and in some parts of
+Switzerland, bands of archers who depend on the bow and arrow for
+their game. But there is not that skill or that poetry attached to the
+sport which made Locksley try conclusions with Hubert, in the presence
+of Prince John, as we read in the immortal pages of Ivanhoe.
+
+The prize was to be a bugle horn mounted with silver, a silken baldric
+richly ornamented, having on it a medallion of Saint Hubert, the
+patron of sylvan sport. Had Robin Hood been beaten he would have
+yielded up bow, baldric, and quiver to the provost of the sports; as
+it was, however, he let fly his arrow, and it lighted upon that of his
+competitor, which it split to shivers.
+
+
+
+
+THE SEASON, BALLS, AND RECEPTIONS.
+
+     "Good-night to the season! the dances,
+       The fillings of hot little rooms,
+     The glancings of rapturous glances,
+       The flarings of fancy costumes,
+     The pleasures which fashion makes duties,
+       The phrasings of fiddles and flutes,
+     The luxury of looking at beauties,
+       The tedium of talking to mutes,
+     The female diplomatists, planners
+       Of matches for Laura and Jane,
+     The ice of her Ladyship's manners!
+       The ice of his Lordship's champagne."
+
+
+The season in London extends from May to August, often longer if
+Parliament is in session. In Paris it is from May to the _Grand Prix_,
+when it is supposed to end, about the 20th of June. In New York and
+Washington it is all winter, from November 1st to Lent, with good
+Episcopalians, and from November to May with the rest of mankind.
+
+It then begins again in July, with the people who go to Newport and to
+Bar Harbor, and keeps up until September, when comes in Tuxedo and the
+gayety of Long Island, and the Hudson. Indeed, with the gayety of
+country-house life, hunting, lawn tennis and driving, it is hard to
+say when the American season ends.
+
+There is one sort of entertainment which is a favourite everywhere and
+very convenient. It is the afternoon reception or party by daylight.
+The gas is lighted, the day excluded, the hostess and her guests are
+in beautiful toilets; their friends come in street dresses and
+bonnets; their male friends in frock coats. This is one of the
+anomalies of fashion. These entertainments are very large, and a
+splendid collation is served. The form of invitation is simply--
+
+                        MRS. BROWNTON at home
+                        Thursday, from 3 to 6.
+
+and unless an R. S. V. P. is appended, no reply is expected. These
+receptions are favourites with housekeepers, as they avoid the
+necessity of keeping the servants up at night.
+
+The drawback to this reception is that, in our busy world of America,
+very few men can spare the time to call in the daytime, so the
+attendance is largely feminine.
+
+On entering, the guest places a card on the table, or, if she cannot
+be present, she should send a card in an envelope.
+
+After these entertainments, which are really parties, a lady should
+call. They are different things entirely from afternoon tea, after
+which no call is expected. If the reception is given to some
+distinguished person, the lady stands beside her guest to present all
+the company to him or her.
+
+If on the card the word "Music" is added, the guests should be
+punctual, as, doubtless, they are to be seated, and that takes time.
+No lady who gives a _musicale_ should invite more than she can seat
+comfortably; and she should have her rooms cool, and her lights soft
+and shaded.
+
+People with weak eyes suffer dreadfully from a glare of gas, and when
+music is going on they cannot move to relieve themselves. The hostess
+should think of all this. Who can endure the mingled misery of a hot
+room, an uncomfortable seat, a glare of gas, and a pianoforte solo?
+
+A very sensible reformation is now in progress in regard to the
+sending of invitations and the answering of the same. The post is now
+freely used as a safe and convenient medium, and no one feels offended
+if an invitation arrives with a two-cent stamp on the envelope. There
+is no loss of caste in sending an invitation by post.
+
+Then comes the ball, or, as they always say in Europe, the dance,
+which is the gayest of all things for the _débutante_. The popular
+form for an invitation to an evening party is as follows:--
+
+                             MRS. HAMMOND
+                       Requests the pleasure of
+                    MR. and MRS. NORTON'S company
+            on Tuesday evening, December 23, at 9 o'clock.
+     R. S. V. P.                                         Dancing.
+
+The card of the _débutante_, if the ball is given for one, is
+enclosed.
+
+If a hostess gives her ball at some public place, like Delmonico's,
+she has but little trouble. The compliment is not the same as if she
+gave it in her own house, however. If there is room, a ball in a
+private house is much more agreeable, and a greater honour to the
+guest.
+
+Gentlemen who have not an acquaintance should be presented to the
+young dancing set; but first, of course, to the _chaperon_. As,
+however, the hostess cannot leave her post while receiving, she should
+have two or three friends to help her. Great care should be taken that
+there be no wall-flowers, no neglected girls. The non-dancers in an
+American ball are like the non-Catholics in a highly doctrinal sermon:
+they are nowhere, pushed into a corner where there is perhaps a
+draught, and the smell of fried oysters. Such is the limbo of the
+woman of forty or over, who in Europe would be the belle, the person
+just beginning to have a career. For it is too true that the woman who
+has learned something, who is still beautiful, the woman who has
+maturity and experience, is pushed to the wall in America, while in
+Europe she is courted and admired. Society holds out all its
+attractive distractions and comforts to such a woman in Europe; in
+America it keeps everything, even its comforts, for the very young.
+
+The fact that American ballrooms, or rather the parlours of our
+ordinary houses, are wholly disproportioned to the needs of society,
+has led to the giving of balls at Delmonico's and other public places.
+If these are under proper patronage there is no reason why they should
+not be as entertaining, as exclusive, and as respectable as a ball at
+home. Any hostess or group of managers should, if they give up a ball
+at home and use the large accommodations of Delmonico or the Assembly
+Rooms, certainly consider the claims of chaperons and mammas who must
+wearily sit through the German. It is to be feared that attention to
+the mamma is not yet a grace in which even her daughter excels. Young
+men who wish to marry mademoiselle had better pay her mother the
+compliment of getting her a seat, and social leaders should also show
+her the greatest attention, not alone from the selfish reason which
+the poet commemorates:--
+
+     "Philosophy has got a charm,--
+       I thought of Martin Tupper,--
+     And offering mamma my arm,
+       I took her down to supper.
+
+     "I gave her Pommery, _Côte d'Or_,
+       Which seethed in rosy bubbles;
+     I called this fleeting life a bore,
+       The world a sea of troubles."
+
+It is to be feared that the life of a _chaperon_ in America is not a
+bed of roses, even if softened by all these attentions.
+
+Kept up late, pushed into a corner, the mother of a society girl
+becomes only a sort of head-chambermaid. Were she in Europe, she would
+be the person who would receive the compliments and the attention and
+be asked to dance in the German.
+
+A competent critic of our manners spoke of this in the following
+sensible words:--
+
+"The evils arising from the excessive liberty permitted to American
+girls cannot be cured by laws. If we ever root them out we must begin
+with the family life, which must be reformed. For young people,
+parental authority is the only sure guide. Coleridge well said that he
+who was not able to govern himself must be governed by others; and
+experience has shown us that the children of civilized parents are as
+little able to govern themselves as the children of savages. The
+liberty or license of our youth will have to be curtailed, as our
+society is becoming more complex and artificial, like older societies
+in Europe. The children will have to approximate to them in status,
+and parents will have to waken to a sense of their responsibilities,
+and subordinate their ambitions and their pleasures to their duties."
+Mothers should go out more with their daughters, join in their
+pleasures, and never permit themselves to be shelved.
+
+Society is in a transition state in America. In one or more cities of
+the West and South it is considered proper for a young man to call for
+a young girl, and drive with her alone to a ball. In Northern cities
+this is considered very bad form. In Europe it would be considered a
+vulgar madness, and a girl's character compromised. Therefore it is
+better for the mother to keep her rightful place as guardian,
+_chaperon_, friend, no matter how she is treated.
+
+Women are gifted with so much tact and so intuitive a faculty, that in
+the conduct of fashionable life they need but few hints.
+
+The art of entertaining should be founded first, on good sense, a
+quiet considerateness, a good heart, a spirit of friendliness; next, a
+consideration of what is due to others and what is due to one's self.
+There is always a social conscience in one's organization, which will
+point aright; but the outward performance of conventional rules can
+never be thoroughly learned, unless the heart is well-bred.
+
+Many ladies are now introducing dancing at crowded day receptions and
+teas. Where people are coming and going this is objectionable, as the
+hostess is expected to do too much, and the guests being in street
+dress, while the hostess and her dancers are in low evening dress, the
+appearance of the party is not ornamental.
+
+Evening parties are far more formal, and require the most elaborate
+dress. Every lady who can wear a low-necked dress should do so. The
+great drawback in New York is now the ridiculous lateness of the
+hour--eleven or twelve--at which the guests arrive.
+
+If a card is written,--
+
+     MRS. BROWN at home Tuesday evening,
+
+some sticklers for etiquette say that she should not put R. S. V. P.
+on her card.
+
+If she wishes an answer, she should say,--
+
+                              MRS. BROWN
+                       requests the pleasure of
+                   MR. and MRS. CAMPBELL'S company.
+        R. S. V. P.
+
+Perhaps the latter is better form. It is more respectful. The "At
+Home" can be used for large and informal receptions, where an
+individual acceptance is not required.
+
+Garden parties are becoming very fashionable at watering-places, in
+rural cities, and at country houses which are accessible to a town. No
+doubt the garden party is a troublesome affair in a climate so
+capricious as ours. The hostess has to be prepared for a sudden
+shower, and to have two tables of refreshments. The effort to give the
+out-of-door plays in this country, as in England, has often been
+frustrated by a sudden shower, as at Mrs. Stevens' palace at Castle
+Point. It is curious that they can and do give them in England, where
+it always rains. However, these entertainments and hunting remain
+rather as visitors than as old and recognized institutions.
+
+Americans all dance well, and are always glad to dance. Whether it be
+assembly, hunt ball, or private party, the German cotillion finishes
+the bail. It is an allegory of society in its complicated and
+bewildering complications, its winding and unwinding of the tangled
+chain.
+
+In every large city a set arises whose aim is to be exclusive.
+Sometimes this privilege seems to be pushed too far. Often one is
+astonished at the black sheep who leap into the well-defended
+enclosures. In London, formerly, an autocratic set of ladies, well
+known as Almacks, turned out the Duke of Wellington because he came in
+a black cravat. In our republican country perpetual Almacks arise,
+offensive and defensive,--a state of things which has its advantages
+and disadvantages. It keeps up an interest in society. It is like the
+fire in the engine: it makes the train move, even if it sends out
+smoke and cinders which get into people's eyes and make them weep. It
+is a part of the inevitable friction which accompanies the best
+machinery; and if they have patience, those who are left out one
+winter will be the inside aristocrats of the next, and can leave
+somebody else out.
+
+Quadrilles, the Lancers, and occasionally a Virginia Reel, are
+introduced to make the modern ball more interesting, and enable people
+who cannot bear the whirl of the waltz to dance. The elderly can dance
+a quadrille without loss of breath or dignity. Indeed, the Americans
+are the only people who relegate the dance to the young alone. In
+Europe the old gray-head, the old mustache, leads the German.
+Ambassadors and generals, princes and potentates, go spinning around
+with gray-haired ladies until they are seventy. Grandmothers dance
+with their grandsons. Socrates learned to dance. In Europe it is the
+elderly woman who receives the most flattering invitations to lead
+the German. An ambassadress of fifty would be very much astonished if
+the prince did not ask her to dance.
+
+The saltatory art is like the flight of a butterfly,--hard to
+describe, impossible to follow. The _valse à deux temps_ keeps its
+precedence in Europe as the favourite measure, varied with galop,
+polka, and polka mazourka. We add, in America, Dancing in the Barn,
+which is really a Spanish dance.
+
+The _Pavanne_ is worthy of study, and the _Minuet de la Cour_ is a
+stately and beautiful thing, quite worthy of being learned, if it only
+teaches our women how to make a courtesy.
+
+Each leader of the German is a potentate; he leads his troops through
+new evolutions, and into combinations so vast, varied, and changeful
+that it is impossible to do more than hint at them.
+
+The proper name for a private ball is "a dance." In London one never
+talks of balls; it is always "a dance." Although supper is served
+generally at a buffet, yet some leaders, with large houses, are
+introducing little tables, which are more agreeable, but infinitely
+inconvenient. The comfort, however, of being able to sit while eating,
+and the fact that a party of four or six may enjoy their supper
+together would certainly determine the question as to its
+agreeableness. This is a London fashion, one set succeeding another at
+the same table. It can only be carried out, however, in a very large
+house or public place. The ball suppers in New York--indeed, all over
+America--are very "gorgeous feeds" compared with those one sees in
+Europe. The profusion of flowers, the hot oysters, boned turkey,
+terrapin, and canvas-back duck, the salmon, the game patties, salads,
+ices, jellies, and creams, all crowded in, sweetbreads and green peas,
+_filet de boeuf_, constant cups of _bouillon_,--one feels Carlyle's
+internal rat gnawing as one reads of them,--the champagne, the punch,
+the fine glass, choice china, the drapery of German looms, the Queen
+Anne silver, the porcelain of Sèvres and Dresden, the beauty of the
+women, the smart dressing, make the ball supper an elegant, an
+amazing, a princely sort of sight, saving that princes do not give
+such feasts,--only Americans.
+
+
+
+
+WEDDINGS.
+
+     "Rice and slippers, slippers and rice!
+     Quaint old symbols of all that's nice
+     In a world made up of sugar and spice,
+         With a honeymoon always shining;
+     A world where the birds keep house by twos,
+     And the ring-dove calls, and the stock-dove coos,
+     And maids are many, and men may choose,
+         And never shall love go pining!"
+
+
+If there were no weddings, there would be no art of entertaining. It
+is the key-note, the initial letter, the "open sesame," of the great
+business of society. Therefore certain general and very, perhaps,
+unnecessary hints as to the conduct of weddings in all countries may
+not be out of place here.
+
+In London a wedding in high life--or, as the French call it,
+"higlif"--is a very sweeping affair. If we were to read the
+descriptions in the "Court Journal" of one wedding trousseau alone,
+furnished to a royal princess, or to Lady Gertrude Somebody, we should
+say with Fielding that "dress is the principal accomplishment of men
+and women." As for the wedding-cake which is built at Gunter's, it is
+a sight to see,--almost as big as Mont Blanc.
+
+The importance of Gunter is assured by the "Epicure's Almanac,"
+published in 1815; and for many years this firm supplied the royal
+family. When George III. was king, the royal dukes stopped to eat
+Gunter's pies, in gratitude for the sweet repasts furnished them in
+childhood; but now the Buzzards, of 197 Oxford Street, also are
+specialists in wedding-cakes.
+
+Leigh Hunt, in one of his essays, described one Trumbull Walker as
+"the artist who confined himself to that denomination," meaning
+wedding-cake. His mantle fell on the Buzzards.
+
+This enormous cake, and the equally enormous bouquet are the chief
+distinctive marks in which a London wedding differs from ours. To be
+legal, unless by special license, weddings in England must be
+celebrated before twelve o'clock. The reason given for this law is
+that before 1820 gentlemen were supposed to be drunk after that hour,
+and not responsible for what they promised at the altar.
+
+In France, a singular difference of dress on the part of the groom
+exists. He always wears a dress-coat and white cravat, as do all his
+ushers and immediate friends. It looks very strange to English and
+American eyes.
+
+How does a wedding begin? As for the premonitory symptoms, they are in
+the air for several weeks. It is whispered about amongst the
+bridesmaids; it gets into the papers. It would be easy to write a
+volume, and it would be a useful volume if it brought conviction to
+the hearts of the offenders, of the wrong done to young ladies by the
+newspapers who assume, without authority, to publish the news of an
+engagement. Many a match has been broken off by such a premature
+surmise, and the happiness of one or more persons injured for life.
+
+Young people like to approach this most important event of their lives
+in a mutual confidence and secrecy; consequently society newspapers
+should be very careful how they either report an engagement, or
+declare that it is off. Sometimes rumors prejudicial to the gentleman
+are circulated without sufficient reason, and of course much
+ill-feeling is engendered.
+
+The first intimation of an engagement should come from the bride's
+mother, and the young bride fixes the day of her wedding herself. Then
+the father and mother, or guardians, of the young lady issue cards,
+naming the day and hour of the wedding.
+
+Brides often give the attendant maidens their dresses; or if they do
+not choose to do this, they suggest what they shall wear.
+
+Six ushers generally precede the party into the church, after having
+seated the guests. These are generally followed by six bridesmaids,
+who walk two and two. No one wears a veil but the bride herself, who
+enters on her father's arm. Widows who marry again must not wear
+white, or veils. The fact that the bride is in white satin, and often
+with low neck and short sleeves, and the groom in full morning
+costume, is much criticised in France.
+
+If the wedding occurs in the evening, the groom must wear a dress-coat
+and white tie.
+
+The invitations to the wedding are very simple and explicit:--
+
+                      GENERAL AND MRS. BROUNLOW
+                 Request the pleasure of your company
+                  at the marriage of their daughter
+                             EXCLAIRMONDE
+                                  to
+                        MR. GERALD FITZGERALD,
+                on Thursday, June 16th, at 12 o'clock,
+                         St. Peter's Church.
+
+In asking a young lady to be her bridesmaid, the bride is supposed to
+be prompted by claims of relationship or friendship, although fashion
+and wealth and other considerations often influence these invitations.
+As for the ushers, they must be unmarried men, and are expected to
+manage all matters at the church.
+
+Music should play softly during the entrance of the family, before the
+service. The mother of the bride, and her nearest relatives, precede
+her into the church, and are seated before she enters, unless the
+mother be a widow and gives the bride away. The ceremony should be
+conducted with great dignity and composure on all sides; for
+exhibitions of feeling in public are in the worst possible taste. At
+the reception, the bride's mother yields her place as hostess for the
+nonce, and is addressed after the bride.
+
+After two hours of receiving her friends, the young wife goes upstairs
+to put on her dress for the journey, which may be of any colour but
+black. Perhaps this is the time for a few tears, as she kisses mamma
+good-by. She comes down, with her mother and sisters, meets the groom
+in the hall, and dispenses the flowers of her bouquet to the smiling
+maidens, each of whom struggles for a flower.
+
+The parents of the bride send announcement cards to persons not
+invited to the wedding.
+
+Dinners to the young pair succeed each other in rapid succession. For
+the first three months the art of entertaining is stretched to its
+uttermost.
+
+A widow, in marrying again, should not use the name or initials of her
+late husband. If she was Mary Steward, and had married Mr. Hamilton,
+and being his widow, wishes to marry James Constable, her cards should
+read:
+
+                         MR. AND MRS. STEWARD
+                 Request the pleasure of your company
+                  at the marriage of their daughter
+                        MARY STEWARD-HAMILTON
+                                  to
+                         MR. JAMES CONSTABLE.
+
+If she is alone, she can invite in her own name as Mrs. Mary Steward
+Hamilton; or better still, a friend sends out the cards in her own
+name, with simply the cards of Mrs. Mary Steward Hamilton, and of the
+gentleman whom she is to marry.
+
+The custom of giving bridal presents has grown into an outrageous
+abuse of a good thing. There has grown up a rivalry between families;
+and the publicity of the whole thing, its notoriety and extravagance,
+ought to be well rebuked.
+
+At the wedding refreshment-table, the bride sometimes cuts the cake
+and allows the young people to search for a ring, but this is rather
+bad for the gloves.
+
+At a country wedding, if the day is fine, little tables are set out on
+the lawn. The ladies seat themselves, the gentlemen carry refreshments
+to them. The piazzas can be decorated with autumn boughs, evergreens,
+and flowers; the whole thing becomes a garden-party, and even the
+family dogs should have a wreath of white flowers around their necks.
+
+Much ill feeling is apt to be engendered by the distinction which is
+inevitably made in leaving out the friends who feel that they were
+entitled to an invitation to the house. It is better to offend no one
+on so important an occasion.
+
+Wedding-cards and wedding stationery should be simple, white without
+glaze, and with no attempt at ornamentation.
+
+It is proper for the bride to have her left hand bare as she walks to
+the altar, as it saves her the trouble of taking off a long glove.
+
+Child bridesmaids are very pretty and very much in favour. These
+charming children, covered with flowers and looking very grave and
+solemn, are the sweetest of heralds for a wedding procession.
+
+There is not, however, much difficulty except when Protestant marries
+Catholic. Such a marriage cannot be celebrated at the High Altar; it
+leads to a house wedding which is in the minds of many much more
+agreeable, as saving the bride the journey to church. In this matter,
+one of individual preference of course, the large and liberal American
+mind can have a very wide choice.
+
+In France the couple must go to the _Mairie_, where an official in a
+tricolour scarf, looking like Marat, marries them. This is especially
+the case if husband or wife is a divorced person, the Catholic church
+refusing to marry such. It is a curious fact, that in Catholic Italy a
+civil marriage is the only legal marriage; therefore good Catholics
+are all married twice. A mixed marriage in Catholic countries is very
+difficult; but in our country, alas! the wedding knot can be untied as
+easily as it is tied.
+
+"This train waits twenty minutes for divorces" is a joke founded on
+fact.
+
+"What do _divorcées_ do with their wedding presents?" has been a
+favourite conundrum of late, especially with those sent by the friends
+of the husband.
+
+If an evening wedding takes place in a church those who are asked to
+the house afterwards should go without bonnets. Catholic ladies,
+however, must always cover their heads in church; so they throw a
+light lace or mantilla over the head.
+
+It is not often that the bride dances at her own wedding, but there is
+no reason why she should not.
+
+"'Tis custom that makes cowards of us all." One brave girl was married
+on a Saturday in May, thus violating all the old saws and
+superstitions. She has been happy ever afterwards. Marriages in May
+used to be said to lead to poverty. It is the month of Mary, the
+Virgin, therefore Catholics object.
+
+One still braver bride chose Friday; this is hangman's day, and also
+the day of the crucifixion, therefore considered unlucky by the larger
+portion of the human race.
+
+However, marriage is lucky or unlucky as the blind goddess pleases; no
+foresight of ours can make it a certainty. Sometimes two very doubtful
+characters make each other better, and live happily; again two very
+fine characters but help to sublimate each other's misery. Perhaps no
+more hopeless picture of this failure was ever painted than the misery
+of Caroline and Robert Elsmere, in that masterly novel which led you
+nowhere.
+
+There is a capital description of a French _bourgeoise_ wedding in one
+of Daudet's novels:--
+
+"The least details of this important day were forever engraved on
+Risler's mind.
+
+"He saw himself at daybreak pacing his bachelor chamber, already
+shaved and dressed, with two pairs of white gloves in his pocket. Then
+came the gala carriages, and in the first one, the one with white
+horses, white reins, and a lining of yellow satin, his bride's veil
+floated like a cloud.
+
+"Then the entrance to the church, two by two, with this white cloud
+always at their head, floating, light, gleaming; the organ, the
+verger, the sermon of the _curé_, the tapers twinkling like jewels,
+the spring toilets, and all the world in the sacristie--the little
+white cloud lost, engulfed, surrounded, embraced, while the groom
+shook hands with the representatives of the great Parisian firms
+assembled in his honour; and the grand swell of the organ at the end,
+more solemn because the doors of the church were wide open so that the
+whole quarter took part in the family ceremony; the noises of the
+street as the cortège passed out, the exclamations of the
+lookers-on,--a burnisher in a lustring apron crying aloud, 'The groom
+is not handsome, but the bride is stunning,'--all this is what makes
+one proud when he is a bridegroom.
+
+"Then the breakfast at the works, in a room ornamented with hangings
+and flowers; the stroll in the Bois, a concession to the bride's
+mother, Madame Chèbe, who in her position as a Parisian _bourgeoise_
+would not have considered her daughter married without the round of
+the lake and a visit to the cascade; then the return for dinner just
+as the lights were appearing on the Boulevard, where every one turned
+to see the wedding party, a true, well-appointed party, as it passed
+in a procession of liveried carriages to the very steps of the Café
+Vefour.
+
+"It was all like a dream.
+
+"Now, dulled by fatigue and happiness, the worthy Risler looked
+dreamily at the great table of twenty-five covers, with a horseshoe at
+each end. Around it were well-known, smiling faces in whose eyes he
+seemed to see his own happiness reflected. Little waves of
+conversation from the different groups drifted across the table; faces
+were turned toward one another. You could see here the white cuffs of
+a black suit behind a basket of asclepias, here the laughing face of a
+girl above a dish of confections. The faces of the guests were half
+hidden behind the flowers and the dessert; all around the board were
+gayety, light, and colour.
+
+"Yes, Risler was happy.
+
+"Aside from his brother Franz, all whom he loved were there. First and
+foremost, facing him, was Sidonie,--yesterday the little Sidonie,
+to-day his wife. She had laid aside her veil for dinner, she had
+emerged from the white cloud.
+
+"Now in her silken gown, white and simple, her charming face seemed
+more clear and sweet under the carefully arranged bridal wreath.
+
+"By the side of Risler sat Madame Chèbe, the mother of the bride, who
+shone and glistened in a dress of green satin gleaming like a shield.
+Since morning all the thoughts of the good woman had been as brilliant
+as her robe. Every moment she had said to herself, 'My daughter is
+marrying Fremont and Risler,'--because in her mind it was not Risler
+whom her daughter married, but the whole establishment.
+
+"All at once came that little movement among the guests that announces
+their leaving the table,--the rustle of silks, the noise of chairs,
+the last words of talk, laughter broken off. Then they all passed into
+the grand _salon_, where those invited were arriving in crowds, and,
+while the orchestra tuned their instruments, the men with glass in eye
+paraded before the young girls all dressed in white and impatient to
+begin."
+
+
+
+
+HOW ROYALTY ENTERTAINS.
+
+     Stand back, and let the King go by.--OLD PLAY.
+
+     "Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers."
+
+
+When we approach the subject of royal entertainments, we cannot but
+feel that the best of us are at a disadvantage. Princes have palaces
+and retainers furnished for them. They have a purse which knows no
+end. They are either by the divine right, or by lucky chance, the
+personages of the hour! It is only when one of them loses his head, or
+is forced to abdicate, or falls by the assassin's dagger, that they
+approach at all our common humanity.
+
+Doubtless to them, entertaining, being a perfunctory affair, becomes
+very tedious. Pomp is not an amusing circumstance and they get so
+tired of it all that when off duty kings and queens are usually the
+most plainly dressed and the most simple of mortals. The "age of
+strut" has passed away. No one cares to assume the puffiness of Louis
+XIV. or George IV.
+
+Royal entertainments, however, have this advantage, they open to the
+observer the historical palace, and the pictures, gems of art, and
+interesting collections of which palaces are the great conservators.
+
+It would seem that Louis XIV., called _le Grand Monarque_, Louis the
+Magnificent, was a master of the art of entertaining. Under him the
+science of giving banquets received, in common with the other
+sciences, a great progressive impulse. There still remains some memory
+of those festivals, which all Europe went to see, and those
+tournaments, where for the last time shone lances and knightly suits
+of armour. The festivals always ended with a sumptuous banquet, where
+were displayed huge centre-pieces of gold and silver, painting,
+sculpture, and enamel, all laudatory of the hero of the occasion.
+
+This fashion made the fame of Benvenuto Cellini in the previous
+century. To-day, monarchs content themselves with having these
+centre-pieces made of cake, sugar, or ices. There will be no record of
+their great feasts for future ages.
+
+Toward the end of the reign of Louis XIV., the cook, the _cordon
+bleu_, received favourable notice; his name was written beside that of
+his patron; he was called in after dinner. It is mentioned in some of
+the English memoirs that this fashion was not unknown so lately as
+fifty years ago in great houses in England, where the cook was called
+in, in his white cap and apron, publicly thanked for his efforts, and
+a glass of wine offered him by his master, all the company drinking
+his health. This must have had an excellent effect on the art of
+gastronomy.
+
+Madame de Maintenon, whose gloomy sway over the old king reduced the
+gay court to the loneliness of an empty cathedral, threw a wet napkin
+on the science of good eating, and put out the kitchen fires for a
+season.
+
+Queen Anne, however, was fond of good cheer, and consulted with her
+cook. Many cookery books have the qualification "after Queen Anne's
+fashion."
+
+Under the Regent Orléans, a princely prince in spite of his faults,
+the art of good eating and entertaining was revived; and he has left a
+reputation for _piqués_ of superlative delicacy, _matelots_ of
+tempting quality, and turkeys superbly stuffed.
+
+The reign of Louis XV. was equally favourable to the art of
+entertaining. Eighteen years of peace had made France rich, and a
+spirit of conviviality was diffused amongst all classes. The proper
+setting of the table, and order, neatness, and elegance, as essentials
+of a well-appointed meal, date from this reign. It is from this period
+that the history of the _petit soupers de Choisy_ begins. We need
+hardly go in to that history of all that was reckless, witty, gay, and
+dissolute in the art of entertaining; but as one item, a floor was
+constructed so that the table and sideboard sank into the lower story
+after each course, to be immediately replaced by others which rose
+covered with a fresh course. From this we may imagine its luxury and
+detail.
+
+Louis XV. was a proficient in the art of cookery; he also worked
+tapestry with his own hand. We should linger over his feasts with more
+pleasure had they not led on to the French Revolution, as a horrible
+dessert. His carving-knives later on became the guillotine.
+
+Under Louis XVI. there was a constant improvement in all the
+"occupations which are required in the preparation of food" by cooks,
+_traiteurs_, pastry cooks, and confectioners. The art of preserving
+food, so that one could have the fruits of summer in the midst of
+winter, really began then, although the art of canning may safely be
+said to belong to our own much later time.
+
+In the year 1740 a dinner was served in this order: Soup, followed by
+the _bouilli_, an _entrée_ of veal cooked in its own gravy, as a side
+dish. Second course: A turkey, a dish of vegetables, a salad, and
+sometimes a cream. Dessert: Cheese, fruit and sweets. Plates were
+changed only thrice: after the soup, at the second course, and at
+dessert. Coffee was rarely served, but cherry brandy or some liqueur
+was passed.
+
+Louis XVIII., who grew to be an immensely fat man, was a remarkable
+gastronome. Let any one read Victor Hugo's "Les Misérables," and an
+account of his reign, to get an idea of this magnificent entertainer.
+His most famous _maître d'hôtel_ was the Duc d'Escars. When he and his
+royal master were closeted together to meditate a dish, the ministers
+of state were kept waiting in the antechamber, and the next day an
+official announcement was made, "Monsieur le Duc d'Escars a travaillé
+dans le cabinet."
+
+How strangely would it affect the American people if President
+Harrison kept them waiting for his signature because he was discussing
+terrapin and Madeira sauce with his _chef_.
+
+The king had invented the _truffles à la purée d'ortolans_, and
+invariably prepared it himself, assisted by the duke. On one occasion
+they jointly composed a dish of more than ordinary dimensions, and
+duly consumed the whole of it. In the night the duke was seized with a
+fit of indigestion, and his case was declared hopeless. Loyal to the
+last, he ordered an attendant to awake and inform the king, who might
+be exposed to a similar attack. His majesty was roused accordingly,
+and told that D'Escars was dying of his invention.
+
+"Dying!" exclaimed the king: "well, I always said I had the better
+stomach of the two."
+
+So much for the gratitude of kings. The Parisian restaurants, those
+world-renowned Edens of the gastronomer, were formed and founded on
+the theories of these cookery-loving kings. But political disturbances
+were to intervene in the year 1770. After the glorious days of Louis
+XIV. and the wild dissipation of the Regency, after the long
+tranquillity under the ministry of Fleury, travellers arriving in
+Paris found its resources very poor as to good cheer. But that soon
+mended itself.
+
+It was not until about 1814 that the parent of Parisian restaurants,
+Beauvilliers, made himself a cosmopolitan reputation by feeding the
+allied armies. He learned to speak English, and in that way became
+most popular. He had a prodigious memory, and would recognize and
+welcome men who had dined at his house twenty years before. In this he
+was like General Grant and the Prince of Wales. It is a very popular
+faculty.
+
+Beauvilliers, Méot, Robert, Rose Legacque, the Brothers Very,
+Hennevan, and Baleine, are the noble army of argonauts in discovering
+the Parisian restaurant; or rather, they founded it.
+
+The Brothers Very, and the Trois Frères Prevenceaux, both in the
+Palais Royal, are still great names to compete with. When the allied
+monarchs held Paris, in 1814, the Brothers Very supplied their table
+for a daily charge of one hundred and twenty pounds, not including
+wine, and in Père-la-Chaise a magnificent monument is erected to one
+of them, declaring that his "whole life was consecrated to the useful
+arts," as it doubtless was.
+
+From that day until 1890, what an advance there has been. There is now
+a restaurant in nearly every street in Paris, where one can get a good
+dinner. What a crowd of them in the Champs Élysées and out near the
+Bois.
+
+A Parisian dinner is thoroughly cosmopolitan, and the best in the
+world, when it is good. Parisian cookery has declined of late in the
+matter of meats. They are not as good as they ought to be. But the
+sauces are so many and so fine that they have given rise to many
+proverbs. "The sauce is the ambassador of a king." "With such a sauce,
+a man could eat his grandfather."
+
+Leaving France for other shores, for France has no monarch to
+entertain us now, let us see how two reigning monarchs entertain.
+
+A presentation at the Court of St. James is a picturesque affair and
+worth seeing, although it is a fatiguing process. A lady must be
+dressed at eleven in the morning, in full court dress, which means low
+neck and short sleeves, with a train four yards long and three wide.
+She must wear a white veil and have three feathers in her hair so that
+they can be seen in front. White gloves are also _de rigueur_, and as
+they are seldom worn now, except at weddings, a lady must remember to
+buy a pair. The carriages approach Buckingham Palace in a long queue,
+and the lady waits an hour or more in line, exposed to the jeers of
+the populace, who look in at the carriage windows and make comments,
+laugh, and amuse themselves. One hopes that this may do these
+ragamuffins some good, for they look miserable enough.
+
+Arriving in the noble quadrangle of Buckingham Palace, the music of
+the Guard's band enlivens one, and the silent, splendid figures of the
+household troops, the handsomest men in the world, sit like statues on
+their horses. No matter if the rain is pouring, as it generally is,
+neither man nor horse stirs.
+
+Once inside the palace, the card of entrance is taken by one of the
+Queen's pages, some other official takes her cloak, and the lady
+wends her way up a magnificent staircase into another gallery, out of
+which open many fine rooms. Gentlemen of the Household in glittering
+uniforms, and with orders, stand about in picturesque groups.
+
+The last room is filled with chairs, and is soon crowded with ladies
+and gentlemen, waiting for the summons to move on. The gentlemen are
+all in black velvet suits, with knee breeches and sword, silk
+stockings and low shoes.
+
+A slight commotion at the little turnstile tells you to take your
+turn; you pass on with the others, your name is loudly called, you
+make three little courtesies to her Majesty, the Prince and Princess
+of Wales, you see a glittering line of royalties, you hear the words,
+"Your train, Madame," it is thrown over your arm by some cavalier
+behind, and all is over; except that you are amongst your friends, and
+see a glittering room full of people, and realize that nothing is so
+bad as you had feared. After about an hour, you find your carriage and
+drive home, or to your minister's for a cup of tea.
+
+Then you receive, if you are fortunate, a great card from the Lord
+Chamberlain, with the Queen's command that you should be invited to a
+ball at Buckingham Palace. This ball is a sight to see, so splendid is
+the ball-room, so grand the elevated red sofas, with the duchesses and
+their jewels. Royalty enters about eleven o'clock, followed by all the
+ambassadors.
+
+Of late years the Queen has relegated her place as hostess to the
+Princess of Wales, but during the jubilee year she kept it, and it was
+a beautiful sight to see the little woman all covered with jewels,
+with her royal brood around her.
+
+The royal family go in to supper through a lane of guests. The
+supper-room is adorned with the gold plate bought by George IV., and
+many very fine pieces of plate given by other monarchs. The eatables
+and drinkables are what they would be at any great ball.
+
+The prettiest entertainment of the jubilee year was, however, the
+Queen's garden-party. No one had seen that lovely park behind
+Buckingham Palace for eighteen years; then it was used for the
+garden-party given to the Khedive of Egypt. Now it was filled by a
+most picturesque group. The Indian princes with all their jewels,
+their turbans, their robes, their dark, handsome faces, stood at the
+foot of a grand staircase which runs from the palace to the green
+turf. Every other man was a king, a prince, a nobleman, a great
+soldier, a statesman, a diplomate, a somebody.
+
+The women were all, of course, beautifully dressed in summer costume;
+and the grounds, full of ancient trees and fountains, artificial lakes
+with swans, marquees with refreshments, were as pretty as only a royal
+English park can be.
+
+Presently we heard the sound of the bagpipes, and a procession headed
+by some dancing Scotchmen came along. It was the Queen, with all her
+children and grandchildren, ladies-in-waiting, and many monarchs,
+amongst whom marched Queen Kapiolani of the Sandwich Islands. The
+Queen walked with a cane, the Prince of Wales by her side. They all
+stopped repeatedly and spoke to their guests on either side; then the
+younger members of the family led the way to the refreshment tents,
+where a truly regal buffet was spread.
+
+There was much talk, much music, much laughter, no stiffness. It was
+real hospitality. In one of the windows of the palace stood looking
+out the Crown Prince of Germany, later on to be the noble Emperor
+Frederic, even then feeling the pressure of that malady which in
+another year was to kill him. He who had been, in the procession of
+Princes on the great day, so important and so handsome a figure, was
+on this day a silent observer. The Queen after this gave an evening
+party to all the royalties, and the ambassadors, and many invited
+guests.
+
+The hospitality of the Queen is, of course, regal, but her dinners
+must of a necessity be formal. General Grant mentioned his
+disappointment that he did not sit next her, when she invited him to
+Windsor, but she had one of her children on either side, and he came
+next to the Princess Beatrice.
+
+The entertainments at Marlborough House are much less formal. The
+Prince of Wales, the most genial and hospitable of men, cannot always
+pen up his delightful cordiality behind the barriers of rank.
+
+As for the King and Queen of Italy, they do not try to restrain their
+cordiality. The Court of Italy is most easy-going, democratic, and
+agreeable, in spite of its thousand years of grandeur. The favoured
+guest who is to be presented receives a card to the _cercle_, on a
+certain Monday evening. The card prescribes low-necked dress, and any
+colour but black. To drive to the Quirinal Palace on a moonlight night
+in Rome is not unpleasant.
+
+The grand staircase, all covered with scarlet carpet, was lined with
+gigantic cuirassiers in scarlet, who stood as motionless as statues.
+We entered a grand hall frescoed by Domenichino. How small we felt
+under these giant figures. We passed on to another _salon_, frescoed
+by Julio Romano, so on to another where a handsome cavalier, the
+Prince Vicovara, received our cards, and opening a door, presented us
+to the Marchesa Villamarina, the Queen's dearest friend and favourite
+lady-in-waiting. We were arranged in rows around a long and handsome
+room. Presently a little movement at the door, and the deep courtesies
+of the Princess Brancaccio and the Princess Vicovara, both Americans,
+told us that the Queen had entered.
+
+Truly she is a royal beauty, a wonder on a throne. An accomplished
+scholar, a thoughtful woman, Marguerite of Savoy is the rose of the
+nineteenth century; her smile keeps Italy together. She is the
+sweetest, the most beautiful of all the queens, and as she walks about
+accompanied by her ladies, who introduce every one, she speaks to each
+person in his or her own language; she is mistress of ten languages.
+After she had said a few gracious words, the Queen disappeared, and
+the Marchesa Villamarina asked us to take some refreshments, saying,
+"I hope we shall see you on Thursday."
+
+The next day came an invitation to the grand court-ball. This is a
+very fine sight. The King and Queen enter and take their places on a
+high estrade covered with a crimson velvet baldaquin. Then the ladies
+and gentlemen of the household and the ambassadors enter.
+
+The Count Gianotti, a very handsome Piedmontese, the favourite friend
+of the King, the prefect of the palace and master of ceremonies,
+declared the ball opened, and the Queen danced with the Baron Kendall.
+The royal quadrille over, dancing became general. The King stood about
+looking soldier-like, bored and silent; a patriot and brave man, he
+hates society. The Queen does all the social work, and she does it
+admirably.
+
+What a company that was,--all the Roman nobility, the diplomatic
+corps, the visitors to Rome, S. P. Q. R., the senate and the Roman
+people. After the dancing, supper was announced. Royalty does not sup
+in public in Rome, as in England. The difference in etiquette is
+curious. The King and Queen retired. We went in as we pleased at ten
+o'clock, had seats, and supped gloriously; the excellent Italian
+cookery, of which we have spoken previously, was served admirably. The
+housekeeping at the Quirinal is excellent.
+
+The Queen of Italy moves about amongst the ambassadors' wives, and
+summons any stranger to whom she may wish to speak, to her side. A
+presentation to her is more personal and gracious than a like honour
+at any other court.
+
+A presentation at court resolves itself into two advantages. One sees
+the paraphernalia of royalty, always amusing and interesting to
+American eyes. Americans see its poetry, its almost vanished meaning,
+better than others. Power, even when it descends for a day on fresh
+Republican shoulders, is awe-inspiring. The boy who is a leader at
+school is more important than the boy who walks behind him. "A captain
+of thousands" was an old Greek term for leadership, dignity, and
+honour. Therefore it is not snobbery to desire to see these people on
+whom have fallen the ermine of power. It is snobbery to bow down
+before some unworthy bearer of a title; but when, as in the case of
+Marguerite of Savoy, there is a very good, a very gifted, a very
+wonderful woman behind it all, we are glad that she has been born to
+wear all these jewels.
+
+We have in our minds one more scene, and a very picturesque one. In
+September, 1888, the Duc d'Aosta, brother to King Humbert, married his
+niece, Letitia Bonaparte, daughter of the Princess Clotilde and Prince
+Jerome Bonaparte. This marriage occurred at Turin. A fine week of
+autumn weather was devoted to this ceremony. It was a great gathering
+of all the family of Victor Emmanuel. The Pope had granted an especial
+dispensation to the nearly related couple. The degree of consanguinity
+so repellent to us, is not considered, however, as prejudicial to
+marriage in Spain, Italy, or Germany.
+
+The King of Italy made this occasion of his brother's marriage, an
+open door for returning to the old Italian customs of past centuries,
+in the art of entertaining. The city of Turin was _en fête_ for the
+week. At booths, in the open air, strolling companies were playing
+opera, tragedy, burlesque, and farce. At the King's charge, the
+streets were lined with gay decorations of pink and white silk,
+banners and escutcheons; music was heard everywhere, and at evening
+brilliant illuminations followed the river.
+
+When the royal cortège appeared on their way to a public square they
+were preceded by six hundred young cavaliers in the dress of Prince
+Eugene, powdered hair, bright red and blue coats, each detachment
+escorting a royal carriage. First came the King and Queen, then the
+bridal pair.
+
+They mounted a superb thing, like a basket of flowers, in the Piazza
+Vittorio Emmanuel, where all the royalties sat around the bride. Music
+and flags saluted them. The vast crowd sat and looked at them for two
+hours. A gayly decorated balloon, covered with roses, floated over
+the Queen's head, and finally, as the rosy light faded away, a gun
+from the fortress sounded the hour of departure. The glittering
+cavalcade drove back to the palace, and we foreigners knew that we had
+seen a real, mediæval Italian festa.
+
+
+
+
+ENTERTAINING AT EASTER.
+
+     "There is a tender hue that tips the first young leaves of spring,
+     A trembling beauty in their notes when young birds learn to sing
+     A purer look when first on earth the gushing brook appears,
+     A liquid depth in infant eyes that fades with summer years."
+
+
+In the early days of ecumenical councils it was a mooted point when
+Easter should be celebrated. The Christian Jews kept the feast on the
+same day as their Passover, the fourteenth of Nisan, the month
+corresponding to our March or April; but the Gentile church observed
+the first Sunday following this, because Christ rose from the dead on
+that day. It was not until the fourth century that the Council of Nice
+decided upon the first Sunday after the full moon which follows the
+twenty-first of March. The contest was waged long and heavily, but the
+Western churches were victorious; a vote settled it.
+
+Perhaps this victory decided the later and more splendid religious
+ceremonials of Easter, which are much more observed in Rome and in all
+Catholic countries than those of Christmas. Constantine gratified his
+love of display by causing Easter to be celebrated with unusual pomp
+and parade. Vigils and night watches were instituted, people remaining
+all night in the churches in Rome, and carrying high wax tapers
+through the streets in processions.
+
+People in the North, glad of an escape from four months of darkness,
+watch to see the sun dawn on an Easter morning. They have a
+superstitious feeling about this observance, which came originally
+from Egypt, and is akin to the legend that the statue of Memnon sings
+when the first ray of the sun touches it.
+
+It is the queen of feasts in all Catholic churches, the world over. In
+early days, the fasting of Lent was restricted to one day, the Friday
+of Passion Week, Good Friday; then it extended to forty hours, then to
+forty days,--showing how much fashion, even in churchly affairs, has
+to do with these matters. One witty author says that, "people who do
+not believe in anything will observe Lent, for it is the fashion."
+
+Certainly, the little dinners of Lent, in fashionable society, are
+amongst the most agreeable of all entertainments. The _crème
+d'écrevisse_, the oyster and clam soups, the newly arrived shad, the
+codfish _à la royale_ and other tempting dainties are very good, and
+the dinner being small, and at eight o'clock, there is before it a
+long twilight for the drive in the Park.
+
+A pope of Rome once offered a prize to the man who would invent one
+thousand ways of cooking eggs, for eggs can always be eaten in Lent,
+and let us hope that he found them. The greatest coxcomb of all cooks,
+Louis Ude, who was prone to demand a carriage and five thousand a
+year, was famous for his little Lenten _menus_, and could cook fish
+and eggs marvellously. The amusements of Lent have left one joke in
+New York. Roller skates were once a very fashionable amusement for
+Lenten afternoons, though now gone out, and a club had rented Irving
+Hall for their playground and chosen _Festina lente_, "Make haste
+slowly," for their motto. It was a very witty motto, but some wise
+Malaprop remarked, "What a very happy selection, 'Festivals of Lent!'"
+
+However, Lent once passed, with its sewing circles and small
+whist-parties, then comes the brilliant Easter, with its splendid
+dinners, its weddings, its christenings and caudle parties, its
+ladies' lunches, its Meadow Brook hunt, its asparagus parties, and the
+chickens of gayety which are hatched out of Easter eggs. It is a great
+day for the confectioner. In Paris, that city full of gold and misery,
+the splendour and luxury of the Easter egg _bonbonnière_ is fabulous.
+A few years since a Paris house furnished an Easter egg for a Spanish
+infanta, which cost eight hundred pounds sterling.
+
+Easter dinners can be made delightful. They are simple, less heavy,
+hot, and stuffy, than those of mid-winter. That enemy of the feminine
+complexion, the furnace, is put out. It no longer sends up its direful
+sirocco behind one's back. Spring lamb and mint sauce, asparagus and
+fresh dandelion salad, replace the heavy joint and the canned
+vegetables. A foreigner said of us that we have everything canned,
+even the canvas-back duck and the American opera. Everything should be
+fresh. The ice-cream man devises allegorical allusions in his forms,
+and there are white dinners for young brides, and roseate dinners for
+_débutantes_.
+
+For a gorgeous ladies' lunch, behold a _menu_. This is for Easter
+Monday:--
+
+                          Little Neck clams.
+     Chablis.       Beef tea or _consommé_ in cups.
+       _Côtelettes de cervelles à la cardinal._      Cucumbers.
+                  Little ducks with fresh mushrooms.
+     Champagne.              Artichokes.
+                     Sweetbread _à la Richelieu_.
+                    Asparagus, Hollandaise sauce.
+     Claret.                 Roman punch.
+                         _Pâté de foie gras._
+                             Roast snipe.
+                        Tomato salad, lettuce.
+     Liqueur.                Ice-creams,
+                   in form of nightingales' nests.
+              Strawberries, sugared fruit, nougat cakes.
+                               Coffee.
+
+Of course, a season of such rejoicing, when "Christians stand praying,
+each in an exalted attitude, with outstretched hands and uplifted
+faces, expressing joy and gladness," is thought to be very propitious
+for marriage. There is generally a wedding every day, excepting
+Friday, during Easter week. A favourite spring travelling-dress for an
+Easter bride is fawn coloured cashmere, with a little round hat and
+bunch of primroses.
+
+For a number of choir boys to sing an epithalamium, walking up the
+aisle before the bride, is a new and very beautiful Easter fashion.
+
+A favourite entertainment for Easter is a christening. Christening
+parties are becoming very important functions in the art of
+entertaining. Many Roman Catholics are so anxious for the salvation of
+the little new soul, that they have their children baptized as soon as
+possible, but others put off this important ceremony until mamma can
+go to church, when little master is five weeks old. Then friends are
+invited to the ceremony very much in this fashion:--
+
+     Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton request the pleasure of your company at
+     the baptism of their infant daughter at the Cathedral, Monday,
+     March 30, at 12 o'clock. At home, after the ceremony, 14 W.
+     Ellicott Square.
+
+Many wealthy Roman Catholics have private chapels where the ceremony
+may be performed earlier.
+
+Presents are sent to the mamma, of flowers and bonbonnières shaped
+like an altar, a cradle, a powder-box; and there may be gold
+tea-scoops, pap-spoons and a caudle-cup. Gifts of old Dutch silver and
+the inevitable posy or couplet are very favourite gifts for the baby
+and mamma on these auspicious occasions.
+
+Caudle is a very succulent porridge made of oatmeal, raisins, spices,
+and rum, all boiled together for several days until it becomes a jelly
+gruel. It is very much sweetened, and is served hot in cups. The
+caudle-cup designed by Albrecht Dürer for some member of the family of
+Maximilian is still shown. Caudle cards are very often stamped with a
+cameo resemblance of these cups, and the invitation reads:--
+
+                         MRS. JAMES HAMILTON,
+                               at Home,
+                Thursday, March 30, from three to six.
+         Caudle.
+
+These do not require an answer.
+
+Very pretty tea-gowns are worn by mamma and the ladies of her family
+for this entertainment, but the guests come in bonnets and street
+dresses. There is no objection to having the afternoon tea-table with
+its silver tea-kettle, alcohol-lamp, pretty silver tea-set, plates of
+bread and butter, and little cakes ready for those ladies who prefer
+tea. Caudle is sometimes added to the teas of a winter afternoon, by
+the remnants of old Dutch families, even when there is no little
+master as a _raison d'être_, and delicious it is.
+
+There is a pretty account of the marriage of Marguerite of Austria
+with Philibert, the handsome Duke of Savoy. It is called _Mariage aux
+oeufs_. She had come to the Castle of Brae, in the charming district
+of Bresse lying on the western slopes of the Alps. Here the rich
+princess kept open house, and Philibert, who was hunting in the
+neighbourhood, came to pay his court to her. It was Easter Monday, and
+high and low danced together on the green. The old men drew their bows
+on a barrel filled with wine, and when one succeeded in planting his
+arrow firmly in it he was privileged to drink as much as he pleased
+_jusqu'à merci_.
+
+A hundred eggs were scattered in a level place, covered with sand, and
+a lad and lass, holding each other by the hand, came forward to
+execute a dance of the country. According to the ancient custom, if
+they succeeded in finishing the _branle_ without breaking a single egg
+they became affianced, and even the will of their parents might not
+avail to break their union. Three couples had already tried it
+unsuccessfully and shouts of laughter derided their attempts, when the
+sound of a horn was heard, and Philibert of Savoy, radiant with youth
+and happiness, appeared on the scene. He bent his knees before the
+noble _châtelaine_ and besought her hospitality. He proposed to her to
+try the egg fortune. She accepted. Their grace and beauty charmed the
+lookers-on and they succeeded, without a single crash, in treading the
+perilous maze.
+
+"Savoy and Austria!" shouted the crowd. And she said, "Let us adopt
+the custom of Bresse."
+
+They were married, and enjoyed a few years of exquisite happiness;
+then the beloved husband died. Marguerite survived him long, but never
+forgot him. She built in his memory a beautiful church. Travellers go
+to-day to see their magnificent tomb.
+
+The egg has been in all ages and in all countries the subject of
+infinite mystery, legend, and history. The ancient Finns believed that
+a mystic bird laid an egg in the lap of Vaimainon, who hatched it in
+his bosom. He let it fall in the water, and it broke. The lower
+portion of the shell formed the earth, the upper the sky, the liquid
+white became the sun, the yolk the moon, while little bits of
+egg-shells became the stars.
+
+Old English and Irish nurses instruct the children, when they have
+eaten a boiled egg, to push the spoon through the bottom of the shell
+to hinder the witches from making a boat of it.
+
+It is difficult to ascertain the precise origin of the custom of
+offering eggs at the festival of Easter. The Persians, the Russians,
+and the Jews all follow it.
+
+Amongst the Romans the year began at Easter, as it did amongst the
+Franks under the Capets. Many presents are exchanged, and as an egg is
+the beginning of all things, nothing better could be found as an
+offering. Its symbolic meaning is striking. We offer our friends all
+the blessings contained under that fragile shell, whose fragility
+represents that of happiness here below. The Romans commenced their
+repasts with an egg; hence the proverbial phrase, "_ab ovo usque ad
+mala_," or, as we still say, "beginning _ab ovo_."
+
+Another reason given for the Easter egg is that, about the fourth
+century, the Church forbade the use of eggs in Lent. But as the
+heretical hens would go on laying, the eggs accumulated to such a
+degree that they were boiled hard and given away. They were given to
+the children for playthings, and they dyed them of gay colours. In
+certain churches in Belgium the priests, at the beginning of a glad
+anthem, threw the eggs at the choristers who threw them back again,
+dancing to the music whilst catching the frail eggs that they might
+not break.
+
+In Germany, where means are more limited than in France, the Easter
+egg _bonbonnière_ is rare. There are none of the eight-hundred-pound
+kind, which was made of enamel, and which on its inside had engraved
+the gospel for the day, while by an ingenious mechanism a little bird,
+lodged in this pretty cage, sang twelve airs from as many operas.
+
+But in Germany, to make up for this poverty, they have transformed the
+hare into an oviparous animal, and in the pastry cook's windows one
+sees this species of hen sitting upright in a nest surrounded by eggs.
+I have often wondered if that inexplicable saying "a mare's nest,"
+might not have been "a hare's nest." As a _lucus a non lucendo_ it
+would have done as well. When a German child, at any season of the
+year, sees a hare run across the field, he says, "Hare, good little
+hare, lay plenty of eggs for me on Easter day." It is the custom of
+German families, on Easter eve, to place sugar-eggs and real eggs, the
+former filled with sugar plums, in a nest, and then to conceal it with
+dried leaves in the garden that the joyous children may hunt for them
+on Easter morning.
+
+It is a superstition all over the world that we should wear new
+clothes on Easter Day. Bad luck will follow if there is not at least
+one article which is new.
+
+
+
+
+HOW TO ENTERTAIN CHILDREN.
+
+     From the realms of old-world story
+       There beckons a lily hand,
+     That calls up the sweetness, the glory,
+       The sounds of a magic land.
+
+     Ah, many a time in my dreaming
+       Through that blessed region I roam!
+     Then the morning sun comes with its beaming
+       And scatters it all like foam!
+                                      HEINE.
+
+
+In the life of Madame Swetchine we read the following account of the
+amusements of a clever child:--
+
+"The occupation of a courtier did not prevent Monsieur Soymonof from
+bestowing the most assiduous care on the education of a daughter, who
+for six years was his only child. He was struck by the progress of her
+young intellect. She showed an aptitude for languages, music, and
+drawing, while she developed firmness of character,--a rare quality in
+a child.
+
+"She desired a watch with an ardour which transpired in all her
+movements, and her father had promised her one. The watch came and was
+worn with the keenest enjoyment; but suddenly a new thought seized
+upon the little Sophia. She reflected that there was something better
+than a watch. To relinquish it of her own accord, she hurried to her
+father and restored to him the object of her passionate desires,
+acknowledging the motive. Her father looked at her, took the watch,
+shut it up in a bureau drawer, and said no more about it.
+
+"M. Soymonof's rooms were adorned with bronzes, medals, and costly
+marbles. Sophia was on terms of intimacy with these personages of
+fable and history; but she felt an unconquerable repugnance to a
+cabinet full of mummies. The poor child blushed for her weakness, and
+one day, when alone, opened the terrible door, ran straight to the
+nearest mummy, took it up, and embraced it till her strength and
+courage gave away, and she fell down in a swoon. At the noise of her
+fall, her father hastened in, raised her in his arms, and obtained
+from her, not without difficulty, an avowal of the terrors which she
+had hitherto concealed from him. But this supreme effort was as good
+for her as a victory. From that day the mummies were to her only
+common objects of interest and curiosity.
+
+"Studious as was her education, M. Soymonof did not banish dolls. His
+daughter loved them as friends and preserved this taste beyond her
+childish years, but elevated it by the admixture of an intellectual
+and often dramatic interest. Her dolls were generally of the largest
+size. She gave them each a name and part to act, established connected
+relations between the different individuals, and kept up animated
+dialogues which occupied her imagination vividly, and became a means
+of instruction. Playing dolls was for her an introduction to ethics
+and a knowledge of the world.
+
+"Catherine's court was a succession of continual _fêtes_. The fairy
+pantomimes performed at the Hermitage were the first to strike the
+imagination of the child, who as yet could not relish the tragedies of
+Voltaire. She composed a _ballet_ which she called 'The Faithful
+Shepherdess and the Fickle Shepherdess.' She writes in her sixtieth
+year: 'One of the liveliest pleasures of my childhood was to compose
+festive decorations which I loved to light up and arrange upon the
+white marble chimney-piece of my schoolroom. The ardour which I threw
+into designing, cutting out, and painting transparencies, and finding
+emblems and mottoes for them was something incredible. My heart beat
+high while the preparations were in progress but the moment my
+illumination began to fade an ineffable devouring melancholy seized
+me.'"
+
+This extract is invaluable not only for its historic importance, but
+for the keynote which it sounds to a child's nature. The noble little
+Russian girl at the court of Catherine of Russia found only those
+pleasures lasting which came from herself, and when she could invest
+the fairy pantomime with her own personality.
+
+A fairy pantomime is possible to the poorest child if some superior
+intelligence, an older sister or aunt, will lend her help. The fairies
+can all be of pasteboard, with strings as the motive power. There can
+be no cheaper _corps de ballet_, nor any so amusing.
+
+"You have done much for your child" is an expression we often hear.
+"You have had a nurse, a nursery governess, a fine pony for your boy,
+you take your children often to the play and give them dancing
+parties, and yet they are not happy." It is the sincere regret of many
+a mamma that she cannot make her children happy. Yet in a large town,
+in a house shut up from our cold winter blasts, what can she do? A
+good dog and a kind-hearted set of servants will solve the problem
+better than all the intellect in the world. Grandmamma brings a doll
+to the little girl, who looks it over and says: "The dolly cannot be
+undressed, I do not want it." It is the dressing and the undressing
+which are the delights of her heart.
+
+A boy wants to make a noise, first of all things. Let him have a large
+upper room, a drum, a tambourine, a ball, and there he should be
+allowed to kick out the effervescence of early manhood. Do not follow
+him with all manner of prohibitions. Constant nagging and
+fault-finding is an offence against a child's paradise. Put him in a
+room for certain hours of the day where no one need say, "Get down!
+don't do that! don't make so much noise!" Let him roar, and shout, and
+climb over chairs and tables, and tear his gown, and work off his
+exuberance, and then he will be very glad to have his hands and face
+washed and listen to a story, or come down to meet papa with a smiling
+countenance.
+
+Children should be allowed to have pet birds, kittens, dogs, and as
+much live stock as the house will hold; it develops their sympathies.
+When a bird dies, and the floodgates of the poor little heart are
+opened, sympathize with it. It is cruel to laugh at childish woe.
+Never refuse a child sympathy in joy or sorrow. This lack of sympathy
+has made more criminals than anything else.
+
+Children should never be deceived either in the taking of medicine or
+the administration of knowledge. One witty writer a few years ago
+spoke of the bad influence of good books. He declared that reading
+"that Tommy was a good boy and kept his pinafore clean and rose to
+affluence, while Harry flung stones and told fibs and was carried off
+by robbers," developed his sympathies for Harry; and that although he
+was naturally a good boy he went, for pure hatred of the virtuous
+Tommy, to the river's brink and helped a bad boy to drown his aunt's
+cat, and then went home and wrote a prize composition called "Frank
+the Friendless, or Honesty is Best." All this was because the boy saw
+that Tommy was a prig, that his virtue was of that kind mentioned in
+Jane Eyre, in which the charity child was asked whether she would
+rather learn a hymn or receive a cake; she said "Learn a hymn,"
+whereupon she received "two cakes as a reward for her infant piety."
+Children cannot be humbugged; they can be made into hypocrites,
+however, by too many good books.
+
+The best entertainment for children is to let them play at being
+useful. Let the little girl get papa's slippers, brush his hat, even
+if the wrong way, find his walking stick, hold the yarn for grandma's
+knitting, or rock her brother's cradle, and she will be happy. Give
+the boy a printing-press or some safe tools, let him make a garden,
+feed his chickens, or clean out the cage of his pet robin, and he will
+be happy. Try to make them think and decide for themselves. A little
+girl says, "I don't know which dress to put on my dolly, Mamma, which
+shall I?" The mamma will be wise if she says, "You must decide, you
+know dolly best."
+
+When a child is ill or nervous, the great hour of despair comes to the
+mamma. A person without nerves, generally a good coloured mammy, is
+the best playmate, and a dog is invaluable. It is touching to see the
+smile come to the poor bloodless lips in a hospital ward, as a great,
+big, kindly dog puts his cold nose out to reach a little feverish
+hand. There is a sympathy in nature which intellect loses.
+
+Madame Swetchine's fear of the mummies has another lesson in it.
+Children are born with pet aversions, as well as with that terrible
+fear which is so much bigger than they are. The first of their rights
+to be respected is that they shall not be frightened, and shall not be
+too seriously blamed for their aversions. Buffalo Bill, who knows more
+about horses than most people, says that no horse is born bad; that he
+is made a bucking horse, a skittish horse, or a stumbling horse by
+being badly trained,--misunderstood when he was young. How true this
+is of human nature! How many villains are developed by an unhappy
+childhood! How many scoundrels does the boys' hall turn out! We must
+try to find these skeletons in the closet, this imprisoned spectre
+which haunts the imaginative child, and lay the ghost by sympathy and
+by common-sense. Cultivating the imagination, not over-feeding it or
+starving it, would seem to be the right way.
+
+Perhaps there are no better ways of entertaining children than by a
+juggler, the magic lantern, and simple scientific experiments. We use
+the term advisedly. Jugglery was the oldest of the sciences. Aaron and
+Moses tried it. One of the most valuable solaces for an invalid
+child--one with a broken leg, or some complaint which necessitates bed
+and quiet--is an experiment in natural magic.
+
+One of these simple tricks is called "The Balanced Coin." Procure a
+bottle, cork it, and in the cork place a needle. Take another cork,
+and cut a slit in it, so that the edge of a dollar will fit into it;
+then put two forks into the upper cork. Place the edge of the coin,
+which holds the upper cork and forks, on the point of the needle, and
+it will revolve without falling. This will amuse an imprisoned boy all
+the afternoon.
+
+The revolving image is a most amusing gentleman. Let poor Harry make
+this himself. Cut a little man out of a thin bit of wood, making him
+end in one leg, like a peg-top, instead of in two. Give him a pair of
+long arms, shaped like oars. Then place him on the tip of your finger,
+and blow; he will stand there and rotate, like an undecided
+politician.
+
+The Spanish dancer is another nice experiment. Cut a figure out of
+pasteboard, and gum one foot on the inverted side of a watch-glass;
+then place the watch-glass on a Japan waiter or a clean plate. Hold
+the plate slanting, and they will slide down; but drop a little water
+on the waiter or plate, and instead of the watch-glass sliding, it
+will begin to revolve, and continue to revolve with increased velocity
+as the experimentalist chooses. This is in consequence of the cohesion
+of water to the two surfaces, by which a new force is introduced.
+These experiments are endless, and will serve a variety of purposes,
+the principal being that of entertaining.
+
+To take children to the pantomime at Christmas is the universal law in
+England. We have seldom the pantomime here. We have the circus, the
+menagerie, and the play. A real play is better for children than a
+burlesque, and it is astonishing to see how soon a child can
+understand even Hamlet.
+
+To allow children to play themselves in a fairy tale, such as
+"Cinderella," is a doubtful practice. The exposure, the excitement,
+the late hours, the rehearsals, are all bad for young nerves; but they
+can play at home if it is in the daytime.
+
+When boys and girls get old enough for dancing-parties, nothing can be
+more amusing than the sight of the youthful followers of Terpsichore.
+It is a healthy amusement, and if kept within proper hours, and
+followed by a light supper only, is the most fitting of all
+children's amusements. Do not, however, make little men and women of
+them too soon. That is lamentable.
+
+As for ruses and catch-games like "The Slave Despoiled," "The Pigeon
+Flies," "The Sorcerer behind the Screen," "The Knight of the Whistle,"
+"The Witch," "The Tombola," one should buy one of the cheap manuals of
+games found at any bookstore, and a clever boy should read up, and put
+himself in touch with this very easy way of passing an evening.
+
+The games requiring wit and intelligence are many; as "The Bouquet,"
+"The Fool's Discourse," which has a resemblance to "Cross Questions,"
+"The Secretary," "The Culprit's Seat." All these need a good memory
+and a ready wit. All mistakes are to be redeemed by forfeit.
+
+Of the games to be played with pencil and paper, none is funnier than
+"The Narrative," in which the leader decides on the title, and gives
+it out to the company. It may be called "The Fortunate and Unfortunate
+Adventures of Miss Palmer." The words to be used may be "history,"
+"reading," "railway accident," "nourishment," "pleasures,"
+"four-in-hand," etc. The paper has a line written, and is folded and
+handed thus to the next,--each writer giving Miss Palmer whatever
+adventures he pleases, only bringing in the desired word. The result
+is incoherent, but amusing, and Miss Palmer becomes a heroine of
+romance.
+
+There are some children, as there are some grown people, who have a
+natural talent for games. It is a great help in entertaining children
+to get hold of a born leader.
+
+The game called "The Language of Animals" is one for philosophers.
+Each player takes his pencil and paper, and describes the feelings,
+emotions, and passions of an animal as if he were one. As, for
+instance, the dog would say: "I feel anger, like a human being. I am
+sometimes vindictive, but generally forgiving. I suffer terribly from
+jealousy. My envy leads me to eat more than I want, because I do not
+wish Tray to get it. Gluttony is my easily besetting sin, but I never
+got drunk in my life. I love my master better than any one; and if he
+dies, I mourn him till death. My worst sorrow is being lost; but my
+delights are never chilled by expectation, so I never lose the edge of
+my enjoyments by over-raised hopes. I want to run twenty miles a day,
+but I like to be with my master in the evening. I love children
+dearly, and would die for any boy: I would save him from drowning. I
+cannot wag my tongue, but I can wag my tail to express my emotion."
+
+The cat says: "I am a natural diplomatist, and I carry on a great
+secret service so that nobody knows anything about it. I do not care
+for my master or mistress, but for the house and the hearth-rug. I am
+very frugal, and have very little appetite. I kill mice because I
+dislike them, not that I like them for food. Oh, no! give me the
+cream-jug for that. I am always ready to do any mischief on the sly;
+and so if any one else does anything, always say, 'It was the cat.' I
+have no heart, by which I escape much misery. I have a great advantage
+over the dog, as he lives but a few years and has but one life. I have
+a long life, and nine of them; but why the number nine is always
+connected with me, I do not know. Why 'cat-o-nine-tails?' Why 'A cat
+has nine lives,' etc.?"
+
+Thus, for children's entertaining we have the same necessities as for
+grown people. Some one must begin; some one must suggest; some one
+must tell how. All society needs a leader. It may be for that reason
+our own grown-up society is a little chaotic.
+
+Perhaps the story of Madame Swetchine and her watch conveys a needed
+moral. Do not deluge children with costly gifts. Do not thus deprive
+them of the pleasures of hope. Anticipation is the dearest part of a
+child's life, and an overfed child, suffering from the pangs of
+dyspepsia, is no more to be pitied than the poor little gorged,
+overburdened child, who has more books than he can read and more toys
+than he can ever play with. Remember, too, "Dr. Blimber's Young
+Gentlemen," and their longing jealousy of the boy in the gutter.
+
+
+
+
+CHRISTMAS AND CHILDREN.
+
+     "Then I stooped for a bunch of holly
+     Which had fallen on the floor,
+     And there fell to the ground as I lifted it
+     A berry--or something more;
+     And after it fell my eyes could see
+     More clearly than before!
+     But oh! for the red Christingle
+     That never was missing of yore,
+     And oh! for the red Christingle
+     That I miss forever more!"
+
+
+Christingles are not much known in this country. They are made by
+piercing a hole in an orange, putting a piece of quill three or four
+inches long, set upright, in the hole, and usually a second piece
+inside this. Each quill is divided into several slips, each one of
+which is loaded with a raisin. The weight of the raisins bends down
+the little boughs, giving two circles of pendants. A coloured taper is
+placed in the upper quill and lighted on Christmas Eve. The custom is
+a German one.
+
+The harbinger of Christmas, in Holland, is a Star of Bethlehem carried
+along through the cities by the young men who pick up alms for the
+poor. They gather much money, for all come to welcome this symbol of
+peace. They then betake themselves to the head burgomaster of the
+town, who is bound to give them a good meal.
+
+The little Russian, amid the snows, looks for the red candle and the
+Christmas Tree, and the ice is all alight with gay illuminations. The
+little Roman boy watches with delight the preparation for the
+_Beffana_ in the public squares of Rome. For the _Beffana_ is the
+witch who rides on a broomstick; she is a female Santa Claus, who
+brings presents to a good child and a bunch of rods to a bad one. Her
+worship is celebrated on Christmas Eve to the sound of trumpets and
+all manner of unearthly noises. Then the boy goes to the Church of the
+Augustins, to see the little Jesus Child lying in the lap of his Holy
+Mother. He hears the most charming music, and singing choristers swing
+the censer before the Host. Above his head Saint Michael fights with
+the dragon. He sees the splendid procession of the cardinals in their
+gorgeous red and white robes, and as he goes down the broad marble
+steps, on each side of which beautiful statues stand in niches, his
+mother, poor Dominica, peasant of the Campagna, kneels and makes the
+sign of the cross, and tells her boy that this is Christmas, the day
+on which the Jesus Child was born to take his sins away. Again he
+wanders with her through the market-place; every one gives him
+playthings, fruits, and cakes; a rich foreigner tosses him a coin. The
+little Antonio asks why, and his mother tells him it is Christmas, but
+not so gay as when she was a little girl, for then the _pifferari_,
+the shepherds from the mountains, came, in their short cloaks with
+ribbons around their pointed hats, to play on their bagpipes before
+every image of the Virgin. Then they go again to the Church, the
+beautiful Church of Ara Coeli, to hear the angel girls make Christmas
+speeches to welcome the little Christ-child, and as he looks at the
+image of the Madonna, all hung with jewels, he wishes it were
+Christmas all the year round.
+
+The Christmas tree dates back to the Druids, but seems to have
+disappeared from England for several centuries. Meantime, it blossomed
+in Germany, where, under the tender and soft Scandinavian influence
+which has such an admirable and ameliorating effect on homely German
+life, it has continued to bear its fruit for six hundred years. It
+came back to England in the days of Queen Charlotte, who, true to her
+German associations, had a tree dressed at Kew Palace in the rooms of
+her German attendant. It was hung, writes the Hon. Amelia Murray, with
+gifts for the children, "who were invited to see it; and I remember,"
+she says, "what a pleasure it was to hunt for one's name."
+
+The "Mayflower," which brought much else that was good, forgot the
+Christmas tree. It was not until the beginning of the present century
+that one could be seen near Plymouth Rock. Men and women now living
+can remember when Washington Irving's "Sketch-book" told to them the
+first story of an English Christmas, and some brave women determined
+to hang a few boughs and red berries around the cold, barren church.
+
+Then the tree began to bud and burgeon with gifts, and the rare
+glories of colour crept in upon the snows of winter. The red fire on
+the hearth, the red berries on the mantel, brought in the light which
+grew pale in winter, the hospitality and the cheer of the turkey and
+plum-pudding went around, and Christmas carols began to be sung by men
+of Puritan antecedents. Old Christmas, frightened away at first by a
+few fanatics, came at last to America to stay, and the mistletoe,
+prettiest, most weird, most artistic of parasites, was removed from
+dreary Druidical associations, and no longer assists at human
+sacrifices,--unless some misogynist may so consider the getting of
+husbands.
+
+The English Christmas is the typical one in the art of entertaining.
+In every country neighbourhood, public county balls are conducted with
+great pomp during the twelve days of Christmas. From all the great
+houses within ten or fifteen miles come large parties, dressed in the
+latest London fashions, among them the most distinguished lights of
+the London world. Country residents are also conspicuous, and for
+people who live altogether in the country this is the chosen occasion
+for the first introduction of a daughter into society. The town hall
+or any other convenient building is beautifully dressed with holly and
+mistletoe. The band is at the upper end and the different sets form
+exclusive groups about the room, seldom mixing even in the Virginia
+Reel and other country dances.
+
+The private festivities of Christmas consist of a dinner to the
+tenantry and a large one to the family, all of whose members are
+expected. The mistletoe is hung conspicuously from the great lantern
+in the hall, or over the stag's head at the door. The rooms are
+wreathed with holly, each picture is framed in it, and the ladies put
+the red berries in their hair and all over their dresses. The
+customary turkey, a mighty bird, enters, making an event at the
+dinner, while later on, a plum-pudding, all ablaze, with a sprig of
+holly in the midst, makes another sensation. Mince-pies are set on
+fire with the aid of a little alcohol, which is poured over them from
+a small silver ladle. After the dinner, is passed the loving cup, a
+silver cup with two handles, containing a hot, spiced, sweetened ale.
+It has two mouths, and as it is lifted its weight requires both hands.
+
+In England, Christmas and New Year's still keep some of the mediæval
+village customs. Men go about in motley, imitating quacks and
+fortune-tellers, and there is much noise and tooting of horns. These
+mummers are sent to the servants' hall, where a plentiful supper and
+horns of ale await them. The waits, or carol singers, are another
+remnant of old Christmas. In remote parts of England the stables are
+lighted, to prove that man has not forgotten the Child born and laid
+in a manger. As for the parish festivities, in which the hall has so
+prominent a part, the school feasts, the blankets for the poor, the
+clothing-club meetings at Martinmas, all has been told us in novels,
+which have also given us many a picture of comfortable and stately
+English life.
+
+The modern English squire does not, however, eat, drink, and make
+merry for twelve days, as he used. The wassail-bowl is broken at the
+fountain, and mince-pies and goose-pies and yule-cakes are thought to
+be heavy for modern digestion. But the good cheer remains.
+
+The noblest as well as the humblest of all English houses, especially
+in Yorkshire, keep up the old superstition of lighting the Yule log,
+"the ponderous ashen fagot from the yard," and great ill-luck is
+foretold if its flame dies out before Twelfth Night. Frumenty, which
+is a porridge boiled with milk, sugar, wine, spices, and raisins, is
+served. It was in a cup of frumenty, as every conscientious reader of
+fairy stories will remember, that Tom Thumb was dropped by his
+careless nurse. The Christmas pie of Yorkshire, is a "brae goose-pie"
+which Herrick in one of his delightful verses thus defends:
+
+     "Come guard this night the Christmas pie,
+     That the thiefe, though ne'er so slie,
+     With his fleshhooks, don't come nie
+                           To catch it.
+
+     "From him who all alone sits there,
+     Having his eyes still in his eare,
+     And a deale of nightly feare
+                           To watch it."
+
+In America, the young people are utilizing Christmas day as they do in
+England, if there is no frost, to go a-hunting. Afternoon tea, under
+the mistletoe in the hall of a country house, is generally taken in a
+riding habit.
+
+In most families it is a purely domestic festival; although, as the
+tree has been enjoyed the night before, when Santa Claus, the great
+German sprite, has held his revels, there is no reason why a grand
+dinner to one's friends should not be given. And let us plead that the
+turkey, our great national bird, may not be cooked by gas. He is so
+much better roasted before a wood fire.
+
+There are some difficulties in giving a Christmas dinner in a large
+city, as nearly all the waiters are sure to be drunk, and the cook has
+also, perhaps, been at the frumenty. Being a religious as well as a
+social festival, it is apt to bring about a confusion of ideas. But,
+everything else apart, it is Children's Day; it is the day when, as
+Dickens says, we should remember the time when its great Founder was a
+child Himself. It is especially the day for the friendless young, the
+children in hospitals, the lame, the sick, the weary, the blind. No
+child should be left alone on Christmas Day, for loneliness with
+children means brooding. A child growing up with no child friend is
+not a child at all, but a premature man or woman.
+
+The best Christmas present to a boy is a box of tools, the best to a
+girl any number of dolls. After dressing and undressing them, giving
+them a bath, taking them through a fit of sickness, punishing them,
+and giving them an airing in the park,--for little maidens begin to
+imitate mamma at a very early age,--the next best amusement is to
+manufacture a doll's house. The brother must plane the box,--an old
+wine box will do,--and fit in it four compartments, each of which must
+be elaborately papered. Then a "real carpet" must be nailed down and
+pictures hung on the wall. These bits, framed with gold paper, usually
+require mamma's help. The kitchen must be fitted up with tins, which
+perhaps had better be bought, but after the _batterie de cuisine_ is
+finished, then the chairs and beds should be made at home. Cardboard
+boxes can be cut into excellent doll's beds. Pillows, bolsters,
+mattress, sheets, pillow-cases, will keep little fingers busy for many
+days.
+
+When they get older, and can write letters, a post-office is a
+delightful boon. These are to be bought, but they are far more amusing
+if made at home. Any good-sized card-box will do for this purpose. The
+lid should be fastened to it so that when it stands up it will open
+like a door. A slit must be cut out about an inch wide, and from five
+to six inches long, so as to allow the postage of small parcels, yet
+not large enough even to admit the smallest hand. Children should
+learn to respect the inviolate character of the post from the earliest
+age.
+
+On the door should be written the times of the post. Most children are
+fond of writing letters to one another, and this will of course give
+rise to a grand manufacture of note paper, envelopes, and post-cards,
+and will call forth ingenuity in designing and colouring monograms and
+crests, for their note paper and envelopes. An envelope must be taken
+carefully to pieces, to form a flat pattern. Then those cut from it
+have to be folded, gummed together, a touch of gum put on the flap
+and the monogram made to correspond. It is wonderful what occupation
+this gives for weeks. A paint-box should be also amongst the Christmas
+gifts.
+
+Capital scrap-books can be made by children. Old railway guides may be
+the foundation, and every illustrated paper the magazine of art. A
+paste-pot, next to a paint-box, is a most serviceable toy.
+
+Children like to imitate their elders. A little boy of two years
+enjoys smoking a pipe as he sees grandpapa smoke, and knocks out
+imaginary ashes, as he does, against the door.
+
+Hobby horses are profitable steeds, and can be made to go through any
+amount of paces. But mechanical toys are more amusing to his elders
+than to the child, who wishes to do his own mechanism. A boy can be
+amused by turning him out of the house, giving him a ball or a kite,
+or letting him dig in the ground for the unhappy mole. Little girls,
+who must be kept in, on a rainy day, or invalid children, are very
+hard to amuse and recourse must be had to story-telling, to the dear
+delightful thousand and one books now written for children, of which
+"Alice in Wonderland" is the flower and perfection.
+
+For communities of children, as in asylums and schools, there is
+nothing like music, songs, and marches; anything to keep them in time
+and tune. It removes for a moment that institutionized look which has
+so unhappy an effect.
+
+Happy is the child who has inherited a garret full of old trunks, old
+furniture, old pictures, any kind of old things. It is a precious
+inheritance. Given the dramatic instinct and a garret, and a family of
+quick-witted boys and girls will have amusement long after the
+Christmas holidays are passed.
+
+It would be a great amusement for weeks before Christmas, if children
+were taught to make the ornaments for the tree, as is done in
+economical Germany. Here the ideas of secrecy and mystery are so
+associated with Santa Claus that such an idea would be rejected. But a
+thing is twice as interesting if we put ourselves into it.
+
+At Christmas time let us invoke the fairies. They, the gentry, the wee
+people, the good people, are very dear to the real little wee people,
+who see the fun and do not believe too much in them. The fairies who
+make their homes under old trees and resort to toadstools for shelter,
+and who make invisible excursions into farmhouses have afforded the
+Irish nurse no end of legends. An old nurse once held a magnificent
+position in the nursery because she had seen a fairy.
+
+The Christmas green was once the home of the peace-loving wood-sprite.
+Christmas evergreens and red berries make the most effective interior
+decorations, their delightful fragrance, their splendid colour renders
+the palace more beautiful, and the humble house attractive. Before
+Twelfth Night, January 6, they must all be taken down. The festivities
+of this great day were much celebrated in mediæval times, and the
+picture by Rubens, "The King Drinks," recalls the splendour of these
+feasts. It is called Kings' Day to commemorate the three kings of
+Orient, who paid their visit to the humble manger, bringing those
+first Christmas gifts of which we have any account.
+
+The negroes from Africa, who were brought as slaves to the West Indian
+Islands, always celebrate this day with queer and fetich rites. It is
+in honour of the black king Melchior whom we see in the pictures "from
+Afric's sunny fountains."
+
+The Twelfth-Night cake, crowned with candles, is cut and eaten with
+many ceremonies on this occasion. The universality of Christmas is its
+most remarkable feature. Trace it as one will to the ancient
+Saturnalia, this universality is still inexplicable. It long antedates
+the Christian era. The distinctly modern customs are the giving of
+gifts, and the good eating, which, if followed back, we find to have
+been gluttony among the Norsemen.
+
+To the older members of the family the day is a sad one. The little
+verse at the head of the chapter recalls the fact that for every child
+gone back to heaven, there is one Christingle less. But if it will
+bring the rich to the poor, if it will not forget a single legend or
+grace, if the holly and evergreen will breathe the sweetest and
+highest significance, if we can remember that every simple festival at
+Christmas which makes the hearth-stone brighter is a tribute to the
+highest wisdom, if we connect Christmas and humanity, then shall we
+keep it aright. For the world unlocks its heart on every Christmas Day
+as it has done for eighteen Christian centuries. The cairn of
+Christmas memories rises higher and higher as the dear procession of
+children, those constantly arriving, precious pilgrims from the
+unknown world, halts by the majestic mountain to receive gifts, giving
+more than they take. For what would Christmas be without the children?
+
+
+
+
+CERTAIN PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS.
+
+
+The rules laid down in books of etiquette may seem preposterously
+elaborate and absurd to the denizens of cities, and to those who have
+had the manual of society at their fingers' ends from childhood, but
+they may be like the grammar of an unknown tongue to the youth or
+maiden whose life has been spent in seclusion or a rustic
+neighbourhood. As it is the aim of this unpretending volume to assist
+such young people, a few hints to young men coming fresh from life on
+the plains, or from an Eastern or Western college, from any life which
+has separated them from the society of ladies, may not be considered
+impertinent.
+
+A young man on coming into a great city, or into a new place where he
+is not known, should try to bring a few letters of introduction. If he
+can bring such a letter to any lady of good social position, he has
+nothing further to do but deliver it, and if she takes him up and
+introduces him, his social position is made. But this good fortune
+cannot always be commanded. Young men often pass through a lonely life
+in a great city, never finding that desired opportunity.
+
+To some it comes through a friendship on the tennis ground, at the
+clubs, or through business. If a friend says to some ladies that
+Tilden is a good fellow, Tilden will be sought out and invited. It is
+hardly creditable to any young man to live in a great city without
+knowing the best ladies' society. He should seek to do so, and
+perhaps the simplest way would be for him to ask some friend to take
+him about and to introduce him. Once introduced, Tilden should be
+particular not to transcend the delicate outlines of social suffrance.
+He must not immediately rush into an intimacy.
+
+A call should never be too long. A woman of the world says that one
+hour is all that should be granted to a caller. This rule is a good
+one for an evening visit. It is much better to have one's hostess
+wishing for a longer visit than to have her sigh that you should go.
+In a first visit, a gentleman should always send in his card. After
+that he may dispense with that ceremony.
+
+A gentleman, for an evening visit, should always be in evening dress,
+black cloth dress-coat, waistcoat, and trousers, faultless linen and
+white cravat, silk stockings, and polished low shoes. A black cravat
+is permissible, but it is not full dress. He should carry a crush hat
+in his hand, and a cane if he likes. For a dinner-party a white cravat
+is indispensable; a man must wear it then. No jewelry of any kind is
+fashionable, excepting rings. Men hide their watch chains, in evening
+dress.
+
+The hands should be especially cared for, the nails carefully cut and
+trimmed. No matter how big or how red the hand is, the more masculine
+the better. Women like men to look manly, as if they could drive, row,
+play ball, cricket, perhaps even handle the gloves.
+
+A gentleman's dress should be so quiet and so perfect that it will not
+excite remark or attention. Thackeray used to advise that a
+watering-pot should be applied to a new hat to take off the gloss. The
+suspicion of being dressed up defeats an otherwise good toilet.
+
+We will suppose that Tilden becomes sufficiently well acquainted to
+be asked to join a theatre party. He must be punctual at the
+rendezvous, and take as a partner whomever the hostess may assign him,
+but in the East he must not offer to send a carriage; that must come
+from the giver of the party. In this, Eastern and Western etiquette
+are at variance, for in certain cities in the West and South a
+gentleman is expected to call in a carriage, and take a young lady to
+a party. To do this would be social ruin in Europe, nor is it allowed
+in Boston or New York. If, however, Tilden wishes to give a theatre
+party, he must furnish everything. He first asks a lady to _chaperon_
+his party. He must arrange that all meet at his room, or a friend's
+house. He must charter an omnibus or send carriages for the whole
+party; he must buy the tickets. He is then expected to invite his
+party to sup with him after the theatre, making the feast as handsome
+as his means allow. This is a favourite and proper manner for a young
+man to return the civilities offered him. It is indispensable that he
+should have the mother of one of the young ladies present. The custom
+of having such a party with only a very young _chaperon_ has fallen,
+properly, into disrepute. And it seems almost unnecessary to say so,
+except that the offence has been committed.
+
+A man should never force himself into any society, or go anywhere
+unasked. Of course, if he be taken by a lady, she assumes the
+responsibility, and it is an understood thing that a leader of society
+can take a young man anywhere. She is his sponsor.
+
+In the early morning a young man should wear the heavy, loosely
+fitting English clothes now so fashionable, but for an afternoon
+promenade with a lady, or for a reception, a frock coat tightly
+buttoned, gray trousers, a neat tie, and plain gold pin is very good
+form. This dress is allowed at a small dinner in the country, or for a
+Sunday tea.
+
+If men are in the Adirondacks, if flannel is the only wear, there is
+no dressing for dinner; but in a country house, where there are
+guests, it is better to make a full evening toilet, unless the hostess
+gives absolution. There should always be some change, and clean linen,
+a fresh coat, fresh shoes, etc., donned even in the quiet retirement
+of one's own home. Neatness, a cold bath every morning, and much
+exercise in the open air are among the admirable customs of young
+gentlemen of the present day. If every one of them, no matter how
+busy, how hard-worked, could come home and dress for dinner, it would
+be a good habit. Indeed, if all American men, like all English men,
+would show this attention to their wives, society would be far more
+elegant. A man always expects his wife to dress for him; why should he
+not dress for her? He is then ready for evening visits, operas,
+parties, theatres, wherever he may wish to go. No man should sit down
+to a seven o'clock dinner unless freshly dressed.
+
+If Tilden can afford to keep a tilbury, or a dog-cart, and fine
+horses, so much the better for him. He can take a young girl to drive,
+if her mamma consents; but a servant should sit behind; that is
+indispensable. The livery and the whole turnout should be elegant, but
+not flashy, if Tilden would succeed. As true refinement comes from
+within, let him read the noble description of Thackeray:--
+
+"What is it to be a gentleman? Is it to be honest, to be gentle, to be
+generous, to be true, to be brave, to be wise, and possessing all
+these qualities to exercise them in the most gentle manner? Ought a
+gentleman to be a loyal son, a true husband, and honest father? Ought
+his life to be decent, his bills to be paid, his tastes to be high and
+elegant? Yes, a thousand times yes!"
+
+Young men who come to a great city to live are sometimes led astray by
+the success of gaudy adventurers who do not fall within the lines of
+the above description, men who get on by means of enormous impudence,
+self-assurance, audacity, and plausible ways. But if they have
+patience and hold to the right, the gentleman will succeed, and the
+adventurer will fail. No such man lasts long. Give him rope enough,
+and he will soon hang himself.
+
+It is not necessary here to refer to the etiquette of clubs. They are
+self-protecting. A man soon learns their rules and limitations. A man
+of honesty and character seldom gets into difficulty at his club. If
+his club rejects or pronounces against him, however, it is a social
+stigma which it is hard to wipe out.
+
+A young man should lose no opportunity of improving himself. Works of
+art are a fine means of instruction. He should read and study in his
+leisure hours, and frequent picture galleries and museums. A young man
+becomes the most agreeable of companions if he brings a keen fresh
+intelligence, refined tastes, and a desire to be agreeable into
+society. Success in society is like electricity,--it makes itself
+felt, and yet is unseen and indescribable.
+
+It is a nice thing if a man has some accomplishment, such as music or
+elocution, and to be a good dancer is almost indispensable. Yet many a
+man gets on without any of these.
+
+It is a work-a-day world that we live in, and the whole formation of
+our society betrays it. Then dress plainly, simply, and without
+display. A gentleman's servants often dress better than their master,
+and yet nothing is so distinctive as the dress of a gentleman. It is
+as much a costume of nobility as if it were the velvet coat which Sir
+Walter Raleigh threw down before Queen Elizabeth.
+
+It may not be inappropriate here to say a word or two on minor points.
+In addressing a note to a lady, whom he does not know well, Tilden
+should use the third person, as follows:--
+
+     Mr. Tilden presents his compliments to Mrs. Montgomery and
+     begs to know if she and Miss Montgomery will honor him with
+     their company at a theatre party in the evening of April 3d,
+     at the Chestnut Street Theatre.
+     R. S. V. P.                         117 South Market Place.
+
+This note should be sealed with wax, impressed with the writer's coat
+of arms or some favourite device, and delivered by a private messenger
+who should wait for an answer. In addressing a letter to a gentleman,
+the full title should be used,--"Walter Tilden, Esq.," or, first name
+not known, "---- Tilden, Esq.," never, "Mr. Walter Tilden." If it be
+an invitation, it is not etiquette to say "Mister."
+
+In writing in the first person, Tilden must not be too familiar. He
+must make no elisions or contractions, but fill out every word and
+line, as if it were a pleasure.
+
+It is urged against us by foreigners, that the manners of men toward
+women partake of the freedom of the age; that they are not
+sufficiently respectful. But, if careless in manner, American men are
+the most chivalrous at heart.
+
+At a ball a young man can ask a friend to present him to a lady who is
+chaperoning a young girl, and through her he can be presented to the
+young girl. No man should, however, introduce another man without
+permission. If he is presented and asks the girl to dance, a short
+walk is permitted before he returns his partner to the side of the
+_chaperon_. But it is bad manners for the young couple to disappear
+for a long time. No man should go into a supper-room alone, or help
+himself while ladies remain unhelped.
+
+To get on in society involves so much that can never be written down
+that any manual is of course imperfect; for no one can predict who
+will succeed and who will fail. Bold and arrogant people--"cheeky"
+people--succeed at first, modest ones in the long run. It is a
+melancholy fact that the most objectionable persons do get into
+fashionable society. It is to be feared that the possession of wealth
+is more desired than the possession of any other attribute; that much
+is forgiven in the rich man which would be rank heresy in the poor
+one.
+
+We would not, however, advise Tilden to choose his friends from the
+worldly point simply, either of fashion or wealth. He should try to
+find those who are well bred, good, true, honourable, and generous.
+Wherever they are, such people are always good society.
+
+In the ranks of society we find sometimes the ideal gentleman. Society
+may not have produced so good a crop as it should have done; yet its
+false aims have not yet dazzled all men out of the true, the ideal
+breeding. There are many clubs; but there are some admirable
+Crichtons,--men who can think, read, study, work, and still be
+fashionable.
+
+A man should go through the fierce fires of social competition, and
+yet not be scorched. All men have not had that fine, repressive
+training, which makes our navy and army men such gentlemen. The
+breeding of the young men of fashion is not what their grandfathers
+would have called good. They sometimes have a severe and bored
+expression when called on to give up a selfish pleasure. One asks,
+"Where are their manners?"
+
+Breeding, cultivation, manners, must start from the heart. The old
+saying that it takes three generations to make a gentleman makes us
+ask, How many does it take to unmake one? Some young and well-born men
+seem to be undoing the work of the three generations, and to have
+inherited nothing of a great ancestor but his bad manners. An American
+should have the best manners. He has had nothing to crush him; he is
+unacquainted with patronage, which in its way makes snobs, and no one
+loves a snob, least of all the man whom the snob cultivates.
+
+The word "gentleman" although one of the best in the language, should
+not be used too much. Be a gentleman, but talk about a man. A man
+avoids display and cultivates simplicity, neatness, and fitness of
+things, if he is both a man and a gentleman.
+
+
+
+
+COMPARATIVE MERITS OF AMERICAN AND FOREIGN MODES OF ENTERTAINING.
+
+
+There is no better old saw in existence than that comparisons are
+odious; they are not only odious, but they are nearly if not quite
+impossible. For instance, if we compare a dinner in London with a
+dinner in New York, we must say, Whose dinner? What dinner? If we
+compare New York with Paris, we must say, What Paris? Shall we take
+the old Catholic aristocracy of the Faubourg St. Germain, or the
+upstart social spheres of the Faubourg St. Honoré and the Chaussée
+d'Antin? Or shall we take _Tout Paris_, with its thousand
+ramifications, with its literary and artistic salons, the _Tout Paris
+mondain_, the _Tout Paris artiste_, the _Tout Paris des Premières_,
+and all the rest of that heterogeneous crowd, any fragment of which
+could swallow up the "four hundred," and all its works?
+
+Shall we attempt to compare New York or Washington with London, with
+its four millions, its Prince of Wales set, its old and sober
+aristocracy of cultivated people, whose ideas of refinement, culture,
+and of all the traditions of good society date back a thousand years?
+Would it be fair, either, to attempt to say which part of this vast
+congeries should be taken as the sample end, and which part of America
+with its new civilization should be compared with any or all of
+these?
+
+Therefore any thoughts which follow must be merely apologized for, as
+the rapid observations of a traveller, who, in seeing many countries,
+has loved her own the best, and who puts down these fleeting
+impressions, merely with a hope to benefit her own, even if sometimes
+criticising it.
+
+Twenty years ago, Justin McCarthy, than whom there has been no better
+international critic, wrote an immortal paper called, "English and
+American Women Compared." It was perhaps the most complimentary, and
+we are therefore bound to say the fairest, description of our women
+ever given to the world. It came at a time when the American girl was
+being served up by Ouida, the American senator by Anthony Trollope,
+and the American _divorcée_ by Victorien Sardou, in "L'Oncle Sam."
+There was never a moment when the American needed a friend more.
+
+In that gentle, yet pungent paper, Mr. McCarthy refers to our
+extravagance, our love of display, our superficial criticisms of the
+merits of English literary women, judged from the standpoint of dress,
+and of a singular underlying snobbery which he observed in a few, who
+wished that the days of titles and of aristocratic customs could come
+back to the land where Thomas Jefferson tied his horse to the Capitol
+palings, when he went up to take the Presidential oath. Since that
+paper was written what a flood of prosperity has deluged the land;
+what a stride has been made in all the arts of entertaining! What
+houses we possess; what dinners we give!
+
+What would Horace Walpole say, could he see the collections of some of
+our really poor people, not to mention those of our billionnaires?
+Should he go out to dinner in New York, the master of Strawberry Hill
+and the first great collector could see more curious old furniture,
+more hawthorn vases, more antique teapots, more rare silver, and more
+_chiffons_ than he had ever dreamed of; he could see the power which a
+young, vigorous nation possesses when it takes a kangaroo trick of
+leaping backward into antiquity, or forward into strange countries,
+and what it can bring home from its constant globe-trotting, in
+exchange for some of its own silver and gold. He would also see the
+power which art has possessed over a nation so suddenly rich that one
+reads with alarm the axiom of Taine, "When a nation has reached its
+highest point of prosperity, and begins to decay, then blossoms the
+consummate flower of art."
+
+We need not go so far back as Horace Walpole; it even astonishes the
+collector of last year to find that he must come to New York to buy
+back his Japanese bronzes, and his Capo di Monte, his Majolica and
+peach-blow vase. We may say that we have the oldest of arts, that of
+entertaining, wrested from the hands of the oldest of nations, and
+placed almost recklessly in the hands of the youngest,--as one would
+take a delicate musical instrument from the hands of a master and put
+it in the hands of a child. What wonder if in the first essay some
+chords are missed, some discords struck? Then we must remember that
+modern life is passing, slowly but decidedly, through a great
+revolution, now nearly achieved. The relation of equality is gradually
+eclipsing every other,--that of inequality, where it does survive,
+taking on its least noble form, as most things do in their decay. In
+Europe there is still deference to title, although the real power of
+feudalism was broken by Louis XI. Its shadow remains even in
+republican France, where if a man has not a title he is apt to buy or
+to steal one. On this side of the Atlantic there is a deference paid
+to wealth, however obtained. This is a much greater strain upon
+character, a more vulgar form of snobbery than the reverence for
+title; for a title means that sometime, no matter how long ago, some
+one lived nobly and won his spurs.
+
+We may therefore assume that the great necromancer Prosperity, with
+his wand, luxury, has suddenly placed our new nation, if not on a
+footing with the old, certainly as a new knight in the field, whose
+prowess deserves that he should be mentioned. Or, to change the
+metaphor, we can imagine some spread-eagle orator comparing us to a
+David who with his smooth stones from the brook, dug up in California
+and Nevada, is giving all modern Goliaths a crack in the forehead.
+When we come to make a comparison, however, let us narrow this down to
+the giving of a dinner in London, in distinction to giving a dinner in
+any city in America, and see what our giant can do.
+
+London possesses a regular system of society, a social citadel, around
+which rally those whose birth, title, and character are all
+well-known. It is conscious of an identity of interest, which compacts
+its members, with the force of cement, into a single corporation.
+
+The queen and her drawing-room, the Prince of Wales and his set, the
+royal family, the nobility and gentry, what is called the aristocracy
+form a core to this apple, and this central idea goes through all its
+juices.
+
+Think what it must mean to a man to read that he is descended from
+Harry Hotspur, Bolingbroke, Clarendon, Sidney, Spenser, Cecil. Imagine
+what it must have been to have known the men who daily gathered around
+the tables of the famous dinner-givers. Imagine what the dinners at
+Holland House were, and then compare such a dinner with one which any
+American could give. And yet, improbable as it may seem, the American
+dinner might be the more amusing. The American dinner would have far
+more flowers; it would be in a brighter room; it would be more
+"talky," perhaps,--but it could not be so well worth going to. In
+England, in the greater as well as in the simpler houses, there is a
+respect for intellect, for intelligence, that we have not. It is the
+fashion to invite the man or the woman who has done something to meet
+the most worshipful company, and the young countess just beginning to
+entertain would receive from her grandmother, who entertained Lord
+Byron, this advice, "My dear, always have a literary man, or an artist
+in your set."
+
+The humblest literary man who has done anything well is immediately
+sought out and is asked to dinner; and the artist of merit, in music,
+painting, architecture, literature, is sure of recognition in London.
+One is almost always sure to see, at a grand dinner in London, some
+quiet elderly woman, who receives the attention of the most
+distinguished guests, and one learns that she is Mrs. So-and-So, who
+has written a story, or a few hymns.
+
+In this respect for the best part of us, our brains, the London
+dinner-giver has shown his thousand years of civilization; he is
+playing the harp like a master.
+
+To return for a moment to the criticism of Justin McCarthy. He says in
+it, that while he admired the American taste in dress, he could not
+admire a certain confusion of mind, by which an otherwise kindly and
+well-informed American woman misjudged a person who preferred to go
+plain, or shabby, if you will. In fact, he stood up for the right
+which every English woman will claim as her own, "to be dowdy," if she
+will. The Queen has taught her this. While the Princess of Wales, the
+younger daughters of the Queen, and much of the fashion of London
+dresses itself in Paris, and is consequently very smart, there is
+still a class who look down on clothes and consider them a small
+matter. Perhaps that is the reason why such stringent regulations are
+laid down for the court dress.
+
+Magnificent, stately, and well-ordered, are the dinners of London,--a
+countess at the head of the table, a footman behind each chair, in
+great houses a very fine dinner, and splendid pieces of plate, some
+old china, pictures on the wall from the pencils of Rembrandt, Rubens,
+Van Dyck, Gainsborough, and Sir Joshua. Sweet, low-voiced, and
+well-bred are the women, with beautiful necks, and shoulders, and fine
+heads. The men are they who are doing the work of the world in the
+House of Lords, the House of Commons, in India, in Egypt, in the
+Soudan; there is a multiplicity of topics of conversation. No English
+stiffness exists at the dinner, and there is always present some
+literary man or woman, some famous artist as the _pièce de
+resistance_; such are the dinners of London.
+
+The luncheons are simpler, and here one is sure to meet men advanced
+in thought, and women of ideas, and there is no question as to the
+rent-roll. Wealth has absolutely nothing to do with society success in
+London.
+
+We might mention many a literary and artistic _salon_, over which
+charming and fascinating, young and fashionable women preside with the
+mingled grace, which adds a beauty and a meaning to Emerson's famous
+_mot_ that "fashion is funded politeness." We might mention many a
+literary or artistic man or woman of London, who is the favoured
+friend of these great ladies, who would, if an American, never be
+asked to a luncheon at Newport, or admitted to a ball at Delmonico's,
+because he was not fashionable. It would not occur to the gay
+entertainers to think that such a person would be desirable.
+
+Paris, as the land of the _mot_ and the epigram, has always had a
+great attraction for literary people. Carlyle said of England that it
+was composed of sixty millions of people, mostly fools. His own
+experience as a favoured guest at Lady Ashburton's, and other great
+houses, ought to have modified his decision. In America, the Carlyles
+would have been called "queer," and probably left out. In England, it
+is a recommendation to be "queer," original, thoughtful. In that
+bubble which rises to the top, to which Mr. McAllister has given the
+name "the four hundred," it is not a recommendation to be queer,
+original, or thoughtful.
+
+That some men and women of genius have commanded success in society
+only proves the rule; that some people of fashion have become writers,
+and painters, and poets, and have still kept their foothold, is only
+the exception.
+
+Charles Astor Bristed, born to fortune and fashion, declared that what
+he gained in prestige in England by becoming an author, he lost in
+America. What woman of fashion goes out of her way to find the man of
+letters who writes the striking editorials in a morning paper in New
+York? In London, a dozen coroneted notes await such a lucky fellow.
+Perhaps the most curious instance of the awkward handling of that rare
+and valuable instrument, which we call the art of entertaining in
+America, is the deliberate ignoring of the best element of a dinner
+party,--the hitherto unknown, or the well-known man of brains. This
+distinguishes our entertaining from that of foreigners.
+
+The best society we have in America is that at Washington; the
+President's house is the palace. He and his ministers, and the judges
+of the Supreme Court, the officers of the army and navy, are our
+aristocracy,--a simple, unpretending one, but as real in its social
+laws and organization as any in the world. And there intellect reigns.
+The dinners at Washington, having a kind of precedence, reinforced by
+intelligence, independent of wealth, and regardless of the arbitrary
+rules of a self-elected leadership, are the most agreeable in this
+country, if not in the world. We have said there are many sorts of
+Paris, and so there are many sorts of America. It must not be supposed
+that clever people do not get together, and that there are not dinners
+of the brightest and the best. Outside the "four hundred" there is a
+group of fifty thousand or more, who have travelled, thought, and
+read, experienced, and learned how to give a good dinner,--a witty
+dinner.
+
+I use the term "four hundred" as a convenient alias for that for which
+Americans have no other name; that is, the particular reigning set in
+every city, every small village. In Paris, republic as it is, there is
+still a very decided aristocracy. There is the Duchesse Rochefaucauld
+Bisaccia, and the eccentric Duchesse d'Uzes, and so on, who are
+decidedly the four hundred. There are the very wealthy Jews, like the
+Rothschilds, who are much to be commended for their recognition of the
+supremacy of art and letters. They have become the protectors of these
+classes commercially, and their intelligent wives have made their
+_salons_ delightful, by bringing in men of culture and talent. On
+Sundays the Comtesse Potocka, who wears the best pearls in Paris,
+tries to revive the traditions of the Hotel Rambouillet, in her
+beautiful hôtel in the Avenue Friedland. Her guests are De Maupassant,
+Ratisbonne, Coquelin, the painter Bérand, and other men of wit. The
+Baroness de Poilly has a tendency to refine Bohemianism and is an
+indefatigable pleasure seeker. The only people she will not receive
+are the financiers and the heavy-witted. The Comtesse de Beaumont says
+that the key to her house is "wit and intellect without regard to
+party, caste, or school." Carolus Duran, Alphonse Daudet, the
+painters, whoever is at the head of music, literature, or the dramatic
+art, is welcomed there.
+
+The princes of the House of Orléans, are most prominent in their
+attentions to people of talent. The Princesse Mathilde has a house in
+the Rue de Berri full of exquisite pictures by the old masters, and a
+few of the modern school. Her _salon_ is a model of comfort and
+refined elegance, and at her Sunday receptions, where one meets the
+world, are men distinguished in diplomacy, art, and letters.
+
+But what simple dinners, as to meat and drink, do any of these great
+people give, compared to the dinners which are given constantly in New
+York,--dinners which are banquets, but to which the young
+_littérateur_ or painter would not be invited! That is to say, in
+London and in Paris the fashionable woman who would make her party
+more fashionable, courts the literary and artistic guild; as a guild,
+the fashionable woman in America does not court them.
+
+It may be said that this is an unfair presentation of the case,
+because in London there may be patronage on one side, while in America
+there is perfect equality, and the literary man is a greater
+aristocrat than the fashionable woman who gives the party. This is in
+one sense true, for the professions have all the honour here. The
+journalists are often the men who give the party. The witty lawyer is
+the most honoured guest everywhere; so are certain _littérateurs_.
+
+People who have become rich suddenly, who wish to be leaders, to have
+gay, young, well-dressed guests at their dinners, do not desire the
+company of any but their own kind. Yet they try to emulate the dinners
+of London, and are surprised when some English critic finds their
+entertainments dull, flat, and unprofitable, overloaded and vulgar.
+The same young, gay, rich dancing set in London would have asked
+Robert Browning to the dinner, merely as a matter of fashion. And it
+is this fashion which is commendable. It improves society.
+
+The social recognition of the dramatic profession is not here what it
+is in England or France. There is no Lady Burdett Coutts to take Mr.
+Irving off on her yacht. No actor here has the social position which
+Mr. Irving has in London. Who ever heard of society running after Mr.
+John Gilbert, one of the most respectable men of his profession, as
+well as a consummate actor?
+
+In London, duchesses and countesses run after Mr. Toole; he is a
+darling of society. Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft have done much to help their
+profession and themselves by taking the initiative, and giving
+delightful little evenings. But it is vastly more common, to see many
+of the leading actors and actresses in society in London than in New
+York. Indeed, it is the custom abroad to ask, "what has he done, what
+can he do?" rather than, "how much is he worth?" The actor is valued
+for what he is doing. Perhaps our system of equality is somewhat to
+blame for this, and the woman of fashion may wait for the dramatic
+artist to take the initiative and call on her. But we know that any
+one who should urge this would be talking nonsense. In our system of
+entertaining in a gay city, it is the richest who reigns, and although
+there are some people who can still boast a grandfather, it is the
+new-comer who is the arbiter of fashion. Such a person could, in
+London or Paris or Rome, merely as a fashionable fad, invite the
+artist or the writer to make her party complete. In America she would
+not do it, unless the man of genius were a lion, a foreigner, a
+novelty. Then she would do so, and perhaps run after him too much.
+
+And now, as we have been treating of a very small, unimportant, and to
+the great American world, unknown quantity, the reigning set in any
+city, let us look at the matter from within. Have we individually
+considered the merits of the festive plenty which crowns our table,
+relatively to the selection of the company which is gathered around
+it?
+
+Have we in any of our cities those _déjeuners d'esprit_, as in Paris,
+where certain witty women invite other witty women to come and talk of
+the last new novel? Have we counted on that possible Utopia where men
+and women meet and talk, to contribute of their best thought to the
+entertaining? Have we many houses to which we are asked to a banquet
+of wit? Are there many opulent people who can say, The key to my house
+is wit and intellect, and character, without regard to party, caste or
+school? If such a house can be found, its owner has, all other things
+being equal, conquered the art of entertaining.
+
+Now, all people of talent are not personages of society. To be that,
+one must have good manners, know how to dress one's self and respect
+the usages of society. We should not like to meet Dr. Johnson at a
+ball, but it is very rare to find people nowadays, however learned,
+however retired, however gifted, who have discarded as he did, the
+decencies of deportment. The far greater evil of depriving society of
+its backbone should be balanced against this lesser danger.
+
+There are literary and artistic and academic _salons_ in Paris, which
+are the most interesting places to the foreigner, which might be
+copied in every university town of America, to the infinite advantage
+of society. A fashionable young woman of Paris never misses these, or
+the lectures, or her Thursday at the Comédie Française where she hears
+the classic plays of Molière and even Shakspeare. It makes her a very
+agreeable talker, although her culture may not be very deep. She is
+not a bit less particular as to the number of buttons on her gloves,
+or the becomingness of her dress, because she has given a few hours to
+her mental development. In America, we have thoughtful women, gifted
+women, brilliant women, but we rarely have the combination which we
+see in France, of all this with fashion.
+
+When this young and fashionable hostess gives a dinner, or an evening,
+she invites Coquelin and some of his witty compeers, and she talks
+over Molière with the men who understand him best.
+
+It is possible that French _littérateurs_ care more for society than
+their American brothers. They go into it more, and at splendid dinners
+in Paris I remember the writers for the "Figaro," as most desirable
+guests. The presence of members of the French Academy, for instance,
+is much courted, and as feminine influence plays a considerable _rôle_
+in the Academy elections, it is advisable for playwrights, novelists,
+and aspiring writers generally to cultivate influential relations with
+a view to the future. However this may be, literature and art are more
+highly honoured socially in Paris than in America, and men of letters
+lead a very joyous existence, dining and being dined, and making a
+dinner delightfully brilliant.
+
+The artists of Paris have become such magnates, living in sumptuous
+houses and giving splendid fêtes, that it is hardly possible to speak
+of their being left out; they are mostly agreeable men,--Carolus Duran
+and Bonnat especially. But painters, especially portrait painters, are
+always favourites in all fashionable society.
+
+The French women talk much about being in the "movement" which to the
+American ear may be translated the "swim." They follow every picture
+exhibition, can quote from the "Figaro" what is going on, they
+criticise the last play, the last new novel, they do much hard work,
+but they seek out and honour the man of brains, known or unknown, who
+has made a fine play or novel.
+
+Every woman in America may take a lesson in entertaining from the old
+world, and strive to combine this respect for both conditions, the
+luxury which feeds, and the brain which illuminates. A house should be
+at once a pleasure and a force,--a force to sustain the struggling, as
+well as a pleasure to the prosperous.
+
+A merely sumptuous buffet, a check sent to Delmonico for a "heavy
+feed" does not master that great art, which has illuminated the
+noblest chapters in the history of our race, and led to the most
+complete improvement in the continuous development of mankind. Without
+each other we become savages, with the conquering of the art of
+entertaining we reach the highest triumphs of civilization.
+
+It is a progressive art, while those that we have worshipped stand
+still. No architect of our day, even when revealing the inner conceit
+which cynics say possesses all minds, would hope to surpass the
+builders of the Parthenon, no carver of marble hopes to reach Phidias,
+no painter dares to measure his brush with Raphael, Titian, or
+Velasquez. "In Asia art has been declining for ages; the Moor of Fez
+would hardly recognize what his race did in Granada; the Indian
+Mussulman gazes at the Pearl Mosque as if the genii had built it; the
+Persians buy their own old carpets; and the Japanese confess, with a
+sigh, that their own old ceramic work cannot be equalled now." In all
+art there is "despair of advance," except in the art of entertaining.
+
+That is always new and always progressive; there is no end to the
+originality which may be brought to bear upon it. This rule should be
+constantly enforced. A hostess must take pains and trouble to give her
+house a colour, an originality, and a type of its own. She must put
+brains into her entertaining.
+
+We have begun this little book, somewhat bumptiously perhaps, with an
+account of our physical resources. Let us pursue the same strain as to
+our mental wealth. We have not only witty after-dinner speakers--in
+that, let no country hope to rival us--amongst our lawyers,
+journalists, and literary men, but we have our clergy. It would be
+difficult to find any hamlet in the United States where there is not
+one agreeable clergyman, more often three or four.
+
+The best addition to a company is an accomplished divine, who knows
+that his mission is for two worlds. He need not be any the less the
+ambassador to the next, of which we know so little, because he is a
+pleasant resident and improver of this world, of which many of us feel
+that we know quite enough. The position of a popular clergyman is a
+peculiar and a dangerous one, for he is expected to be merry with one,
+and sad with another, at all hours of the day. Next to the doctor, we
+confide in him, and the call on his sympathies might well make a man
+doubtful whether any of his emotions are his own.
+
+But the scholarship, the communing with high ideas, the relationship
+to his flock, all tend to the formation of that type of man which we
+call the agreeable, and America is extremely rich in this eminent aid
+to the art of entertaining. As a Roman Catholic bishop once observed,
+"As a part of my duty, I must make myself agreeable in society;" and
+so must every clergyman.
+
+And to say truth, we have few examples of a disagreeable clergyman.
+While his cloth surrounds him with reverence and respect, his fertile
+brain, ready wit, and cheerful co-operation in the pleasure of the
+moment, will be like a finer education and a purifying atmosphere.
+From the days of Chrysostom to Sydney Smith the clergy should be known
+as the golden-mouthed. The American mind, brilliant, rapid, and clear,
+the American speech, voluble, ready, and replete, the talent for
+repartee, rapier-like with so many of our orators, and the quick wit
+which seems to be born of our oxygen, all this, added to the
+remarkable beauty and tact of our women, of which all the world is
+talking, and which the young aristocrats of the old world seem to be
+quite willing to appropriate, makes splendid provision for a dinner, a
+reception, an afternoon tea, or a ball.
+
+We sometimes hear complaints of the insufficiency of society, and that
+our best men will not go into it. If there is such an insufficiency,
+it is because we have too much sufficiency, we are struggling with the
+overplus, often as great an embarrassment as the too little. It is
+somebody's fault if we have not learned to play on this "harp of a
+thousand strings."
+
+We need not heed the criticism of the world, snobbishly; we are a
+great nation, and can afford to make our own laws. But we should ask
+of ourselves the question, whether or not we are too lavish, too fond
+of display, too much given to overfeeding, too fond of dress, too much
+concerned with the outside of things; we should take the best ideas of
+all nations in regard to the progressive art, the art of entertaining.
+
+
+
+
+            *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+  Inconsistent hyphenation, diacritical marks and spelling in the
+  original document have been preserved. Obvious typographical
+  errors have been corrected.
+
+  The quote starting on page 13, "Viticulture in Algeria", does not
+  have an ending quote mark.
+
+  On page 117, "spatch-cooked" should possibly be "spatch-cocked".
+
+  On page 160, "gormandize" should possibly be "gourmandize".
+
+  The chapter starting on page 176 is called "Receipts" in the Contents
+  and "Recipes" in the text.
+
+  On page 193, "gargonzala" should possibly be "gorgonzola".
+
+  On page 310, "boaston" should possibly be "boston".
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41632 ***