Old Jam-pot Scrapings on Musty Bread.
That they didn't all rise like one man with a howl of execration on
reading this was soon explained when the Professorial Butler set down
a soup-plate before the Epicurean Duke and with an insinuating smile,
simply announced it as _Tortue claire_. It was clear from this
that they were under the impression that they were partaking of a
first-class little dinner, and had read the _Menu_ at the will of
the Professorial Butler, as he subsequently explained to me in such
fashion that the toast-and-water soup, in which the candle-ends played
the part of green fat, appeared to them in the light of the finest
"clear turtle." "And how about the Herrings' Heads and Tails?" I
asked. "They take that for _Saumon de Gloucester, sauce Pierre Le
Grand_," was the bland reply, a fact which at that moment the Gourmand
endorsed, by smacking his lips and with an ejaculation of "Sublime
salmon that! I'll take a little more," holding out his plate for a
second helping. The Cabbage-stalks figured in their imagination as
"_Asperges d'Italie, en branches glacees a la Tour d'Amsterdam_," while
the pennyworth of plain cat's meat, passed more than muster as
"_Filet de B[oe]uf en Diplomat, braisee a la Prince de Pekin_." The
Shoe-leather and Jam-pot Scrapings brought the Menu to a triumphant
close, with "_Ris de Veau pralinee au boucles Menschikoff_," and
"_Bombardes Imperials de Peru_" respectively.
I confess, when I heard one of the Diners-out asking for Champagne,
and saw his glass filled with Harvey's Sauce and water, with the
announcement that it was _Dry Monopole Cuvee Reservee_, I felt some
momentary misgivings, but they were speedily put to flight on my
noticing the evident gusto with which he emptied his glass, at the
same time pronouncing it to be "a very fine wine," which he assigned
to the vintage of '76. I own too I felt a little nervous when the
Professorial Butler, I think not without a sly twinkle in his eye,
gave all the party a _liqueur_ of petroleum for Green Chartreuse, but
they certainly seemed to find it all right, and so my apprehensions
disappeared.
Thus my "Little Dinner" came at length to a conclusion. That it was
an undoubted success, from a financial point of view, there can be
no sort of doubt, for fourpence more than covered the cost of the
materials, to which, adding the Professorial Butler's fee of two
shillings and sixpence, brings the whole cost of the entertainment up
to eightpence-halfpenny a head. It is true I have not heard whether
any of my guests have suffered any ill-effects from partaking of my
hospitality, but I suppose if any of them had died or been seized with
violent symptoms, the fact would have been notified to me. So, on
the whole, I may congratulate myself. I certainly could not afford
to entertain largely in any other fashion, but, with the aid of the
Professorial Butler, I am already contemplating giving a series of
nice "Little Dinners," and even on a more extended scale. Indeed, with
the assistance of Hypnotism, it is possible, at a trifling cost, to
see one's friends. And in the general interests of Society, I mean to
do it.
* * * * *
[Illustration: FANCY PORTRAIT.
(_After reading the Correspondence on Fruit and Birds in the "Morning
Post."_)