Apparently, whoever was in charge had simply provided all there was in the world of everything; and a guest had merely to mention a preference for anything edible, and it was immediately served to him.
The Londoners of course, being quite unaware what they wanted to eat, vaguely suggested one thing or another at random; and the vague waiters, apparently knowing the game, brought them something quite different. These viands the Londoners consumed with satisfaction; but in what was unmistakably a crass ignorance of what they were eating.
All this fascinated me so that I greatly desired to try experiments, such as sprinkling their food thickly with red pepper or putting sugar in their wine. I have not the slightest doubt that they would have calmly continued their repast, without the slightest suspicion of anything wrong.
The air of the “passive patrician” of London society is unmistakable, inimitable, and absorbingly interesting; and never did I have a better opportunity to observe it than at the beautiful reception at Stafford House to which I was invited, “quite informally.”
In contrast to this, and as a fine example of the Londoner’s utter absence of a sense of proportion, listen to the tale of a lady who called on me one day.
I had met her before, but knew her very slightly. She was exceedingly polite, and well-bred, and of very formal manner.
The purpose of her call was to invite me to her house. She definitely stated a date ten days hence, and asked if I would enjoy a bread-and-milk supper. “For we are plain folk,” she said, “and do not entertain on an elaborate scale.”
I accepted with pleasure, and she went politely away.
But I was not to be fooled by intimations of informality. “Bread and milk,” indeed! _that_, I well knew, was a euphonious burlesque for a high tea if not a sumptuous dinner. I remembered that she had called personally to invite me; that she asked me ten days before the occasion; and that the hour, seven o’clock, might mean anything at all.
Therefore, when the day came, I donned evening costume, called a hansom, and started.
I had never been to the house before, and on reaching it found myself confronted by a high stone wall and a broad wooden door.
Pushing open the latter, I doubtfully entered, and seemed to be in a large and somewhat neglected garden filled with a tangle of shrubs, vines, and flowers. Magnificent old trees drooped their branches low over the winding paths; rustic arbors, covered with earwiggy vines, would have delighted Amy March; here and there a broken and weather-beaten statue of stone or marble poked its head or its headlessness up through the wandering branches.