“In a quarter of an hour everyone was ready for dinner, but five out of fifteen minutes I had given to the hasty scribbling of a pencilled note for Monica. I hoped to slip it into her hand in the dining-room, but she was closely under guard; and Carmona annexed four seats at the head of the long table, by which manœuvre he secured isolation for his party. It was safe from any sortie of ours, as there was a scattered contingent of commercial travellers already earnestly engaged in dining on either side of the table. Two polite men on the left, and three on the right, all with napkins tucked under their chins, rose, offering to move rather than divide friends; but Carmona assured them that the sacrifice was unnecessary. As they were all paralysed by Monica’s beauty, of a type so different from any to which they were accustomed, they had not the self-command to protest; and as dinner went on (in many courses of which the landlord was evidently proud), they could scarcely do justice to their _merluza_ served with grilled lemon and minced red Spanish pepper; their _tortilla_ of eggs, potatoes, peas, and ham; their pigeons with olives, or even their freshly baked maccaroni, for gazing languorously at the vision of pink and white and gold.”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
Cut your slices of ham of a uniform size and shape. Fry quickly, and take them out of the pan as soon as they are done. Have the eggs ready, and drop them, one at a time, in the hissing fat. Have a large pan for this purpose, that they may not touch and run together. In three minutes they will be done. The meat should be kept hot, and when the eggs are ready, lay one upon each slice of ham, which should have been cut the proper size for this. Do not use the gravy.
Sources: The passage is from C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson, The Car of Destiny, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Harland, Common Sense in the Household of 1871, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — forest cloth, boar stamp.