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Sundry Guides to Good Cheer: Madame

He ought to dine and digest at the same time, and nothing aids this dual function like good conversation. Perhaps the 1 "L'Hygiene des Hommes livrés aux Travaux de l'Esprit." servant of Madame de Maintenon, when the latter was still Madame Scarron, was a greater philosopher than we suspect when he whispered to his mistress, ‘Madame, the roast has run short; give them another story. " It was after a dinner in a Fifth Avenue restaurant, at which terrapin and '89 Pol Roger, canvasback, and '78 Haut-Bailly figured, that while smoking his Vuelta-Abajo-impressed with the excellence of the repast, and smitten at the thought of his absent ones-the host observed to his companions, "Heavens! how I wish I could afford to treat my family to a dinner like this!" The stomach also has its conscience. But Thackeray has covered precisely such a case in the essay, "On some Dinners at Paris." "What is the use," he asks, "of having your children, who live on roast mutton in the nursery, to sit down and take the best three-fourths of a perdreau truffé with you? What is the use of helping your wife, who does n't know the difference between sherry and Madeira, to a glass of priceless Romanée or sweetly odoriferous Château Lafite of '42?"

Besides his sonnets "Le Toast" and "Barrière du Maine," Charles Monselet has written most entertainingly of the restaurant under the title, "Les Cabinets Particuliers," a sketch which figured in "Le Double Almanach Gourmand" of 1866, of which he was the editor for several years. In this publication appeared Albert Glatigny's "Rue des Poitevins," one of several poems with the restaurant as their theme, the stanzas being not unworthy of the melodious lyre of "Les Vignes Folles" and "Les Flèches d'Or": "C'est le vieux restaurant où vont les écoliers Qui n'ont point submergés les cols brisés encore.

Dans l'atmosphère chaude et franche on voit éclore, Entre deux brocs de vin des refrains cavaliers. "Les peintres, les rimeurs, leurs soucis oubliés,- Y vont rire le soir d'un bon rire sonore, Et pour mon compte, moi dans mon for, je m'honore D'avoir allègrement grimpé ses escaliers. "Des escaliers du temps de la serrurerie, Larges, la rampe en fer, ouvragés, bien dallés, Donnant sur un cour propre à la rêverie. "Maison Laveur! hier, c'était là qu'attablés Devant la soupe aux choux, nous guettions, mon Lemoyne, La petite servante aux rougeurs de pivoine."

The student of Glatigny, who must always admire the rhythm and melody of his Muse, will also remember his quaint sonnet published in "Gilles et Pasquins," entitled "Monselet devoured by the Lobsters." The works of Henri Murger are replete with epulary sketches of the old Latin Quarter of Paris, a district from which Victor Hugo has also drawn.