Having now glanced over the whole of Mr. Walker's contributions to the art of dining, we shall endeavour to convey some notion, however faint, of the varied and extended interests which the subject may be fairly considered to comprise :— "I have already," he says, "alluded to the importance of the City being well provisioned ; and although City feasting is often a subject of joke, and is no doubt sometimes carried to excess, yet I am of opinion that a great deal of English spirit is owing to it, and that, as long as men are so often emboldened by good cheer, they are in no danger of becoming slaves. The City halls, with their feasts, their music, and their inspiriting associations, are so many temples of liberty; and I only wish that they could be dispersed through the metropolis, and have each a local government attached in proportion to the means of the establishment. Then would there be objects worthy of the highest intelligence united with social attractions, and improvement in government might be expected to become steadily progressive." One class of City dinners are or were altogether peculiar of their kind, namely, the dinners given by the sheriffs, during the Old Bailey sittings, to the judges and aldermen in attendance, the recorder, common-serjeant, City pleaders, and occasionally a few members of the bar. The first course was rather miscellaneous, and varied with the season, though marrow puddings always formed a part of it; the second never varied, and consisted exclusively of beefsteaks. The custom was to serve two dinners (exact duplicates) a-day, the first at three o'clock, the second at five. As the judges relieved each other, it was impracticable for them to partake of both; but the aldermen often did so; and a late chaplain, whose duty it was to preside at the lower end of the table, was never absent from his post. This invaluable public servant persevered from a sheer sense of duty till he had acquired the habit of eating two dinners a-day, and he practised it for nearly ten years without any perceptible injury to his health. We had the pleasure of witnessing his performances at one of the five o'clock dinners, and can assert with confidence that the vigour of his attack on the beefsteaks was wholly unimpared by the effective execution a friend assured us he had done on them two hours before. The occasion to which we allude was so remarkable for other reasons, that we have the most distinct recollection of the circumstances. It was the first trial of the late St. John Long for rubbing a young lady into her grave. The presiding judges were the late Mr. Justice Park and the late Mr. Baron Garrow, who retired to dinner about five, having first desired the jury, amongst whom there was a difference of opinion, to be locked up. The dinner proceeded merrily; the beefsteaks were renewed again and again, and received the solemn sanction of judicial approbation repeatedly. Mr. Adolphus told some of his best stories, and the chaplain was on the point of complying with a challenge for a song, when the court-keeper appeared with a face of consternation to announce that the jury, after being very noisy for an hour or so, had sunk into a dead lull, which, to the experienced in such matters, augurs the longest period of deliberation which the heads, or rather the stomachs, of the jurymen can endure. The trial had unfortunately taken place upon a Saturday; and it became a serious question in what manner they were to be dealt with. Mr. Baron Garrow proposed waiting till within a few minutes of twelve, and then discharging them. Mr. Justice Park, the senior judge, and a warm admirer of the times when refractory juries were carried round the country in a cart, would hear of no expedient of the kind. He said a judge was not bound to wait beyond a reasonable hour at night, nor to attend before a reasonable hour in the morning; that Sunday was a dies non in law; and that a verdict must be delivered in the presence of the judge: he consequently declared his intention of waiting till what he deemed a reasonable hour, namely, about ten, and then informing the jury that, if they were not agreed, they must be locked up without fire or candle until a reasonable hour (about nine) on the Monday, by which time he trusted they would be unanimous. The effect of such an intimation was not put to the test, for Mr. St. John Long was found guilty about nine. We must add a few words as to the use that may be made of dinner-giving in creating or extending political influence. Tenez bonne table et soignez les femmes, was the sum of Napoleon's instructions to the Abbé de Pradt, when despatched to gain over Poland to his cause. From Sir Robert Walpole's time downwards, the Whigs have acted on Napoleon's maxim with singular and well-merited success; and no one who knows anything of human nature will deny, that it is of the last importance to a party to have a few noble or highly distinguished houses, where all its rank and beauty, wit, eloquence, accomplishment, and agreeability may congregate; where, above all, each young recruit of promise may be received on an apparent footing of equality, his feelings taken captive by kindness, or his vanity conciliated by flattery. Many a time has the successful débutant in parliament, or the author just rising into note, repaired to Holland or Lansdowne House with unsettled views and wavering expectations, fixed in nothing but to attach himself for a time to no party. He is received with that cordial welcome which, as the Rev. Sydney Smith has very truly observed, warms more than dinner or wine*: he is presented to a host of literary, social, and political celebrities, with whom it has been for years his fondest ambition to be associated: it is gently insinuated that he may become an actual member of that brilliant circle by willing it, or his acquiescence is tacitly and imperceptibly assumed; till, thrown off his guard in the intoxication of the moment, he finds or thinks himself irrecoverably committed, and, suppressing any lurking inclination towards Toryism, becomes deeply and definitely Whig. Far be it from us to say or insinuate that the hospitality of these noble houses was ever calculated with direct reference to such an end; for we believe Lord Holland and Lord Lansdowne to have been actuated by a genuine sympathy with intellectual excellence, and a praiseworthy desire to raise it to that position in society which is its due. Our observation applies merely to the effects as to which, it would appear from their imitative zeal, the noble or wealthy leaders of most of the parties, or sections of parties, which now divide the political world, agree with us. Dinner-giving, in short, has become one of the received modes of gaining or conciliating political adherents. Need more be added to enhance the dignity and importance of the subject, which has been discussed in these pages with the more humble object of facilitating convivial enjoyment and promoting sociability. *Life of Mackintosh, vol. ii. p. 503. APPENDIX. COPY OF ONE OF THE LATE KING OF HANOVER'S BILLS OF FARE. N.B. The copies placed by the plates of the lady guests were printed on rose-coloured paper. Diner le 11 Septembre 1845. Girot. Un potage à la princesse. Girot. Un potage en hoche-pot aux queues de bœuf. Huitres au naturel. Verclas. Truites au bleu au beurre fondu, sauce de cavice. Longe de veau à la broche au jus, garnie de Jlsen. Girot. Girot. croquets de pommes de terre. Purée de coqs be bruyères, garnie de petites bouchées. Epinards, garnis de côtelettes d'agneau glacées. Verclas. Filets de sandats à la marinière à l'aspic. Verclas. Une compote de poires. Verclas. Ris anglo-française à l'ananas. Robby. Glaces de fraises. FISH DINNER AT BLACKWALL OR GREENWICH. La tortue à l'anglaise. |