Dinner bell

“ Fifteen minutes before the hour for dinner, the waitress, after having lighted the lights on the parlor floor and in the front hall stands at the front door watching to open it promptly to prevent any guest from having to ring the bell. She helps the gentlemen off with their coats, hangs up their hats, places their canes in the rack, and hands them the tray on which the card envelopes have been placed. When all the guests have arrived, the chambermaid signals the cook this fact, then fills the glasses with iced water, while the waitress lights the candles on the dining-table. ”

“ THE lounge of the Planet Hotel was deserted. The guests, resident and casual, had gone to dine—a listener might have caught the hum of humanity and the sigh of music escaping from the great restaurant—yes, all had gone save a drowsy old gentleman, an elderly couple who talked furtively, uneasy in their rich and palmy surroundings, and, at the other end of the place, a young man in correct evening-dress with a good-looking but haggard countenance.
Alan Moore raised his heavy eyes and took a lingering survey of the lounge. ”

“ In the centre of this patch of grass was spread a rug made of green denim, just the colour of the grass, and on this stood a dinner-table of weathered oak. Here, in fine weather, we took all our meals. Breakfast was served anywhere from six to ten, and by looking from your bedroom windows, you might see a man in white flannels, smoking a cigarette and reading the morning paper over coffee or rolls or a dish of strawberries on thin green leaves.
The women—until they had once tried the open-air breakfast—always preferred their coffee in their rooms. ”

“ Men going on watch at noon—as the Marine sentries, for example—are allowed to fetch their dinner at "seven bells" (11.30) , and sometimes ludicrous mistakes will arise through this privilege. The men take turns to prepare the dinner, and the cook of the mess for the day usually fetches his mess-mates' dinner from the "galley." On one occasion which the writer recalls, the cook was at work on deck when the bell struck seven, and could not get away. ”

“ When dinner is over comes a very pretty custom. The hostess, whose seat is nearest the door, rises, and each guest kisses her hand or her arm as he passes out, and thanks her in a phrase for her hospitality. Sometimes it is only “Thank you, princess”; sometimes “Many thanks for your beautiful dinner,” or anything you like. They speak Polish to each other and to their servants, but they are such wonderful linguists that they always address a guest in his own language. To their peasants, however, who speak an unlearnable dialect, they are obliged always to have an interpreter. ”

“ A hundred-pound note in the Planet restaurant is not a daily happening; on the other hand, it is not a startling event.
"How would m'sieu like the change?" the waiter softly inquired, and Alan's wits began to come together again.
"Oh, fives or tens," he managed to reply, and wrote his name and address. It did not occur to him to give false ones.
He poured out wine, and forgot to drink it.
"Ripping dinner! Thousand thanks, Anna, old girl!" Ronnie was saying to his sister.
"Well, you aren't twenty every day, Ronnie," she returned kindly, "and there's only the two of us, you know. ”

“ He folded and dropped in the paper, and closed the bag. He rose, swayed a little, steadied himself, and passed out of the lounge in the direction of the cloakroom.
And then some crazy impulse sent him right about and into the restaurant. He had only borrowed the money! People were beginning to leave for the theatres. The head waiter, recognising him, got him a small table to himself. ”

“ Then the doors leading into the dining room were thrown open, disclosing a table covered with rosetrees in full bloom five feet in height and a concealed orchestra began to play. There were twenty-four seats and a footman for each two chairs, besides two butlers, who directed the service. The dinner consisted of hors-d'oeuvre and grapefruit, turtle soup, fish of all sorts, elaborate entrées, roasts, breasts of plover served separately with salad, and a riot of ices and exotic fruits. ”

“ I'm mad," I answered, genially.
"I am not mad. I am hungry," said Aubrey.
"Being hungry for a man is the same as being mad for a woman," I observed.
Aubrey grinned.
"Now," he said, mysteriously. "Don't eat any dinner to-night, and follow my lead in everything."
"Don't eat any dinner!" I cried, in a whisper. "I am starv—"
"Hush," he whispered. "You said you weren't hungry."
Although we were only ten feet away from her and in plain view, Mary struck the Roman chime of bells, by which she always announces dinner.
As we took our seats the clock struck eight. The table was a dream of loveliness. ”

“ The plates used are ordinarily of rather smaller size than those seen at dinner, as the dishes are of a lighter character, and the handsomest are reserved for the fingerbowls, which [Pg 13] are put on the table with the bonbons and coffee only, unless the meal begins with fruit, when they appear twice.
The question of lighting the table is one that often puzzles young housekeepers or novices at entertaining. "Shall we use candles at luncheon?" they ask, bewildered at the seeming absurdity of the idea. ”

“ What gorging dinner-party could compare with the thrill of feasting at midnight on crackers and cheese, devilled ham, boned chicken, mince pie and root beer, by the light of a solitary candle, with the cracks of the doors and windows smothered with rugs and blankets, listening at every mouthful for the tread of the master that sometimes (oh, acme of delight!) ”

“ It is a pity, perhaps, that there is not daylight to brighten the restaurant from end to end, and that the electric lamps are always alight; but at dinner-time this is no drawback. An excellent string band plays on the terrace, but it is as well at dinner-time to choose a table far enough away from the musicians to ensure comfortable converse. ”

“ They have a table d'hôte dinner at two o'clock, and while it is going on a very tolerable band plays all manner of Italian airs and German waltzes, and as there is a fine long corridor into which my room-door opens, with a window at each end, I have a very agreeable promenade, and take my exercise to this musical accompaniment....
I have at this moment on my table a lovely nosegay—roses, geraniums, rare heaths, and perfect white camellias. Our windows are all wide open; the heat is intense, and the air that comes in at them like a sirocco. ”

“ The hors-d'œuvre were on the table, but it was difficult, hungry as she was, to induce the little prima donna to leave her first view of the river, a river now grown steel-colour in the growing darkness, and to turn to the prosaic side of life, and dinner.
It is a comfortable dining-room, with its green curtains to the big bow-window, its paper with a flower pattern, its mirrors and its great panes of glass through which the arched looking-glasses of the hall can be seen. Of our fellow-diners there was no one whose face is well known to the world. ”

“ Cheese straws or cheese crusts may be served with the salad. Although the cheese belongs with the salad, it enters into some delicate dishes, such as fondus and souffles, which may come to the table either after the oysters or soup, as relishes, or before the large sweets at dessert, previous to the service of the nuts and fruit. Then comes the dessert. If the dinner is a small one it is perfectly permissible for the hostess to make the coffee at the table, or it may be served in the drawing-room later. Even with the best chosen menu, the success of a dinner depends on the skill of the cook. ”

“ I shall not enter into the details of the pugilistic dinner, but will introduce the reader into the banquet-hall at rather a late stage in the proceedings; in point of fact, just as the festival is about to break up. It is two o'clock in the morning; the table is strewn with the débris of a dessert, in which figs, almonds and raisins, mixed biscuits, grape-stalks, and apple and orange-peel seem rather to predominate. The table is a very field of Cressy or Waterloo, as to dead men in the way of empty bottles ”

“ We find no fault with the elegances of the table, in plate, crystal, china, and so forth; but an English dinner is not an elegant meal. The guests are supposed, by a polite fiction, to have the hunger of the whole day to satisfy, and provision is made accordingly. Varieties of soup, fish, flesh, fowl, game, rich-made dishes, load the board spread for a group of well-dressed men and women, known to have already dined, and who would affect to shudder at so heavy a meal, if it was termed supper. ”

“ Over this comes the snowy, linen table-cover, falling gracefully over the sides with the four points almost touching the floor. A place is laid for each guest. The most fashionable method is to have a large lace or embroidered doily in the center of the table, and smaller ones indicating the position of the guests. A centerpiece of glass, china, silver, is usually used, over the doily or without it, and on top of this flowers. Delicate ferns are sometimes used instead of flowers, although roses (hot-house roses when no others are obtainable) are always the favorite at an elaborate dinner. ”

“ There is nothing more conducive to thorough enjoyment of an evening, to the thorough enjoyment of a menu, than when table and appointments are perfect and artistically simple. The hostess should give as much time and thought to the preparation and arrangement of the table, as she does to the planning of the menu. She will find that her guests will appreciate novel lighting effects, surprising color tones, unusual serving innovations. And she will find that a correctly laid table will add surprisingly to the entire success of her dinner party. ”

“ ON A YUNNAN ROAD
At noon we stopped at a handy inn or tea-house [45] for tiffin and a long rest. I was ordinarily served at the back of the big eating-room open to the street in as dignified seclusion as my cook could achieve. Rice again, with perhaps stewed fowl or tinned beef, and a dessert of jam and biscuit, usually formed my luncheon, and dinner was like unto it, save that occasionally we succeeded in securing some onions or potatoes. ”

“ Carving is done in the kitchen and no food set on the table except ornamental dishes of fruit, candy and nuts. The plate service is also the same as at dinner. The places are never left plateless, excepting after salad, when the table is cleared and crumbed for dessert. The dessert plates and finger bowls are arranged as for dinner. Flowers are usually put in the finger bowls, a little spray of any sweet-scented flower, but "corsage bouquets" laid at the places with flower pins complete are in very bad taste. ”

“ The table-cloth should be of the heaviest and handsomest damask, the centre-piece, the floral decorations, the candelabra, with their candles and silk shades, the dishes, containing hors-d'œuvres, bonbons, glacé fruits, etc., differ little from the similar array on the table at a formal luncheon. The same general plan is to be followed in serving the courses. The dinner usually begins with oysters or clams. Next comes a soup—consommé, or a cream soup of some really choice variety. ”

“ A doll dressed as a farmer in blue overalls and big straw hat can be placed on the seat for driver and hold the ribbons.
Another pretty centerpiece is a massive silver bowl, or a fancy Indian basket piled high with pretty fruits, nuts, nut burrs and the vine and berries of the bittersweet. If the dinner is to be late in the afternoon use Colonial candlesticks of brass or glass without shades. At each plate have a toy garden implement tied with a ribbon, the guests' names written on the ribbons. ”

“ The latter charge has a foundation in fact: he does ask a few of his more fortunate patients to dinner. More than this, he gives them a dinner much too artistic for most of them to understand. To bring Art into a menu, to invent and build up a dinner which shall be completely artistic in every part, a harmonious whole; one course leading naturally to the next; a dinner of one colour in many tints; the wine gurgling like part of an orchestra, is a gift within the powers of very few. ”

“ They will all want to get down on their hands and knees, Grandfather and Grandmother and all, and crawl under the table. Won't that be funny? They all clap their hands and dance up and down. That's what the magic hazel nuts will make them do, says SANTA CLAUS. And when they have crawled under the table—you see, it's a table that has a Christmas dinner on it, and that makes a difference, of course—well, when they have crawled under the table, then—. ”

“ As to the dinner itself—the mere dinner—it goes off much the same everywhere. Tureens of soup are emptied with awful rapidity—waiters take plates of turbot away, to get lobster-sauce, and bring back plates of lobster-sauce without turbot; people who can carve poultry, are great fools if they own it, and people who can’t have no wish to learn. The knives and forks form a pleasing accompaniment to Auber’s music, and Auber’s music would form a pleasing accompaniment to the dinner, if you could hear anything besides the cymbals. ”

“ So it was six o’clock before any one dreamed that it could be so late, and the men went off to their hotels for dinner, leaving the girls to gloat over the flower-boxes piled high on the hall-table, to gossip over the afternoon’s adventures, and then hurry off to dress, dinner being a superfluity to them after so many salads and sandwiches, ices and macaroons, all far more appetizing than a campus dinner menu. ”