DINNER-GIVING SNOBS FURTHER CONSIDERED
If my friends would but follow the present prevailing fashion, I think they ought to give me a testimonial for the paper on Dinner-giving Snobs, which I am now writing.
What do you say now to a handsome comfortable dinner-service of plate (NOT including plates, for I hold silver plates to be sheer wantonness, and would almost as soon think of silver teacups), a couple of neat teapots, a coffeepot, trays, &c., with a little inscription to my wife, Mrs.Snob; and a half-score of silver tankards for the little Snoblings, to glitter on the homely table where they partake of their quotidian mutton?
If I had my way, and my plans could be carried out, dinner-giving would increase as much on the one hand as dinner-giving Snobbishness would diminish:--to my mind the most amiable part of the work lately published by my esteemed friend (if upon a very brief acquaintance he will allow me to call him so), Alexis Soyer, the regenerator--what he (in his noble style) would call the most succulent, savoury, and elegant passages--are those which relate, not to the grand banquets and ceremonial dinners, but to his 'dinners at home.'
The 'dinner at home' ought to be the centre of the whole system of dinner-giving.Your usual style of meal--that is, plenteous, comfortable, and in its perfection--should be that to which you welcome your friends, as it is that of which you partake yourself.
For, towards what woman in the world do I entertain a higher regard than towards the beloved partner of my existence, Mrs.Snob? Who should have a greater place in my affections than her six brothers (three or four of whom we are pretty sure will favour us with their company at seven o'clock), or her angelic mother, my own valued mother-in-law?--for whom, finally, would I wish to cater more generously than for your very humble servant, the present writer? Now, nobody supposes that the Birmingham plate is had out, the disguised carpet-beaters introduced to the exclusion of the neat parlour-maid, the miserable ENTREES from the pastrycook's ordered in, and the children packed off (as it is supposed) to the nursery, but really only to the staircase, down which they slide during the dinner-time, waylaying the dishes as they come out, and fingering the round bumps on the jellies, and the forced-meat balls in the soup,--nobody, I say, supposes that a dinner at home is characterized by the horrible ceremony, the foolish makeshifts, the mean pomp and ostentation which distinguish our banquets on grand field-days.
Such a notion is monstrous.I would as soon think of having my dearest Bessy sitting opposite me in a turban and bird of paradise, and showing her jolly mottled arms out of blond sleeves in her famous red satin gown: ay, or of having Mr.Toole every day, in a white waistcoat, at my back, shouting, 'Silence FAW the chair!'
Now, if this be the case; if the Brummagem-plate pomp and the processions of disguised footmen are odious and foolish in everyday life, why not always? Why should Jones and I, who are in the middle rank, alter the modes of our being to assume an ECLAT which does not belong to us--to entertain our friends, who (if we are worth anything and honest fellows at bottom,) are men of the middle rank too, who are not in the least deceived by our temporary splendour, and who play off exactly the same absurd trick upon us when they ask us to dine?
If it be pleasant to dine with your friends, as all persons with good stomachs and kindly hearts will, Ipresume, allow it to be, it is better to dine twice than to dine once.It is impossible for men of small means to be continually spending five-and-twenty or thirty shillings on each friend who sits down to their table.
People dine for less.I myself have seen, at my favourite Club (the Senior United Service), His Grace the Duke of Wellington quite contented with the joint, one-and-three, and half-pint of sherry, nine; and if his Grace, why not you and I?
This rule I have made, and found the benefit of.
Whenever I ask a couple of Dukes and a Marquis or so to dine with me, I set them down to a piece of beef, or a leg-of-mutton and trimmings.The grandees thank you for this simplicity, and appreciate the same.My dear Jones, ask any of those whom you have the honour of knowing, if such be not the case.
