fiery furnace, and have it presently brought
back the tenderest, juciest, most toothsome
morsel such as a domestic cook, despairing of
imitating, may fling down her ladle and die;
such as ministers, princes, and other quality,
noble lords and members, come down privily to
relish, so has this Eternal City its own little
dingy tabernacles, deliciously low and vulgar,
exquisitely plebeian in appointments and decorations;
but where ravishing stews and divine
extracts shall be served to you. It is the
Three Provincial Brothers, Chevet, Véry,
Philippe, in coarse working clothes, bound in
rough pigskin. The street and approaches are
sloppy, and inches deep in mud; vile old
clothes shops and rag establishments hang out
their staple in offensive prominence. Beaked
Hebrew faces peer out over farthing candles,
and at the door of the cabaret, public, pothouse,
estaminet, or auberge, taking a low rank too in
the scale of such establishments. Carrying on
his preparations with a loud publicity, stands
Roman Soyer, with his arms bare, and sleeves
tucked up, rising godlike out of a cloud of
vapour. A supreme fragrance is diffused around,
and we pass by him reverently with bowed
heads, and without daring to whisper. These
last few seconds are as a crisis of fearful
moment ; dishes are in their throes and hover on
the verge of miscarriage; a word, a look, a
breath, a wink, may undo all. Let us give him
our prayers and pass him by into this inner
sanctuary, where the banquet shall be served—
a barn-looking chamber with bare white walls
and roof of beams— everything deliciously rude,
rustic, and in the rough. Wicker-work chairs
of the familiar make of humble life — long deal
table, four-legged, and halting slightly in one
limb, of the simple workmanship so dear to
kitchen economy. In remote corner, two
Ostade boors, in blue frocks, are bent over their
goblets with heads laid close together. The
whole thing has the most refreshingly
democratic, hail-fellow-well-meeting complexion
that can be imagined.

Merrynote in the chair, on a burst of
acclamation! The cloth, rough in grain as a Turkish
towel, hard as a board, but spotless as snow,
excites universal admiration; and two brass lamps
of the Pompeian funereal model, being presently
set down, the enthusiasm works up to furore.
Ministering fauns, who someway appear to have
a high agricultural tone, and whose hands the
plough-tail would seem to fit appropriately,
dance round, performing the offices of their
calling in an eminently rustic way. And now,
word being passed forward that all has gone well
with the Roman Soyer—that he is out of danger,
and as well as can be expected — here is now
being borne in to us a rich reeking steam, not
unaccompanied by hissing sounds, as though
something had been lifted from the furnace, and,
in fierce commotion, were being transferred
bodily to a dish. The moment draws nigh: all
eyes look wistfully to the door. The hour has
come: and Our Guide, as chorus to the piece
thinks it time to speak.

He sings Fish and its loveliness. To-day, by
sportive whim, or the light coquetry of
gormandise, it shall be the sole aliment. We have
sighed, not for the flesh, but for the fish-pots of
Eygpt; and the squamiferous tribe shall have a
glorious monopoly. The speciality of Roman
Soyer lies in dealing with fins: he is wonderful in
gills. The Eternal fish is poor in quality, scarce
in number, and dear in price; by so much the
more will Roman Soyer rise to the situation
gloriously, toying with his quarry, playing magic
tricks with it, twisting it finally into some
miracle of art. It hath been wagered, that
were there such a thing as a leathern fish, the
leathern fish would be sent up exquisitely juicy,
soft, delicately firm, and flavoured with the
breath of the gods.

See, it comes — the first preparation—making
triumphal entry, borne aloft by agricultural
waiters. The prologue, the overture, and Merrynote
begins to sing with enthusiasm the praises
of soup. He delivers an explanatory lecture,
and expounds rapturously the occult virtues of
every dish. We must not eat blindly, after
the manner of the meaner animals, but with an
instructed, intellectual appreciation of the
heavenly savours and juices before us. As the covers,
taken off hastily, diffuse an ambrosial essence
around, he thus speaks:

"The Mariners' Soup! Please to observe
how it is presented in a state of abnormal
separation, the heavy constituents in one tureen, the
juice or soup, pure and simple, in another. The
union of these elements, the soul and the body,
results in the mariners' soup! See all these
diverse components fused in happiest combination
—see fish of every hue and creed and party,
united here in a sort of divine harmony. Yes !"
continues the lecturer, piling each proffered
plate hurriedly, while fierce kindling eyes — with
ever so little of a cannibal twinkle in them—
were watching him greedily, and would not reck
delay — " yes! this is the far-famed mariners'
soup!"

"So called," says a voice struggling with a
mouthful of the delicious miscellany, " because
the hardy sons of Ocean love to prepare it in the
simple retirement of their forecastle."

Happy, hardy sons of Ocean! We would all
gladly be perpetual hardy sons of Ocean on such
terms. And expectant platters are again put
forward. Merrynote shakes a warning finger:

"'Tis but the overture," he said; " there are
Alps upon Alps in the way of delicacies yet in
store. Exercise, then, a just reticence and a
wise discretion."

The obvious prudence of this remark drew
unanimous adhesion. But, alack! he had
well-nigh spoken too late, for some thoughtless
ones had almost dined (compressing three acts
into that one) on the mariners' soup, and looked
ruefully on their empty trenchers. It is
delightful to hear Merrynote as an art-lecturer on
the beautiful in fish and its culinary aesthetics:

"One of the most wide-spread of popular
fallacies, and with which I have, I may say,
unsuccessfully done battle during a lifetime,"