Roundabout Papers - Penn State University

Roundabout Papersnot tread on them. I am wafted over the ground, downthe stairs, through the doors. This sort of travelling,dear friends, I am sure you have all of you indulged.Well, on the night in question (and, if you wish toknow the precise date, it was the 31st of Septemberlast), after having some little conversation with Mr.Sterne in our bedroom, I must have got up, though Iprotest I don’t know how, and come down stairs withhim into the coffee-room of the “Hotel Dessein,” wherethe moon was shining, and a cold supper was laid out.I forget what we had—”vol-au-vent d’oeufs de Phenix—agneau aux pistaches a la Barmecide,”—what matterswhat we had?“As regards supper this is certain, the less you have ofit the better.”That is what one of the guests remarked,—a shabbyold man, in a wig, and such a dirty, ragged, disreputabledressing-gown that I should have been quite surprisedat him, only one never IS surprised in dr——under certain circumstances.“I can’t eat ‘em now,” said the greasy man (with hisfalse old teeth, I wonder he could eat anything). “Iremember Alvanley eating three suppers once at CarltonHouse—one night de petite comite.”“Petit comite, sir,” said Mr. Sterne.“Dammy, sir, let me tell my own story my own way. Isay, one night at Carlton house, playing at blind hookeywith York, Wales, Tom Raikes, Prince Boothby, and DutchSam the boxer, Alvanley ate three suppers, and wonthree and twenty hundred pounds in ponies. Never sawa fellow with such an appetite, except Wales in his goodtime. But he destroyed the finest digestion a man everhad with maraschino, by Jove—always at it.”“Try mine,” said Mr. Sterne.“What a doosid queer box,” says Mr. Brummell.“I had it from a Capuchin friar in this town. The box isbut a horn one; but to the nose of sensibility Araby’sperfume is not more delicate.”“I call it doosid stale old rappee,” says Mr. Brummell—(as for me I declare I could not smell anything at all ineither of the boxes.) “Old boy in smock-frock, take apinch?”266