The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1833-09-24 00:00:00

MR. GALT.

We arts sorry to hear that, just as this gentleman's auto-biography
has come out, he has been visited by another paralytic stroke
which seriously endangers his life as well as disables him from fol -
lowing his literary avocations. The following touching lines, by
himself, have reference to his painful situation:—
Helpless, forgotten, sad, and lame,
On one lone seat the live-long day,
I muse of youth and dreams of fame.
And hopes and wishes all away.

No more to me with carol gay,
Shall mountain lark from pasture rise,
Nor breezes bland on upland play.
Nor far fair scenes my steps entice.
Ah I never more beneath the skies
The winged heart shall glowing soar,
Nor e'er be reach'd the goal or prize,—
The spells of life enchant no more.
The burning thought, the boding sigh,
The grief unnamed that old men feel,
The languid limbs that withering lie,
- The powerless will's effect-less zeal ;
All these are mine, and Heaven bestows
The gifts, but still I find them woes.

THE BARON D'HAUSSEZ'g DESCRIPTION OF
AN ENGLISH DINNER.
"To enjoy oneself at table is, in France, an axiom of good
sense and good company. In England, on the contrary, to eat
to live seems to be the sole object; there the refinements of
cookery are unknown. It is not, in a word, a science ; neither
does the succession in which dishes should be served appear to
be studied. To cover a table with immense pieces, boiled or
roasted, and to demolish them, in the confusion in which chance
has placed them, appears to be the whole gastronomic science of
the country. The most ordinary seasoning of the English
cuisine is a profusion of spices unsparingly thrown into the
sauces. To correct the effect of this, recourse is bad to the in-
sipid simplicity of plain-boiled vegetables, which continually
circulate round the table, and with which the host would fain
load the guest's plate. The meat is either boiled or roasted. The
fish is ays boiled, and is served invariably with melted butter.
The numerous transformations which the natives of the deep
-tindery before appearing on a French table are altogether un-
known in England. Eggs are excluded from English dinner-
tables, and even when produced at other meals they are served
in the shell; for the talent of making an omelette enters not into
the education of an English cook. English fowls are of an
indifferent quality; and game is subjected to a process of roast-
ing which deprives it of all its flavour. The confectionary is
bactlymade, and without variety. The vegetables, condemned
only to figure as correctives of,a too exciting cuisine, do not ap-
pear upon the table. The entremets are limited to a very scanty
supply of creams and insipid jellies.
"The following is the order in which an English dinner is
served. The first course comprises two soups of different kinds;
One highly peppery, in which float morsels of meat; the other a
soup d/a F'rancaise. They are placed at either extremity of
the table, and helped by. the master and mistress of the house.
They are succeeded by a dish of fish and by roast beef, of which
the toughest part is served round. Where there is no plateau, a
salad occupies the middle of the table. This course being re-
Moved, regular entrées are brought in, and the servants hand
round dishes-with divisions, containing vegetables. The course
which follows is equivalent to the second course in France; but,
prepared without taste, it is served confusedly. Each guest at-
tacks (without offering to his neighbour) the dish before him.
"The creams have often disappeared before the roast is
thought of; which, ill carved, always comes cold to him who is
to partake of it. The English carve on the dinner-table, and
as, before proceeding to this operation, each person is asked
whether he wishes to taste of the dish or not, a considerable
time is lost in fetching the plate of the person who accepts. A
dinner never lasts less than two hours and a-half or three hours,
without including the time the gentlemen sit at table after the
departure of the ladies. The salad appears again before the
dessert, flanked by some plates of cheese. After the cloth is re-
moved, dried and green fruit with biscuits are placed on the
table. These compose the not very brilliant dessert.
THE DRAWING Roost.—" Ten o'clock has already struck:
the ladies, who have been more than an hour in the drawing-
room, await, round the tea-table, the end of the conversation
which is still prolonged in the dining-room. Some strangers
arrive; shake the hand of the mistress of the house, and exhi-
bit a like politeness to such of the ladies present as they are ac-
quainted with. 'they group themselves afterwards round the
fire-place, to chat together if they are intimate, or if they have
been introduced—that is to say, if their names have been inter-
changed by the friendly agency of a third person. Without
this formality, custom does not sanction any intercourse be-
tween strangers. The dinner guests enter the drawing-room
one after another; they approach the ladies; they take coffee
or tea, and sometimes Liqueurs; they then form groups, and re-
tnrn to the eternal subject of politics, always, it must be ad-
ulated, discussed without violence or warmth, and with much
forbearance towards opposite opinions. Some form parties to
play at cards. Others approach the piano to hear a sonata
coldly executed; or romances sung by voices often agreeable,
but rarely animated: for in England music is not a passion nor
even a taste; it is but •an affair of ton and conversance, a means
of killing time. Some of the ladies range themselves round a
table covered-with knick-knacks, which are passed from hand
to hand with a lazy curiosity, and have no other merit than their
exorbitant cost. .How much better had the money squandered on
then- been applied to the purchase of clocks, wanting' in all the
English apartments, or to a more elegant species of furniture
than that covered with
.printed calico, which one sees in the
greater part of the bestfurnished salons of the capital.
"Albums, chiefly composed of engravings and coloured litho-
graphs, as well as caricatures, are turned over, till the moment
when the sated appetite is again stimulated by the display of
cold meats, confectionary, and fruits in an adjoining room.
Sometimes the sound of the piano provokes a country dance,
wherein figure those pretty persons who have at last borrowed
from France the graces which have always distinguished her
dancers.
" An English salon presents in its ensemble and arrangement
a emip d'ceil quite different from a French one, and without par-
tiality it may be averred that the-comparison is quite in favour
of the latter. The cause of this is owing to the grouping and
ineangraity_of the English furniture; you seldom see the furni-
ture of an English room uniform, rarer still is it to find it ranged
in order, Among a dozen chairs and faeteuils there are not two
alike in height, size, and destination. The greater part of them
are so low, that one falls down rather than sits: and a disagree-
able ear: is necessary to rise from this position."