American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1881-05-14
The American Dinner.

An English writer. who has made the
tour of the States, gives this account oil
the National dinner: 1.-THE principal
thing that characterizes an American
dinner is its abundance. Huge joints
of meat are not so common in this
country as in England, eight pounds
of sirloin or an eight-pound leg OF
mutton being considered fairly large
joint, while the English sixteen to
twenty-pound roast are never seen in
| private families. But outside of the
size of the joint, everything else is on
larger proportiOnate scale-large
dishes of vegetables and great variety
of them, large pies and a huge tureen
full of soup-however few are going to
sit at table. Anything less than such
abundance savors, to most Americans,
of stint; and it is common to hear it re-
marked among them, of English tables,
that everything seemed SO scant. Such
tiny tart for three people! One may
ask-small as it was if there was not
more than sufficient. and be answered
in the ALTERNATIVES; but to those accus-
toned to see pies made a foot in
diameter, whether there are two or
eight to eat it, the average English
fruit tart would, indeed, look very
small. By the way, when speaking OF
American pies mean the article
peculiar to the country-tarts are un-
known as we understand them, pies
are in their place, and are great in
stitution;' pumpkin Commonly pro-
nounced 'punkin } and apple pie tax
ing the lead in popularity, although CO.
coanut, custard and lemon pies
SO. In providing for their table
of raroiu
consider what go with what cot
course, there are the epicurean few who
dog. Except the Yankee pork and
beans there seems to be no Wand SO
welded to a vegetable as to be spoken
of together. Ike our duck and green
peas,' mutton and turnips,' etc. Cen
orally speaking, vegetables are chosen
haphazard, and SO carrots, or dried
beans. or turnips are as often served
with poultry as not; no question of the
eternal fitness OF things seems to
trouble the average housekeeper.
Then, not only is the unfitness of GER
tain meats unthought of. but the vege-
tables themselves are served with SUBJ
lime disregard to harmony, and SO peas
and asparagus, and summer squash and
potatoes often find themselves cheek
by jowl on one plate. From four to
six vegetables are often served at once,
and two merely are considered by any
but very fashionable people (who affect
English and French customs very
much) to be a very mean sort of din
ner. Tomatoes, in some form or other,
are invariably on the table when in
season, and more often than not canned,
even in winter. But although they are
now as generally eaten as potatoes are
with us. 1 am told that twenty-five
years ago they were quite rare, and
few people liked them. They are now,
however, the most popular of all vege-
tables, except potatoes. which are here
called Irish potatoes to distinguish
them from the sweet esculent, and are
cooked in variety of ways, some, l
think, quite new to English people"
An interesting trial of new stepo-
graphic machine was made in the
French Chamber of Deputies the other
morning in the presence of Nj. Gambetta
and number of other officials and
members. The mechanism, which is an
Italian invention, is worked by kind
of key board similar to that of a piano,
and the stenographic signs are automat-
ically printed on continuous ribbon of
paper. The signs registered of course
represent sounds, irrespective OF SPELL
ing, and the machine can be used by
person unacquainted with the language
spoken. The daughter of the inventor
worked tho machine successfully, TAX
ing down a speech read at average
speed in Italian and one read in French
by nj. Gambetta, she being ignorant 81
the latter language. A comparison be-
tween the speed of the machine and
that of the shorthand writers OF the
Chamber proved favorable to the for
mer. Further experiments will be
made with view to a possible adop-
ton OF the apparatus, which is already
in use in the Italian Chambers,