The Sentinel. [volume] (Trenton, N.J.) 1880-1882, 1882-11-04
Modern Egyptian Fleshpots.

Z
What is tieshpot? This is no CO.
nundrum, but only the humble cropping
OF an earnest searcher after truth. Is
it merely pot-nore or less ornamen.
tai according to taste of designer-or
Ito be desirable and thing for non
possessers to be envious of must it be
a cornucopla of good things? The
condition of the hotels here just now
suggests this abstruse question Is an
hotel of necessity place to dine in or
a place where you can procure bed
and nothing more? Instead of dine, I
should say feed, for no one dimes just
now except successful commanders-in-
chief and their lucky guests. We fill
our vacuum when we can, and are
thankful, independent of quality.
We are ravenously hungry, and dip
our noses in the Manager. But what
if that manger contains brickbats or
priceless Egyptian euriosities manu-
featured at Birmingham, or any other
utterly useless and unnutritious object.
Shepherds Hotel is closed-like the
shops, which are enjoy ing prolonged
Bank Holiday. The royal is so
crammed with officers of high degree
gentlemen who, quiet and courteous
and hospItable in their own familiar
Rag, are awful despots here. The
New Hotel-vsst barra 3k-is hope
lessly uncomfortabl; nothing remains
but the Oriental, whittier we have all
learned 20 congregate. That does not
mean, however, that we are taken in
and done for" Fresh from the tender
mercies of the British commissariat,
we are not difficult to please; but,
reaching our haven at last, we did
hope to give up the munching of hard
biscuits, the scraping of empty potted-
meat tins. We have reached the
promised land, but the grapes Eschol
have not arrived. Such scene of
confusion as this caravanserai presents
at what the proprietor is pleased to
call dinner time would require the
facile pencil of a Firth to depict. The
dining hall is spacious, lofty, decorated
with taste. The long tables by the
glitter of their cloths and cutlery in
vite the hungry guest, but the POM
pous show is akin to the whiteness of
the sepulchre. Happily, there are no
dead mems bones under the tables
we have had surfeit of them lately
on the field neither is there more
uncleanness that we can we'll put up
with: but, alas there is instead Of
nothingne-s-a non-existence of the
mportant-which rouses the British
Lion. 1t is Hamlet without the
princely Dane. The plates are there
and exc the knives and FORKS, but
where is the dinner? A smooth-faced
little man assures us of the proximate
arrival of the delicacies of the season
if our Excellencies will wait two little,
minutes. We wait thirty, a whole
long hour, still no signs of aught to
place upon these plates. We storm,
we rage; the little man appears with
sweeter smiles than ever. IF their
will have little
patience" But the fifty guests or
so, with their unshorn chins and con-
vict hair and despatched and stained
red coats, are young English warriors,
who stood without blenching under
that whitening fire at Tel-eI-Kebir.
They are ravenous as young hawks
they are lion whelps whom mamma
kind Mother COmmissariat-has.l left to
wean themselves. They have driven
before them the ridiculous Arab-will
they submit to bad practical jokes on
the part of this plausible smiler? No.
With one accord they bowl him over
and advance q pas de charge over his
PROSTATE form. They escalade the
lobby, take ne kitchen with a rush,
and fall to searching for the spoil. All,
me! The practical joke is tolerably
complete and well managed. Two or
three small fowls, half-roasted, about
the size of thrush; a pot containing
beans, another with curious COM
pound in it that might be meant for
dark curry or a pallld hash. And
that Is all all that the smaller has pro-
vlded for the lion whelps. This is
worse than the tender mercies of the
Commissariat, for we expected moth
ing from her, and were not, therefore,
disappointed bat in Cairo-the splen-
did city so magnifcently Hauss-
manized by the ex. Khedive IsmaiI-
it is very, very painful. Oh, for
Spiers and Pond, or Bertram and
Roberts. Oh, for modest sandwich,
humble hard-boiled egg! But no In
this city of palaces, of metal work from