The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1892-11-01

AN OLD LONDON TAVERN.

AN OLD LONDON TAVERN.
A Lady Dimes 1T the Famous "Cheshire
Cheese"
A flare Of unshaded gas lights up a
small, old-fashioned room, the floor of
which is covered with sawdust. The
ceiling is white. with projecting cross
beams, and at one side of the room is a
long oak table at which Johnson,
Goldsmith and few other choice spir-
its were won't to sit and feed; and here.
1t is said, originated the well known
riddle about the number of beefsteaks
it would take to reach the moon.
All along one side of the room are
wooden partitions, exactly like old
fashioned pews, with hard, cushionless
seats. We are told that this chop
house has been in existence ever since
1867, and is no ephemeral mushroom
house of the hour to be sought out one
day and forgotten The next; there is
also an old-fashioned, not to say ante
diluvian, air about the diners quite in
keeping with the antiquity of the place.
Our pew just holds six comforta bly,
and we sit down three and three oppo-
site each other on either side of a mar
row table covered with spotless white
cloth. We have black-handled knives,
but not two-pronged steel forks, for
which ! am not little grateful as l
have never forgotten the taste of steel
on the nursery forks when l was
child and my parents were away and
had to dine there all alone
We have willow-pattern plates, large
and hot for the meat, and small and
cold, each with a pat of butter on it,
for our potatoes. First we have the
thick slices of hot ham, the lean, tender
and pink and the fat succulent, with
an immense dish of the most delicious
peas / ever ate, and young potatoes
served in their jackets.
ANY one who has tasted fresh run
salmon which has been green kippered
and has compared it with the hard salt
fish cured for the London market will
appreciate the difference between an
ordinary ham and one that is prepared
for immediate consumption.
These Yorkshire hams were not in
tended for keeping, and, as the cook
afterwards informed us, were all eaten
up in day. should easily have be-
lieved her if she had said one was eaten
up at every meal, Judging by the thick
ness of the slices to which we were
helped and the amount we were sup
posed to eat of them.
The next dish is a point steak. rosy
without being saignant. accompanied
by fresh dishes of young peas and pota-
toes. After this comes the buck
rabbit"-that is, toasted cheese served
in little shallow tins boiling hot, one
to each person, with two pieces of toast
on the side of the plate.
/ was by this time beginning to feel
thoroughly uncomfortable, owing to
the want of some sort of stuffing to my
seat and | leaned first on one elbow,
then on the other, then back against
the hard wood, then upright again: but
ali in vain. for no change of position
gave me even momentary relief and l
longed to get one of the even
ing papers of which there was
plentiful supply hanging over the back
of the pews to fill it with shavings out
of the CRATE, roll it up into cushion
and sit upon it.
Any one. unless he has spent his life
in a velvet armchair as l have, might
think me fanciful; but / can assure
them was quito miserable and could
not even get through my ''buck rabbit. "
At last appealed to our host and asked
him if h~ oonl1 NIT eraf mo q ~, G hiop.
upon which he in turn appealed to the
waiter-and never shall 1 forget the
walters expression and never did feel
more completely snubbed than when he
answered slowly and solemnly, without
a smile on his pallid face: ''Sir. this is
the old Cheshire Cheese"
After the remains of the buck rabbit
have been removed eur somewhat &C.
centric dinner is brought to close by
a bowl of rum punch, accompanied by
six long church-warden pipes and a
glass full of bird's-eye tobacco. We
wonder if the ladies who usually dine
at ''Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese" are in the
habit of finishing off their meal with a
pipe but unfortunately have no means
of ascertaining what is the correct
thing to do, as the only other female in
the place is dining behind a curtain in
the far corner of the room. / own to
having been tempted into trying some
amber-scented cigarettes which We're
brought me especially from Algiers but
] am not an habitual smoker and am
bound TO confess l would much have
preferred to suck bons-bon Or even eat
ripe greengages, than to fill my mouth
with nasty tobacco smoke.-N. Y. Jour