Evening star., 1898-07-30
EATING OF THE FRENCH
A Great Change Seems to Have Come About
in That Country.
The Hurry Plan of Slowing Away
Food is Now in Vogue-EngIfsh
Customs Adopted.
From the New York Sun.

From the New York Sun.
| PARIS, July 15.-The French have an
aphorism which says, Animals feed,
| man eats, but only the Frenchman
knows how to eat Sometimes they
| amplify this by adding that only the
Frenchman krows what to eat. and
they are often serious. 1t is a cardinal
belief with many cf them that the English
never see food other than raw beef and
watery potatoes; that the Germans have
knowledge only of sausage and sauerkraut.
and that the Americans bill of fare is
| made uD solely of fried ham and buck
wheat cakes. Now, the odd thing about all
| this is that rare roast beef has become the
standard dish at all Paris restaurants and
| that sausage, ham and sauerkraut are
served largely everywhere, and that you
| can always get them when you can get
| nothing else 1t is a gastronomic change
which has kept pace with the taste for
beer, which is the common drink in Paris
except at meals. Even with food il has
superseded wine. so that the two drinks
| are about in the proportion of one to four
Ihis is not because the ordinary French
wine has grown so bad, for the French
beer is worse than anything else could be-
france, In CO ntradiction to Paris is not
a country of Snails and frogs legs but OF
| trlpe. Where IL all comes from is one of
the mysteries. Everybody of moderate and
| lesser means eats triTe; it is cooked in
many ways, and is disguised IN none which
may indicate that tie French fancy It,
Next to tripe there is nothing you are so
sure of getting at a French table d'hote
as stewed rabbit, especially if you do not
have preference for it. The French be-
ing naturally a little suspicious since the
days of the PrusSian siege these rabbits
are always sold with the heads on
The days of the great restaurants of
Paris, the gilded palaces of the bou!evards
whose fame was worldwide, are said to be
score remaining, and the best known of
these, the Cafe AnsIais will be closed
within the year. They no longer pay Con-
temporaneously, too the more modest
places in the quiet streets leading from
the boulevards, which catered solely to
the race Of goUImets bred by the second
empire, have disappeared one by one, after
Valnly trying to recruit clients from the
new generation. AS q matter of fact the
gournets Paris pride, have died out. The
modern prototype is the clubman who imi-
tates everything English, and thinks 1t
bad form to lose half his day eating and
d1gesting. Now, instead of spending three
hours over his midday breakfast at one of
the old-time fashionable restaurants dis
cussing the bill of fare with a boon friend
as If it We're the draft of an international
treaty, this man hurries over a breakfast
OF slice of cold beef, English bread and
a pewter mug of ale, which he gets at one
OF the numerous English taverns which
have hourished in Paris for a decade Then
ne rushes off to some sporting event
q
the gourmet was made. But the gourmet
isn't English, and the English have no
more slavish worshicer than the modern
fashionable Frenchman except the mod
ern fashionable German
IN other grades of French society run
nng the gamut of professional and business
men students, shopkeepers and workmen
the charge is no less to be marked The
Bohemian is the only man who has NOT
altered his prandial habits, and he doesn't
count, because he doesn't eat often enough
TO form the habit. The most striking point
IN the change is hurry. Not SO very long
ago one was struck-lf he were foreigner
and not Latln-with the Ieisurely, not to
say dilatory. atmosphere of a French res
taurant OF any class. Patrons and walters !
alike seemed to be bound to kill time some
now. There was much talking, much ges-
uculating, and mere eating was an avoca-
ton. Today French restaurant bears
striking similarity to the quick lunch'
places of America. There is hustle and
confusion and when a man opens his mouth
IT Is nearly always to put something into
II, or to- scold the waiter. There is an
other French aphorism. Don't scold the
waiter, or he'll spit on the plates;" but the
modern Frenchman who loves to air his
English by quoting Teen iss moaney," Is
content to run the risk in his eagerness for
quick service.
When the French say that it is only they
that know how to eat" they probably
do not refer altogether to their manners at
table, because that would mean too much
The person of other lands habituated to the
use of a napkin might, for instance, feel
inclined to criticise the universal French
use OF that article as a bib. Wherever you
go in Paris, whether it be to dinner in
private family, to hotel or to a swell res
taurant, YOU find the napkin-in France an
expansive spread-tucked into the mascu-
line collar just under the left ear, or into
the feminine corsage; some women, indeed
tie it around the neck, thus permitting its
ample folds to envelop the entire upper part
OF the body There is at the present mo-
ment or view in the shop windows of the
Rue de Rivoii large photograph of a state
diplomatic dinner in which you can see
scarcely anything but napkins and heads
And the napkin-bib is really continental
not French only
Among other things. also, about which