Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-01-29

the waiter to whisk it away from in front
of them and fetch on the next course. ..
Henry knew why they eXuded their little
white lie about their love for spaghetti,
and it was this that amused him. lie
knew that their pretense Of a love for
spaghetti was merely their method OF
striving after a reputation for sophistlcat-
edness: and his shoulders would snake
and his wide, round face beam as he
watched their struggles with their fct1ch,
and considered how sorely they We're put
to it to make their pretense good
And SO l repeat his question. How
many folks really care for spaghetti?
not because l have the slightest hope Oh
obtaining any statistical enlightenment on
that subject, but because | ind myseit
in a constant state of wonderment over
the way the spaghetti fetish holds us
own or even expands. When one is mys-
tilted, it is natural, / presume, that he
express his sense of mystification.
Does spaghetti, then, in as many cases,
say, as i've out of any random iunuIeu'
really fall gratefully, refreshlnSiy, salts
rylnsly upon the palate? L wonder IL
anybody ever by any chance detected
any sure-enough taste to spashett. 10
the squirmy stuff itself, mean, not 10
the highly seasoned sauces OF dressings
or dopes with which it is smothered at
the tables d'hotes or elsewhere: Or
course, one can taste the Drowned tomato
sauce with which it IS Smeared at theSe
places and certainly, too, one can palat-
iZe the acrid tang of the grated cheese
with which spaghetti is SpElnkled at these
feeds. But the spaghetti Itself, the
hangy, recalcitrant, perVerSe STRANDS OF
Whitley flourish stuff-dOes that ever hit
anybody's palate with grateful, APP
peasefui, appetizing sensation, like, say.
beef stew, or even it's highly seasoned
variant, Hungarian goulash? ! wonder?
The undersigned. it will of course have
been seen by this time. is worse than
from Missouri, he is from Boetia, as to
this spaghetti question-this spaghetti
bug pretense, was going to write. He
can't help but class spaghetti with, say,
summer squash, or number of other
things like that, to him, are the mereSt
counterfeit pretenders III the domain of
food Does summer squash taste like
anything TO anybody? You know what
the sage, sardonc old farmer man said
about summer squash "Ycu take a mess
O. summer squash, and you put plenty O
butter and salt and pepper it, and
then you eat it and look happy, and you
know all the time that it tastes less like
anything what ever was on land or sea
than anything you can think Of.
Thus, too, as to artichokes; thus,
again, as to mushrooms. Often l gaze
with sort of poignant usefulness at
persons who are eating artichokes and
mushrooms. and making all kinds of /,
fuss over those uncannily tasteless
products of the soil, and ! hope in my
heart that they are telling the truth !;
that they are not living even ever SO
innocent 4 lie.
You know there are in this town par
ticularly. ever so many thousands Of
otherwise quite truthful persons who
profess that they're positively looney
over chop suey who. down in the depths
Of their beings, haven't any more use
Tor chop suey than they would have
Tor BIRDS nest soup or shark fin soup,
two other Chinese culinary unspeak-
ables of which this writer has partaken
by way of penance 1t is the thing,
you understand, to say that you're a
bug over chop suey, just as it is The
klnk TO say that you're a lunatlc ote
spaghetti, although in a slightly lesser
degree. And the Teller or felleresS who
can ack-tilly partake of chop suey with
chOpsticks, instead of ignobly resorting
to spoon, preens himself or herself
so enormously as, really, to be quite
insuferabe Why should any Ameri-
can human being be so Unfortunately,
so Internally proud of the ability to
dip up an always doubtful Chimes ar
ucle of food with couple of sticks
Is that in the final analysis anything
to become swelly or intolerable about?
interior Of China for years who can't
use chopsticks and who would as lief
make the pretenSe to the ability to use
chopsticks as they would to proficiency
on the yioloncello. So that these things.
as one must imagine. are all IL part or
the indurated desire of New Workers.
Ia, profess n contact with dreary sort
OF an imitation, Sray-hued, neVer-was