garden--and produces the fruit from his own
orchards for the tarts. Ever and anon a waiter walks round with a can of
ale and fills the glasses, whether asked or not. Beef and mutton,
vegetables and fruit tarts, and ale are simple and plain fare, but when
they are served in the best form, how will you surpass them? The real
English cheese, the fresh salads, the exquisite butter--everything on the
table is genuine, juicy, succulent, and rich. Could such a dinner be found
in London, how the folk would crowd thither! Finally, comes the waiter
with his two clean plates, the upper one to receive the money, the lower
to retain what is his. If you are a stranger, and remember what you have
been charged elsewhere in smoky cities for tough beef, stringy mutton,
waxy potatoes, and the very bread black with smuts, you select half a
sovereign and drop it on the upper plate. In the twinkling of an eye eight
shillings are returned to you; the charge is a florin only.

They live well in Fleeceborough, as every fresh experience of the place
will prove; they have plentiful food, and of the best quality; poultry
abounds, for every resident having a great garden (many, too, have
paddocks) keeps fowls; fresh eggs are common; as for vegetables and fruit,
the abundance is not to be described. A veritable cornucopia--a horn of
plenty--seems to forever pour a shower of these good things into their
houses. And their ale! To the first sight it is not tempting. It is thick,
dark, a deep wine colour; a slight aroma rises from it like that which
dwells in bonded warehouses. The first taste is not pleasing; but it
induces a second, and a third. By-and-by the flavour grows upon the
palate; and now beware, for if a small quantity be thrown upon the fire it
will blaze up with a blue flame like pure alcohol. That dark
vinous-looking ale is full of the strength of malt and hops; it is the
brandy of the barley. The unwary find their heads curiously queer before
they have partaken, as it seems to them, of a couple of glasses. The very
spirit and character of Fleeceborough is embodied in the ale; rich,
strong, genuine. No one knows what English ale is till he has tried this.

After the market dinner the guests sit still--they do not hurry away to
counter and desk; they rest awhile, and dwell as it were on the flavour of
their food. There is a hum of pleasant talk, for each man is a right boon
companion. The burden of that talk has been the same for generatio