artments attached to it, and for any one having to
stay at Marseilles, either while waiting for the _Messageries Maritimes_
liner or for the arrival of a yacht, it is infinitely preferable to the
hot, stuffy town, and would be an excellent winter quarter. Like many
similar seaside cafes abroad, it has its own _parc au coquillages_ or
shell-fish tanks, and you here get the world-renowned _Bouillabaisse_ in
perfection.

The best shell-fish are the _praires_ and the _clovisses_, about the
same size as walnuts or little neck clams; the _clovisses_ are the
largest, and rather take the place of oysters when the latter are not in
season, in the same way the clam does in America; others are mussels,
oysters, and _langoustes_. _Langoustes_ differ as much as a skinny fowl
from a _Poularde de Mans_. Mons. Echenard gets his from Corsica, and you
then learn how they can vary. He has also a _Poularde Reserve en Cocotte
Raviolis_, which is a dish to be remembered; and a small fat sole caught
between Hyeres and Toulon is not to be despised.

I am free to confess that the _Tutti Frutti de la Mare_, or stew
consisting of the many lovely and variegated small fish that are caught
in those waters, has no charm for me. Personally, I would as soon eat a
surprise packet of pins, but of course, _chacun a son gout_. Anyway, if
you are stranded in Marseilles for an afternoon or longer, you could go
to many a worse place than the Reserve.

I suppose it is not necessary for me to add to A.B.'s discourse any
description of what _Bouillabaisse_ is, or how the Southerners firmly
believe that this dish cannot be properly made except of the fish that
swim in the Mediterranean, the rascaz, a little fellow all head and
eyes, being an essential in the savoury stew, along with the eel, the
lobster, the dory, the mackerel, and the girelle. Thackeray has sung the
ballad of the dish as he used to eat it, and his _recette_, because it
is poetry, is accepted, though it is but the fresh-water edition of the
stew. If you do not like oil, garlic, and saffron, which all come into
its composition, give it a wide berth. The _Brandade_, which is a
cod-fish stew and a regular fisherman's dish, is by no means to be
despised.

Before leaving the subject of Marseilles and its cookery and
restaurants, let me record the verdict of a true gourmet and Englishman
who always lives the winter through in Marseilles. He writes me that in
Marseilles itself there are no restauran