at the hour of half-past ten. The waiter entered with the
bill. "Soups, chops, cutlets, steaks, roast joints, birds."

"Get some soup," said I, "a slice or two of lion, and half a dozen
birds."

"Sir," said the solemn waiter, "you can't have less than a whole lion,
and we have only two birds in the house."

"Pray," asked I, "are you in the habit of supplying your larder from
Exeter 'Change, or do you breed lions here like poultry?"

"Sir," answered the grim waiter, never relaxing into a smile, "we have
lions brought us from the country every day."

"What do you pay for them?" said I.

"About three and sixpence a-piece, Sir."

"Humph!--market in Africa overstocked," thought I.

"Pray, how do you dress an animal of that description?"

"Roast and stuff him, Sir, and serve him up with currant jelly."

"What! like a hare?"

"It is a hare, Sir."

"What!"

"Yes, Sir, it is a hare! [Note: I have since learned, that this custom
of calling a hare a lion is not peculiar to Cheltenham. At that time
I was utterly unacquainted with the regulations of the London
coffee-houses.]--but we call it a lion, because of the Game Laws."

'Bright discovery,' thought I; 'they have a new language in Cheltenham:
nothing's like travelling to enlarge the mind.' "And the birds," said I,
aloud, "are neither humming birds, nor ostriches, I suppose?"

"No, Sir; they are partridges."

"Well, then, give me some soup; a cotelette de mouton, and a 'bird,' as
you term it, and be quick about it."

"It shall be done with dispatch," answered the pompous attendant, and
withdrew.

Is there, in the whole course of this pleasant and varying life, which
young gentlemen and ladies write verses to prove same and sorrowful,--is
there, in the whole course of it, one half-hour really and genuinely
disagreeable?--if so, it is the half-hour before dinner at a strange
inn. Nevertheless, by the help of philosophy and the window, I managed
to endure it with great patience: and though I was famishing with
hunger, I pretended the indifference of a sage, even when the dinner was
at length announced. I coquetted a whole minute with my napkin, before I
attempted the soup, and I helped myself to the potatory food with a slow
dignity that must have perfectly won the heart of the solemn waiter. The
soup was a little better than hot water, and the sharp sauced cotelette
than leather and vinegar; howbeit, I attacked them with the vigour of
an Irishman, and washed