round the genial board, evinced their
dexterity in launching their forks at the fattest pieces in this mighty
dish,--in much the same manner that sailors harpoon porpoises at sea, or
our Indians spear salmon in the lakes.

Sometimes the table was graced with immense apple pies, or saucers full
of preserved peaches and pears; but it was always sure to boast an
enormous dish of balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog's fat and called
doughnuts or _olykoeks_, a delicious kind of cake, at present little
known in this city, except in genuine Dutch families.

The tea was served out of a majestic Delft teapot, ornamented with
paintings of fat little Dutch shepherds and shepherdesses tending
pigs,--with boats sailing in the air, and houses built in the clouds,
and sundry other ingenious Dutch fancies. The beaux distinguished
themselves by their adroitness in replenishing this pot from a huge
copper teakettle. To sweeten the beverage, a lump of sugar was laid
beside each cup, and the company alternately nibbled and sipped with
great decorum; until an improvement was introduced by a shrewd and
economic old lady, which was to suspend, by a string from the ceiling, a
large lump directly over the tea table, so that it could be swung from
mouth to mouth.

At these primitive tea parties, the utmost propriety and dignity
prevailed,--no flirting nor coquetting; no romping of young ladies; no
self-satisfied struttings of wealthy gentlemen, with their brains in
their pockets, nor amusing conceits and monkey divertisements of smart
young gentlemen, with no brains at all.

On the contrary, the young ladies seated themselves demurely in their
rush-bottomed chairs, and knit their own woolen stockings; nor ever
opened their lips, excepting to say "_Yah, Mynheer_," or "_Yah, yah,
Vrouw_," to any question that was asked them; behaving in all things
like decent, well-educated damsels. As to the gentlemen, each of them
tranquilly smoked his pipe, and seemed lost in contemplation of the blue
and white tiles with which the fireplaces were decorated; wherein sundry
passages of Scripture were piously portrayed. Tobit and his dog figured
to great advantage; Haman swung conspicuously on his gibbet; and Jonah
appeared most manfully leaping from the whale's mouth, like Harlequin
through a barrel of fire.

FOOTNOTE:

[Footnote 19: From Diedrich Knickerbocker's, "History of New York," by
Washington Irving.]

NOTES: More than two hundred and fif