liminary point settled, of whom the duty of chairman
devolved on, a situation, as I understood, always filled in a commercial
room by ~252~~the last gentleman traveller who makes it his residence,
we proceeded to business. The privilege of finding fault with the
dinner, which, by the by, was excellent, is always conceded to the
ancients of the fraternity of traders; these gentlemen who, having been
half a century upon the road, remember all the previous proprietors of
the hotel to the fifteenth or twentieth generation removed, make a point
of enumerating their gracious qualities upon such occasions, to keep the
living host and representative _up to the mark_, as they phrase it. For
instance--the old buck in the chair, who was a city tea broker, found
fault with the fish: "There vas nothing of that ere sort to be had good
but at Billingsgate, where all the best fish from all the vorld vas,
as he contended, to be bought cheaper as butcher's meat." The result of
which remark induced the young wags at the table to finish a very fine
brill, without leaving him a taste, while he was abusing it. "This soup
is not like friend Birch's," said Mr. Obadiah Pure, a gentleman in the
drug line; "it hath a watery and unchristianlike taste with it." "Ay,"
replied a youngster at the bottom of the table, with whom it appeared to
be in request, "I quake for fear while I am eating it, only I know there
can be no drugs in it, or you would not find fault with a customer."
"Thou art one of the newly imported, friend," replied Mr. Pure, "and art
yet like a young bear, with all thy troubles to come." "True," said the
wag, "thou may be right, friend; but I shall not be found a _bruin_
with thy materials for all that." This sally put down the drug merchant
for the rest of the dinner-time. "You had better take a little fish
or soup before they are cold," said the chairman, to a bluff-looking
beef-eater at his back, who was arranging his papers and samples. "Sir,
I never eat warm wittals, drink hot liquors, wear a great coat, or have
my bed warmed." "The natural heat of your ~253~~constitution, I suppose,
excuses you," said I, venturing upon a joke. "Sir, you had better heat
your natural meal, while it is hot, without attempting to heat other
people's tempers," was the reply; to which Bob retorted, by saying, "It
was quite clear the gentleman was not mealy-mouthed." "This beef smells
a little of Hounslow Heath," said a jeweller's gentleman, on my right