The Pleasures of Dining / Classifieds

The Pleasures of Dining

Being a person of some standing, one was recently a guest of the Duke of Rutland at Belvoir. Having arrived at a late hour due to a rather unusual occurrence at the F.O. when an attractive foreign lady of unknown origin had become hopelessly entangled with my moustache during an discussion on the exploitation of young women (a jolly fine idea I told her), I was shown immediately to my sleeping quarters.

As the Duchess showed me to my quarters she visibly shuddered at the sight of the magnificent tapestries depicting the battles of the Great Duke and the heroic forms of dying soldiers and dead horses. I could not help giving a little chuckle, never ceasing to be amazed at the frailty of the female sort who could be so uncomfortable around what is an everyday sight such as a young soldier hanging from a tree by his own intestines. However the Duchess soon perked up when I gave her a slap across the rear-end with a cat o’ nine tails that I happened to have nearby in my hand luggage, she fairly skipped out of the room..

A good night’s rest was broken rather abruptly at 8 a.m. when I was awoken by a military band outside the window playing a rousing battle song. In less than five seconds I was standing to attention beside the bed as is the British way. I was slightly disconcerted however, to discover upon entering the latrines, a Scottish bagpipe band playing ‘ye bonny banks and braes’ rather too energetically among the porcelain. I hurriedly concluded my ablutions and made a hasty exit.

Later that day while on an errand in town, I took the opportunity to break bread at Trollopes Plumstead Episcopi where among convivial surroundings I partook of poached turbot and salmon mayonnaise followed by turkey and roast mutton accompanied by several entrées, cutlets, fillets of leveret, sautéed fillet of fowl, sorbet, lobster salad, maraschino jelly, truffles and champagne. I then left the establishment and returned immediately to Belvoir where I was just in time for dinner.

Dinner in the Grand dining-hall consisted of pheasant stuffed with truffles and smothered on oleaginous sauce, snails packed with foie Gras and served with oysters, mushrooms, prawns, tomatoes and croquettes. Then followed boned snipe filled with forcemeat and covered with truffles, as well as Madeira sauce. What a marvellous appetiser for the 12 courses that followed. The only blemish on the affair was the fact that every single course was stone cold due to the distance between the kitchen and the dining-room of some 800 yards. In fact the food was so cold that upon the arrival of the champagne the Earl of Beaconsfield was heard to exclaim sardonically ‘Thank God for something warm at last!’

The problem of the distance between kitchen and dining room was a problem that the Duke had been attempting to solve for several years. Some months back he had employed the services of several of England’s finest athletes who would sprint at high speed to the dining hall carrying one platter at a time. This initially appeared to be something of a success but it soon became clear that when faced with a plate full of roast lamb it was simply unacceptable to have to wait another 41/2 minutes for the mint sauce to arrive. The Duke then decided that the athletes should load the food onto large trolleys and then push said conveyances to the dining hall. This, in essence, appeared a remarkably good idea but unfortunately ended in disaster when one of the athletes scalded himself to death with lobster soup while attempting to manoeuvre the trolley over the high hurdles, a complete waste of good soup. After this, the Duke decided to dismiss the athletes and resorted to a cunningly designed arrangement of pulleys and levers but this attempt also ended fatally when the Duke of Greyshott was decapitated by a rack of lamb.

My whole time a Belvoir was a wonderful experience of top quality comestibles, and the company was delightful. the only slight blemish was when the Duke of Rutland, a fastidious and sarcastic man, decided that 2 hours was quite long enough for any meal, and upon the striking of the hour began ushering the guests into the drawing room with the aid of a catapult and a bucket of putrefying bladders that he had about his person. I myself was hit on the hand by a duck bladder, and I can tell you that it was not a pleasant experience at all. I, however, consider myself fortunate when comparing my fate to that of a rather well upholstered Countess who took a full hit in the chest from a massive bladder, probably from an Aberdeen Angus, what’s worse, it was still full! I made a hasty retreat to my room, pausing only to request that a cold roast chicken be left by my bedside in case I needed a snack in the night. So there you have it, an insight into the glamorous and sophisticated world of dining.

Next issue:

The pleasures of Flagellation.

Classifieds…Classifieds…Classifieds.

The Marylebone Hiding Club seeks new members. And existing ones.

Send applications to:

the man inside the postbox that wasn’t there yesterday

Regent Street

London

Lodgings Available due to sudden departure of previous annoying lodger.

Excellent room. Ignore smell from under the floorboards. Also for sale - set of steak knives (only used once) 2s 6d

Don’t throw away your old snotty handkerchiefs. Instead, send them to…

Miss J. Reilly at 12 Skipton Mews, Islington.

That’ll teach her to turn me down for a date.

Small dead thing for sale. Ideal gift for a strange person who collects similar items

The Arts

I was lucky enough at the weekend to chance upon a play which challenges the spectator like no other I have seen for many a year. It is always a landmark when a playwright dares to peel back the fabric of society and expose a taboo subject which we all know effects many marriages in society, but few feel comfortable to talk about openly. The main protagonists are a relatively young married couple called George and Elizabeth. Here, in one of the opening scenes, Elizabeth drops her bombshell.

Elizabeth : George, darling. There’s something I’ve got to tell you.

George : yes dear?

Elizabeth : You know I said that I’d been feeling a little frail lately.

George : yes.

Elizabeth : well.......I went to the doctors the other day and...

George : the doctors?

Elizabeth : yes the doctors. They’ve done all the tests. There’s really no doubt about it.

George : (tense) What is it dear?

Elizabeth : oh god...

George : tell me!

Elizabeth : They found out that I’m..

George : what?

Elizabeth : (tearful) I’m......a woman

George : a woman! But how?

Elizabeth : I don’t know. I thought we’d been so careful.

Overall a fine play - although there could have been more scenes involving badger-baiting for my money.