LUNCHEON BARS.. I HAVE heard a lunch an insult to one's breakfast and an outrage on one's dinner. Some people evade the imputation by dining at lunch time, or by making the lunch one's dinner. In modern life we nearly all dine in the evening, but, nevertheless, we feel hungriest at the noonday; and so it is said that, from her Majesty downwards, we make a dinner at our lunch, and a supper at our dinner. There are people who will only take a biscuit or a crust for lunch, and some who only take the very slightest breakfast and hold out till an eight o'clock dinner. I apprehend that is a bad habit. It was Lord George Bentinck's, and he dropped rather suddenly. The etherealized beings whom we meet at dinner-parties make bird-like peckings, which contrast gracefully with our grosser feeding. But we say commonly that they have virtually made a good wholesome dinner at half-past one a hot fowl or leg of mutton-and have carried out the idea by a fiveo'-clock cup of tea. But let not the ladies suppose that the worthy husband has been working like a steam engine all day without taking in coal and water. The noble animal has perhaps been disporting himself in rich pastures since breakfast-time, and returns home to the great event of the day in a highly-fed and succulent condition. He has made ample acquaintance with the great modern institution of Luncheon Bars. And let it not be supposed that luncheon is confined to the modest repast snatched hastily at a luncheon bar. Our homely notes will chiefly be confined to these; but the term is construed in a large and liberal sense. There are many men who make a thoroughly British dinner for their lunch, without prejudice to the later refection at home. A fish dinner, whether at Billingsgate or in Cheapside, is a great favourite. Fish presents the advantage of being easily and soon digested, and so leaving its votaries in an orthodox state of hunger for the evening. I supVOL. XVII.-NO. XCIX. pose it is on this account that M. Agassiz so strongly presses men, especially of a sedentary and literary life, to make fish as large an element as possible in their diet. The system of Lent, when it prevailed, certainly had the advantage of encouraging our fisheries, and giving men a wholesome change from the perpetual meat diet. You get an astonishing amount of fish at these places, salmon and all other things in their season; but the chairs are so close, the tables so crowded, the waiting so hurried, that fish being very bony creatures, their consumption must be attended with some peril. As for a bowl of oyster sauce to keep the cod in company, it reminds us of the Virgilian line, 'Apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto.' At these fish dinners they brew a very seductive liquor called punch, and its potation during business hours is occasionally disastrous to ordinary business purposes. Many at other places go in for a cut off the joint, with cheese and celery, and, like soldiers, find that in the daily battle of life they can fight best upon beef. Some time ago there was a letter strongly recommending the French eating-houses in the mysterious region skirted by the squares of Leicester and Soho. I went at two o'clock, being given to understand that this was a good time of the day. And they certainly gave you a clear, good, vegetable soup, and, wonderful to say, only charged you threepence for it, thereby opening up a vista of views respecting culinary profits. The Times' saidand I will not dispute its opinionthat it was as good as the soup which you get at the clubs. But when upon the simple basis of soup you proceeded to elaborate a good French lunch, then the time consumed between the removes was immense. The French have no idea of time, and they think that you have no idea either. Order a French dinner, if you will, or go to sup with choice spirits, with whom it is pleasant to while away some hours; but to have a good lunch, and to have R |