Souper. Oeufs de Pluvier Consommé Double en Tasse Fillet de Merlan à l'Anglaise Pommes Nature Caille Cocotte Arménienne Buffet Froid Salade Petit Glace Parisienne Friandises
This is arbitrary, however. On the crested bill of fare we learn that there are other things to be had, but that they must be ordered _à la carte_. Glancing down the mammoth card we begin reading such items: _Saumon Fumé_, _Pigeon Cocotte Bonne Femme_, _Rognons Sautés_, _Champignons_, _Caille Royal aux Raisins_, _Tournedos Sauté Mascotte_, _Noisette d'Agneau Fines Herbes_, _Poussin de Hambourg Vapeur_, _Médaillon Ris de Veau Colbert_, _Terrine de Boeuf à la Mode Glacée_, _Suprême de Chapon Jeannette_ ... and so on, almost indefinitely. I saw nothing in the fact--nor had I seen anything in the fact--that the menu contained not one English word; but later in the week these affectations of French dishes became highly significant. They were really the symbol of London's night romance. They were the tuning fork which gave the pitch for London pleasures. For romance and gaiety in London are grafted to an otherwise unromantic and lugubrious hulk. All joys in that terrible city are lugged from overseas, and, in the process of suturing, the spontaneity has been lost, the buoyancy has disappeared, the honesty has vanished.
But no people can be without romance. No nation can withstand forever the engines of repression. Not all the moral lawmakers of England have succeeded in stamping out the natural impulses. Hypocrisy, that great mediator, sits into the game and stacks the cards. There is no more sensuous dining room in the world than the Savoy. There is no more impressive vision of human beings in the primitive act of eating than can be gained from the top of the stairway which leads into that great double room. And nowhere on earth is there a more cosmopolitan gathering than sits down to the Savoy supper when the theatres are over. Here at least is visual romance; and when we inspect the people at closer range we glimpse a more intimate romance. One catches snatches of conversation from a dozen languages within the radius of hearing. Here is modern civilisation at apogee--the final word in luxury--the _dénouement_ of spectacular life. Go to the Aquarium in St. Petersburg, to the Adlon in Berlin, to the Bristol in Vienna, to the Café de Paris; go wherever you will--to Cairo, to Buenos Aires, to Madrid--the Savoy at the supper hour surpasses them all. From the pantalooned giants who relieve you of your outer garments to the farthest table in the room where the great windows overlook the Embankment Gardens, there is not one note to mar the gorgeous _ensemble_.