PRIVATE BOX.

* * * * *

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

The Baron thanks Sir HENRY THOMPSON for his Food and Feeding, which (published by WARNE & Co., a suggestive name) has reached its sixth edition.  It is, indeed, an entertaining work, and a work that all honest entertainers should carefully study.  It will delight alike the host and the guest.  To the first, Sir HENRY, being a host in himself, can give such valuable advice as, if acted upon, will secure the ready pupil a position as a Lucullus of the first class; and, even when so placed, he will still have much to learn from this Past Grand Master in the art of living well and wisely. “Fas est ab ‘hoste’ doceri”—­and a better host it would be difficult to find as teacher than Sir HENRY THOMPSON, P.G.M., to whose health and happiness the Baron quaffs a bumper of burgundy of the right sort and at the right time.  Most opportunely does this book appear in the season of Lent, which may be well and profitably spent in acquiring a thorough knowledge of how to turn to the best account the fleshpots of Egypt, when the penitential time is past, and the yolk of mortification is thrown off with the welcome return of the Easter Egg.  Read attentively what our guide and friend has to say about salads, especially note his remarks on the salad of “cold boiled table vegetables.”  His arrangement of the menu, to the Baron’s simple taste, humble mode of life, and not inconsiderable experience, is perfect. Hors d’oeuvres are works of supererogation, and have never been, so to speak, acclimatised in our English table-land.  The Baron may have overlooked any directions about ecrivisses, not as bisque, but pure and simple as cray-fish, which, fresh from the river and served hot and hot come in late but welcome as an admirable refresher to the palate, and as a relish for the champagne, though the Baron is free to admit that the dainty manipulation of them is somewhat of a trial to the inexperienced guest, especially in the presence of “Woman, lovely Woman.”  “Hease afore helegance,” was Mr. Weller’s motto, but “Ease combined with elegance” may be attained in a few lessons, which any skilled M.D.E. (i.e., Mangeur d’ecrivisses) will be delighted to give at the well-furnished table of an apt and ardent pupil.  Once more “Your health, Sir HENRY!” that’s the Baron’s toast (bread not permitted) in honour of the eminent practician who does so much for the health of everybody.

That a considerable number of novel-readers like Saint Monica, by Mrs. BENNETT-EDWARDS, is evident, because it has reached its sixth edition, but that the Baron is not one of this happy number he is fain to admit. Saint Monica seems to him to be a story with which the author of As in a Looking-Glass might have done something in his peculiar way.  It begins with promise, which promise is not justified by performance.