I protest I am no glutton; in fact, I despise the man whose meal-times are the epochs of his life; yet I frankly confess to emotions of a very positive character, in contemplating the associations of the table, and I admit farther, that I take pleasure in the reality as well as in the imagination.  I like to be ‘one of the company,’ whether in palace or in farm-house.  I always brighten up when I see the dining-room door thrown open to an angle hospitably obtuse, and am pleased alike with the politely-worded request, ’Will the ladies and gentlemen please walk out and partake of some refreshments?’ or the blunt, kindly voice of mine host, ‘Come, friends; dinner’s ready.’  Still I assert my freedom from any slavish fondness for the creature comforts.  It is not the bill of fare that so pleases me.  In fact, some of the best meals of which I have ever partaken, were those the materials of which I could not have remembered twenty minutes after.  Exquisite palatal pleasures, then, are not a sine qua non in the enjoyment of table comforts.  No, indeed.  There is a condiment which is calculated to impart a high relish to the humblest fare; but without this charmed seasoning, every banquet is a failure.  Solomon was a man of nice observation, even in so humble a matter as a meal.  Let him reveal the secret in his own words:  ’Better is a dinner of herbs, where LOVE is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith.’

By a merciful arrangement of Providence, man is so constituted that he may think, talk, and eat, all at one and the same time.  Hence, the table is often the scene of animated and very interesting conversations, provided love is there.  Many of our Saviour’s most interesting and instructive discourses were delivered while ‘sitting at meat,’ and the ‘table-talk’ of some authors is decidedly the most meritorious of all their performances.

But the truth is, there are not many meals where love is entirely absent.  Cheerfulness is naturally connected with eating; eating begets it probably.  It is difficult for a man to eat at all, if he is in a bad humor.  Quite impossible, if he is in a rage; especially if he is obliged to sit down to his dinner in company with the man he hates.  There are so many little kind offices that guests must perform for each other at table, so many delicate compliments may be paid to those we love or revere, by polite attentions to them, and so necessary, indeed, have these become to our notion of a satisfactory repast, that to banish such amiable usages from our tables would be not only to degrade us to the level of the brute, but would deprive us of a most humanising and refining means of enjoyment.  How beautiful and necessary, then, is the arrangement by which, morning, noon, and night, (I pity folks