“Gallant archer,” said she, “you must be hungry after your day’s march.  What supper will you have?  Shall it be a delicate lobster-salad? or a dish of elegant tripe and onions? or a slice of boar’s-head and truffles? or a Welsh rabbit a la cave au cidre? or a beefsteak and shallot? or a couple of rognons a la brochette?  Speak, brave bowyer:  you have but to order.”

As there was nothing on the table but a covered silver dish, Wolfgang thought that the lady who proposed such a multiplicity of delicacies to him was only laughing at him; so he determined to try her with something extremely rare.

“Fair princess,” he said, “I should like very much a pork-chop and some mashed potatoes.”

She lifted the cover:  there was such a pork-chop as Simpson never served, with a dish of mashed potatoes that would have formed at least six portions in our degenerate days in Rupert Street.

When he had helped himself to these delicacies, the lady put the cover on the dish again, and watched him eating with interest.  He was for some time too much occupied with his own food to remark that his companion did not eat a morsel; but big as it was, his chop was soon gone; the shining silver of his plate was scraped quite clean with his knife, and, heaving a great sigh, he confessed a humble desire for something to drink.

“Call for what you like, sweet sir,” said the lady, lifting up a silver filigree bottle, with an india-rubber cork, ornamented with gold.

“Then,” said Master Wolfgang—­for the fellow’s tastes were, in sooth, very humble—­“I call for half-and-half.”  According to his wish, a pint of that delicious beverage was poured from the bottle, foaming, into his beaker.

Having emptied this at a draught, and declared that on his conscience it was the best tap he ever knew in his life, the young man felt his appetite renewed; and it is impossible to say how many different dishes he called for.  Only enchantment, he was afterwards heard to declare (though none of his friends believed him), could have given him the appetite he possessed on that extraordinary night.  He called for another pork-chop and potatoes, then for pickled salmon; then he thought he would try a devilled turkey-wing.  “I adore the devil,” said he.

“So do I,” said the pale lady, with unwonted animation; and the dish was served straightway.  It was succeeded by black-puddings, tripe, toasted cheese, and—­what was most remarkable—­every one of the dishes which he desired came from under the same silver cover:  which circumstance, when he had partaken of about fourteen different articles, he began to find rather mysterious.

“Oh,” said the pale lady, with a smile, “the mystery is easily accounted for:  the servants hear you, and the kitchen is below.”  But this did not account for the manner in which more half-and-half, bitter ale, punch (both gin and rum), and even oil and vinegar, which he took with cucumber to his salmon, came out of the self-same bottle from which the lady had first poured out his pint of half-and-half.