When the dinner was at last completed and sent to table, the master-cook straightened himself and gave a short order, which was immediately obeyed.  I saw him go into the scullery near by and souse his head and neck in a bucket of cold water.  In a trice the tables of his late business were cleared, and the scullions laid out the materials for supper.  These were, as may be supposed, distinguished by abundance rather than refinement:  a dish of tripe, a chine of beef, spaghetti in wash-hand basins, onion salad with garlic, sausages, blood-puddings, pigs’ feet in vinegar.  High wicker flasks of wine stood in iron cages, to be swung down by the finger; there was one bottle of water:  all was ready.  But nobody sat down until the master-cook appeared.  The men stood on one side of the table, the maids on the other, like soldiers on parade.  He entered, the huge fellow, red from his cold douche, his hair all rumpled from the rude embraces of the jack-towel, and walked over to the men’s side, wiping the wet from his ears as he went.  He stood—­this captain of the kitchen—­in front of his company, and with a sweeping and appraising eye surveyed the ordered nymphs.  He selected the partner of his choice, a modest-mannered creature who answered to the name of Gentucca; she came forward and stood by his side.  With no more waiting he took his seat at the head of the board, and, plunging his fingers into a steaming bowl of spaghetti, began to gobble at it in the unedifying way which his nation have—­and which, indeed, the dish demands.  Gentucca sat at his right hand, but took nothing until she had helped him to drink.  Meantime the others had made their arrangements—­ from the second in command down to the merest pot-boy selections had been made from among the maids.  I heard, “Lisabetta, come here,” or, “No, no, Liperata, I have chosen you”—­or it was Caterina, or Giocosa, or Bettina, as the case may have been.  To be brief, down sat everybody in the kitchen, Jack by his Gill, save my unhappy self.

It was the highly favoured Gentucca who pointed me out to the Grand Master of the Cooks.  As I still wore the cape and long coat of Aquamorta’s servant I was naturally accepted as such.  The master-cook, who saw directly that I was a foreigner, courteously invited me to the right hand of Gentucca, ordering a bouncing girl of the name of Maria-Maddelena to make room for me.  She very pleasantly did so; my plate was heaped, my cup was filled; all the company stood up and drank my health.  Nothing could have been kinder than this humble society.  My eyes clouded more than once to recognise it.