THE INVALUABLE ONION 



septic properties, This is as may be. The province of the 

 precious plant, the duty which it fulfils well and simply, is 

 that of supplying savour to things that may be nutritious 

 but lack appetizing virtue. Many are the instances that 

 might be adduced in support of this economic plea, but 

 none more directly to the point than that of the soupe a 

 I'oignon, which your thrifty French housewife contrives 

 at shortest noticethe traditional "soup meagre/' object 

 of such bitter contempt in our beef-gorging Hogarthian 

 days. 



This new culinary topic sets me once more back in the 

 streets of old Paris, on the occasion when I made personal 

 acquaintance with the possibilities of a penny meal the 

 best appreciated breakfast 1 have ever known. 

 It was in the very last of my French days. Paris had 

 then recovered from the miseries of the German siege and 

 the nightmare of Commune anarchy, three years past. 

 Within the next few months a new life was to be opened 

 to me in England. The prospect of the great change, albeit 

 fraught with some features of gravity, was exhilarating. 

 The Lt/ce'e, for all its admirable scheme of studies, had 

 lately been abandoned in favour of a quaint old British 

 scholar, very poor, very learned, who lived on the heights 

 of Montmartre, in the oddest little house so filled with 

 books that almost everywhere one had to move literally 

 edge-ways. The very stairs, for lack of shelves, were 

 piled on both sides with volumes, old and modern, 

 tattered or nobly bound, stored regardless of subjects, 

 merely in sizes for the sake of room. 



93 



