BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 29 



"September 24, at Grand Hotel, there was an evening re- 

 ception to Henrik Ibsen, the distinguished Norwegian poet, 

 whom I was introduced to and shook hands with. He was of 

 rather short stature, ruddy face, wiry, brown hair, and side 

 whiskers. He wore decorations and a wide red ribbon across 

 his breast. The reception was held in a suite of rooms of the 

 Grand Hotel. About nine o'clock, the guests passed into the 

 large dining-room set with long table in middle on which 

 the supper was placed : cold fish dressed with delicious sauce 

 and cold peas, carrots cut fine, small cabbage, vegetable some- 

 thing like pods of beans, cold potatoes, delicate cutlets with 

 peas, the Norwegian game, white meat like a partridge, the 

 berry like cranberry only smaller, and salad cut fine. The 

 waiter passed, after serving the game, a tray on which was a 

 sauce and little dishes holding other articles. After that came 

 a kind of charlotte russe surrounded with ice cream. 



"Before sitting down, the guests go first to smaller tables 

 covered with small round plates like soup plates with the food 

 arranged very artistically, cold beef in thin, small slices, 

 raw fish, sardines left in boxes. The middle of the table has 

 two piles of plates, which, however, the Swede never uses when 

 eating this hors d'ceuvre. First one helps one's self to a thin 

 slice of bread or a piece of the Swedish knakkebrad, a rye bread 

 which is like Jewish bread in appearance, a coarse kind of 

 passover bread. The knife is then brought into use, and butter 

 is taken from a large butter dish; then with a fork some kind 

 of cold meat or fish is chosen and eaten. I noticed also a small 

 kind of fried sausage, and a decanter and glass for the strong, 

 white, Swedish whiskey. 



"There was an absence of obsequious serving on the part 

 of servants, each person helping himself, and no servants were 

 seen helping at the beginning of the supper. Wine, claret and 

 sherry, also beer and seltzer water, were opened and standing 

 about for each to help himself. 



"Before drinking, the glasses are always touched with the 

 word skald, meaning "health.' In saluting, the ladies give 

 a little courtesy, bending the knee, which it is considered very 

 polite to do though not obligatory. The men bow quite low, 



