206 THE GARDEN OF A 



an assumption, a vulgarity. Oh, the flaunting of 

 bare bones and leaf lard that father and I have seen 

 in the past when entertained by some of his "summer 

 resident " patients, whose culinary pretentions, by the 

 way, were very slight. None of these, however, had 

 the peculiar quality of flesh possessed by the " turtles," 

 a species of Englishwoman that Evan and I constantly 

 met and so classified age between fifty and seventy, 

 never the mother of sons, but of daughters, only 

 unmarried daughters, who evidently made their own 

 clothes with the neck openings all of the same meas- 

 ure, irrespective of under or over development. 



I've often wished when at some of the " profes- 

 sional necessity " dinner parties, that less meat on 

 the hoof had been exhibited and more had been 

 cooked and served at table, instead of the eight 

 courses of spinklets that frequently separated the 

 very tough and altogether-too-large-to-be-eaten-raw 

 clams from the half cold, disintegrated coffee ; but 

 such are the risks of society, and so we learned to 

 smile and say nothing ; but when we came home, we 

 always had a supper of honest roast beef sandwiches 

 and Bass's ale. It does sound vulgar, but it's so 

 comforting, and ale is quite safe when one is rather 

 tall, slender, and takes plenty of exercise. 



