de l'Europe, to which we had been directed, in every respect deserving of its high reputation, and inferior, perhaps, to no country inn on the continent. After reconnoitring Mont Blanc again from the windows of the clean and airy bed-rooms to which we had been shown, we dined at the table d'hôte, which was served within a quarter of an hour after the arrival of the coche. Among the more polished company present, I was not a little diverted by some scattered specimens of the French gentleman-farmer, present for the express purpose of wallowing for once in a dinner drest by the Duc d'Angouleme's ci-devant cook; fat and well-clad; their countenances wearing a sort of awkward purse-proud defiance to the cool sarcastic look with which the Parisian travellers eyed them; and their conscious shame struggling with the desire to appropriate all the good things before them. Numps, in the well-known old tale, was but a type of these honest personages, who seemed to be considered as "de trop" by the majority. In spite of the mixtures (I do not mean those made in the stomach) which must necessarily take place on these occasions, and allowing for the English prejudice in favour of privacy, there are advantages in dining at all French table d'hôtes, frequented by tolerable company. To the epicure it ensures better fare and attendance than he can command by any other means, as the landlord and his attendants feel both their credit and interest concerned in displaying the most alacrity, and producing the greatest variety of dishes before a large party; while chance customers, after waiting for a long hungry interval, may have to encounter tired waiters, and partake of the tossed-up leavings of this very table d'hôte;
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