Punch (73.1877)

98 PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARLVAEI. [September 8, 1877.

A FEW DAYS IN A COUNTBY-HOUSE.

The Dinner with the New Arrivals—The Vice-Chair—The First
Topic—Dinner Cantata—A Suggestion—Prelude—Finish of
First Movement—Notes on the Weather—Some of our Excite-
ments— The Blusher—Plunging in—An Aickward Prospect.

At dinner on this first evening with our new arrivals, the Bud-
deemees, the order of conversation is as follows:—First, the
weather, by way of prelude (as I subsequently suggest to Pogmore
the Composer, who might do worse than write a Cantata in Eight
Courses,and a Dessert, entitled Dinner,—to my mind a most expan-
sive idea), led off by Buddeemer in the vice-chair, looking as wise
as he is bald. In his gravest and most philosophic manner, after
haying settled himself on his seat and arranged his napkin to his
liking, Buddeemee, with the air of a man of science intensely
interested in the probable forthcoming solution of a problem which
has been apparently disturbing his rest for days, puts this question
to the Poet—

" What sort of weather have you been having here lately?"
In breathless suspense, and in strained silence, only broken by
the Butler handing the soup, we await Mumley's reply. We, as

it were, hang on the Poet's lips. We are all (I feel sure) trying to
recall what sort of weather it has been during the last three days at
Boodels, just as boys in a class, dreading individually lest the
question put by the master to number one should be passed on to
them, scrub up their wits to try with all their might and maia to
remember the right answer. We are all becoming mentally confused
as to whether it was or was not fine on Monday last, and are inex-
pressibly relieved when Mttmley, with greater presence of mind
than could have been expected of a Poet in such an ordinary affair,
deliberately replies—■

" Well, it has not been much to boast of."

Whereupon the strings of our tongues being loosened, we shake our
heads, the strings of our heads are at the same time loosened also,
and declare that Mumlet is right, and that the weather has not
been much to boast of. Then Buddeemee, in the vice-chair, being
a man of vast conversational resources, seizes the opportunity to tell
us what sort of weather he had (from his account you would think
that Providence had arranged the weather for his special annoyance)
when he was ia Wales this time last year ; which reminiscence gives
the cue. for Mrs. Buddeemee to observe to Boodels, "You know
Wales, of course, Mr. Boodels?" and Boodels,_whose thoughts
have been far from the subject of conversation, having been engaged