The Argosy — page 221: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

204 Letters from Majorca. off. Apparently it was not meant to do so, and I wondered, like George III. with the dumplings, how the water ever got inside. [I suppose they have false bottoms to them. About an hour later, H. C. makes his appearance, and shortly after, Francisco comes in with our first breakfast: a truly conventual meal consisting of coffee and rolls, without butter. Butter in Majorca seems to be unknown—at least of its own manufacture. The first morning they brought us something which looked like the real thing, and we took it in faith. We have not yet recovered from the fright. We thought they had brought us poison, and hurriedly set about making our wills. If the option were now given me of taking that or the fatal bowl, I would choose the latter, especially if administered at the hands of a fair Rosamund. Sze, I am aware, was the victim in days gone by, but I would permit her now to have her revenge. ‘This butter that they eat, is brought over from Spain. ‘To describe it as rancid is not to give you the faintest idea of its horrors. We fell back upon dry bread, to which I am still devoted ; but H{. C. has purchased unto himself sundry pots of jam, which, like Mr. Gladstone, he seems to think ‘‘an excellent substitute for butter.” He is fast creating a dearth in Palma of this luxurious article of food. But do not imagine that it is hike our English jams. It is a sort of jelly, soft and sickly, like French confiture, reminding one of nothing so much as the days of gray powders and childish convalescences. Like the late Lord Derby, who preferred the gout to a certain pre- scribed wine—lI prefer my bread dry. They also bring us—it is a universal custom in Majorca—each a small round cake, or bun, of pastry, very pleasant and agreeable. It is made with olive oil, and is so light that you might almost blow it away. We are not wise or we should leave it to the last, but we invariably begin upon it first. I would restrain my ardour, but H. C. is impatient, and I know that if mine were in existence when his has departed this life, I should stand small chance of my share of the good things of a Mallorcan breakfast. ‘The weak, you know, always go to the wall. The first morning we both declined this delicacy ; but have since ‘‘ acquired” the taste which generally comes with perseverance. Le goitit, comme l’appétit, vient en mangeant. The first two mornings we thought to spare the waiter trouble, and went down to this first breakfast ; but the room was each time in possession of two or three Spaniards outsmoking each other with a tobacco which was not to our fastidious liking. It was too much for our sensitive nerves. We gave up philanthropy and the breakfast- room, and are much more at ease in our little sitting-room. It is humbly furnished, but it is all our own. A few wooden chairs, a deal table covered with oil-cloth, a chest of drawers in one corner, yacuum in the other three corners—these are our household goods in Palma de Mallorca, and we are more than content. CONNIELOOKS.EO) m