As for the dishes themselves--here St. George with Jemima's help was pastmaster: dishes sizzling hot; dishes warm, and dishes stone cold. And their several arrivals and departures, accompanied by their several staffs: the soup as an advance guard--of gumbo or clams--or both if you chose; then a sheepshead caught off Cobb's Island the day before, just arrived by the day boat, with potatoes that would melt in your mouth--in gray jackets these; then soft-shell crabs--big, crisp fellows, with fixed bayonets of legs, and orderlies of cucumber--the first served on a huge silver platter with the coat-of-arms of the Temples cut in the centre of the rim and the last on an old English cut-glass dish. Then the woodcock and green peas--and green corn--their teeth in a broad grin; then an olio of pineapple, and a wonderful Cheshire cheese, just arrived in a late invoice--and marvellous crackers--and coffee--and fruit (cantaloupes and peaches that would make your mouth water), then nuts, and last a few crusts of dry bread! And here everything came to a halt and all the troops were sent back to the barracks--(Aunt Jemima will do for the barracks). With this there was to follow a change of base--a most important change. Everything eatable and drinkable and all the glasses and dishes were to be lifted from the table--one half at a time--the cloth rolled back and whisked away and the polished mahogany laid bare; the silver coasters posted in advantageous positions, and in was to rattle the light artillery:--Black Warrior of 1810--Port of 1815--a Royal Brown Sherry that nobody knew anything about, and had no desire to, so fragrant was it. Last of all the notched finger-bowls in which to cool the delicate, pipe-stem glasses; and then, and only then, did the real dinner begin. All this Todd had done dozens and dozens of times before, and all this (with Malachi's assistance--Richard Horn consenting--for there was nothing too good for the great poet) would Todd do again on this eventful night.