And then there was Dame Marigold's brother, Master Polydore Vigil, and his wife, Dame Dreamsweet, and old Mat Pyepowders and his preposterous, chattering dame, and the Peregrine Laquers and the Goceline Flacks and the Hyacinth Baldbreeches--in fact, all the cream of the society of Lud-in-the-Mist, and each of them labelled with his or her appropriate joke. And the old jokes went round and round, like bottles of port, and with each round the company grew more hilarious. The anonymous antiquary could have found in the culinary language of Dorimare another example to support his thesis; for the menu of the supper provided by Dame Marigold for her guests sounded like a series of tragic sonnets. The first dish was called "The Bitter-Sweet Mystery"--it was a soup of herbs on the successful blending of which the cooks of Lud-in-the-Mist based their reputation. This was followed by "The Lottery of Dreams," which consisted of such delicacies as quail, snails, chicken's liver, plovers' eggs, peacocks' hearts, concealed under a mountain of boiled rice. Then came "True-Love-in-Ashes," a special way of preparing pigeons; and last, "Death's Violets," an extremely indigestible pudding decorated with sugared violets. "And now!" cried Master Nathaniel gleefully, "here comes the turn of our old friend! Fill your glasses, and drink to the King of Moongrass Cheeses!" "To the King of Moongrass Cheeses!" echoed the guests, stamping with their feet and banging on the table. Whereupon Master Nathaniel seized a knife, and was about to plunge it into the magnificent cheese, when suddenly Ranulph rushed round to his side and, with tears in his eyes, implored him, in a shrill terrified voice, not to cut the cheese. The guests, thinking it must be some obscure joke, tittered encouragingly, and Master Nathaniel, after staring at him in amazement for a few seconds, said testily, "What's taken the boy? Hands off, Ranulph, I say! Have you gone mad?" But Ranulph's eyes were now starting out of his head in fury, and, hanging on to his father's arm, he screamed in his shrill, childish voice, "No, you won't! you won't, you won't! I won't let you!" "That's right, Ranulph!" laughed one of the guests. "You stand up to your father!" "By the Milky Way! Marigold," roared Master Nathaniel, beginning to lose his temper, "what's taken the boy, I ask?" Dame Marigold was looking nervous. "Ranulph! Ranulph!" she cried reproachfully, "go back to your place, and don't tease your father." "No! No! No!" shrieked Ranulph still more shrilly, "he shall not kill the moon ... he shall not, I say. If he does, all the flowers will wither in Fairyland."