I append herewith a few items selected at random from the price card of a fashionable establishment in one of the larger Coast cities: caviar imperial d'Astracan, two dollars for a double portion; buffet Russe--whatever that is--ninety cents; German asparagus, a single helping, one dollar and forty cents; blue-point oysters, fifty cents; fifty cents for clams; Gorgonzola cheese, fifty cents a portion; and, in a land where peaches and figs grow anywhere and everywhere, seventy-five cents for an order of brandied peaches and fifty cents for an order of spiced figs. Even seasoned New Yorkers have been known to breathe hard on receiving a check for a full meal at certain restaurants in Los Angeles and San Francisco. On the other hand, you can step round any corner in San Francisco and walk into that institution which people in other large cities are forever seeking and never finding--a table-d'hote restaurant where a perfect meal is to be had at a most moderate price. The best Italian restaurant in the world--and I wish to say, after personal experience, that Sunny Italy itself is not barred--is a little place on the fringe of the Barbary Coast. There is another place not far away where, for a dollar, you get a bottle of good domestic wine and a selection from the following range of dishes: Celery, ripe olives, green olives, radishes, onions, lettuce, sliced tomatoes, combination salad or crab-meat salad; soup--onion or consomme; fish--sole, salmon, bass, sand dabs, mussels or clams; entrees--sweetbreads with mushrooms, curry of lamb, calf's tongue, tripe with peppers, tagliatini a l'Italienne, or boiled kidney with bacon; vegetables--asparagus, string-beans and cauliflower; roast--spring lamb with green peas, broiled chicken or broiled pig's feet; dessert--rhubarb pie, ice cream and cake, apple sauce, stewed fruits, baked pear or baked apple, mixed fruits; cheese of three varieties, and coffee to wind up on. The proprietor doesn't cut out his portions with a pair of buttonhole scissors, either, or sauce them with a medicine-dropperful of gravy. He gives a big, full, satisfying helping, well cooked and well served. There is some romance in the San Francisco cooking, too, if the oldtimers who bemourn the old days only realized it.