I think, having myself none of the _gourmet's_ gifts, that the possession of them must cause continual and poignant unhappiness. It is like the endowment of the critical faculty at its highest. Nothing pleases wholly. When the critic of the menu dines out, alas, what false notes, what discords, what bad time, what feeble rendering, what platitude of conception, he must endure! Let us not envy his gifts, let us rather continue to enjoy, unheeding, dinners which would be only a prolonged torture to the sensitive soul of the perfect critic. The doctor made his selections carefully from his patients and friends. He knew all the amusing people about town, especially those benefactors to their kind who consent to play and sing for after-dinner amusement; he knew all the actors, especially those who do not take themselves too seriously; he knew the men who can tell stories, sing songs, and are always in good temper. He loved them as King William loved the red deer; he esteemed them higher than princes; more excellent company than poets; more clubable than painters. Among his friends of the profession was Mr. Richard Woodroffe, whom the doctor esteemed even above his fellows for his unvarying cheerfulness and his great gifts and graces in music and in song. Him he invited to dinner on a certain evening, partly on account of these gifts and partly for another reason--the other guests were the Haverils, who would be useless in conversation; Miss Molly Pennefather, their cousin, who would not probably prove a leader in talk; Sir Humphrey Woodroffe, whom he invited for reasons which you know--and others, yet conscious beforehand that the young man would be out of his element and perhaps sulky; and two _umbræ_, persons of no account--mere patients--to make up the number of eight, the only number, unless it is four, which is permissible for a dinner-party. For the menu there was only one person to be considered; Dick, for instance, would eat tough steak with as much willingness as a Chateaubriand; Mr. Haveril knew not one dish from another; Humphrey, whom he had met at his mother's table, would be the only guest capable of understanding a dinner. Moreover, Humphrey would have to be conciliated by the dinner itself, to make up for the company. The doctor therefore prepared a dinner of a few _plats_ harmonized with the desire of pleasing a young man who was most easily approached, he had already discovered, by means of any one, or any group, of the senses. Dinner, as every artistic soul knows, appeals to a group of the senses, which is the reason why civilized man decorates his tables. Those unhappy persons to whom dinner is but feeding might as well serve up a single dish on one wine-case and sit down to it on another.