The history of the present success of the Princes' Restaurant is the story of the triumph of the short dinner over the long one. As a lunching place Princes' was a great success from the day its doors first opened. The ladies of Mayfair and Belgravia and Tyburnia found that it was comfortably near their shopping centres, and the little ladies of the stage also liked to lunch there. The musical comedy ladies monopolised the first half-dozen tables to the right as one entered, leaving the rest of the tables to the other ladies, and Stage looked at Society's hats, and Society looked at Stage's furs, and no doubt each envied what the other wore. But for quite a while--it seemed a long while to the shareholders--Princes' did not find its destiny as a dining place. M. Benoist wished it to be a great _à la carte_ restaurant such as he has made the restaurant of the Hermitage at Monte Carlo, but for some unexplainable reason diners did not flock to Princes' to eat expensive dinners, nor did a long _table d'hôte_ dinner tempt them. At last it was determined that new methods should be tried and new men came on to the Board of Directors to try them, that very energetic and very successful organiser, Mr Harry Preston, of Brighton, being one of them. A short theatre dinner became the trump card of the restaurant in the evening, the Princes' ballrooms became the scene of most of the dances organised in theatreland, and when the company began to earn an annual dividend for its shareholders the advantages of brief dinners became very apparent to them. This was the dinner of the day that I took a lady to eat at seven o'clock on an evening on which Sir George Alexander produced a new play at the St James's:-- Hors d'œuvre à la Russe. Petite Marmite Henri IV. Crème Lamballe. Suprême de Saumon Doria. Agneau de Pauillac à la Grecque. Boutons de Crucifères aux Fines Herbes. Chapons à la Broche. Salade. Biscuit Glacé au Chocolat Praliné. Friandises.