On the whole, I am not sure that strawberries ought to be eaten when any one is with you. There is always under such circumstances, even though your companion be the dearest friend you have on earth, a feeling of restraint, a consciousness that your attention is divided, a diffidence about betraying the unfathomable depth of your love for the fruit before you, a lurking uneasiness lest he should eat faster than yourself, or appropriate an undue share of the delicious cream; in short there is always, on such occasions, a secret desire that the best friend you have in the world were at any distant part of the globe he might happen to have a liking for. But, oh! the bliss of solitary fruition, when there is none to interrupt you--none to compete with you--none to express stupid amazement at the extent of your godlike appetite, or to bring back your thoughts, by some obtrusive remark, to the vulgar affairs of an unsubstantial world!--Behold! the milky nectar is crimsoned by the roseate fruit! Heavens! what a flavour! and there is not another human being near to intrude upon the sacred intensity of your joy! Painter--poet--philosopher--where is your beau-ideal--happiness? It is concentrated there--and, divided into equal portions by that silver spoon, glides gloriously down the throat! Eat, child of mortality! for June cometh but once in the year! eat, for there is yet misery in store for thee! eat, for thy days are numbered! eat, as if thou wert eating immortal life!--eat, eat, though thy next mouthful terminate in apoplexy! My dream of strawberries hath passed away! the little red rotundities have been gathered from the surface of the globe, and man’s insatiate maw has devoured them all! New hopes may arise, and new sources of pleasure may perhaps be discovered;--the yellow gooseberry may glitter like amber beads upon the bending branches--the ruby cherry may be plucked from the living bough, and its sunny sides bruised into nectar by the willing teeth--the apple, tinted with the vermillion bloom of maiden beauty, may woo the eye, and tempt the silver knife--the golden pear melting into lusciousness, soft as the lip, and sweet as the breath of her thou lovest most, may win, for a time, thy heart’s idolatry--the velvet peach, or downy apricot, may lull thee into brief forgetfulness of all terrestrial woe--the dark-blue plum, or sunbeam coloured _magnum bonum_, may waft thy soul to heaven--or, last of all, thy hot-house grapes, purple on their bursting richness, may carry thee back to the world’s prime, to the fawn and dryad-haunted groves of Arcady, or lap thee in an elysium of poetry and music--but still the remembrance of thy first love will be strong in thy heart, and, pamper thy noble nature as thou wilt, with all the luxuries that summer yields, never, never, will the innermost recesses of thy soul cease to be inhabited by an immortal reminiscence of “Strawberries and Cream!” [Memoirs of a Bon Vivant.] [Illustration: 052]