Page:Face to Face With the Mexicans.djvu/71

 The first meal cooked in that dainty little fire-place was more delicious than any that could be furnished at Delmonico's. In his quaint efforts to assist, Pancho perambulated around with an air as all-important as though he were chef of that famous café. But the climax of all was reached in Pancho's estimation when I put a pure white linen cloth on my green, historic table and arranged for the meal. He said over and over: "Muy bonita cena!" ("Very pretty supper"). But I discovered it was the attractions of my silver knives and forks



and other natty table ware from home that constituted the novelty. In his experience fingers were made before knives and forks.

I found my major domo knew everything and everybody; the name of every street, the price of every article to be bought or sold. My curiosity, I presume, only stimulated his imagination, and the more pleased I appeared at his recitals the more marvelous were his tales.

He gave the lineage of every family of the "jente decente," for generations, his unique style adding pith and point to his narrations. He told me the story of Hidalgo and Morelos and Iturbide; the coming of the Americans, the French intervention, and all the late revolutions, until my head rang with the boom of cannon and the beat