Page:Through a Glass Lightly (1897, Greg).djvu/129

 by an appeal to him for potatoes, not from a craving for those starchy globules, but from an irresistible longing to whisper into his ear, and demonstrate the all-too-patent vacuity beside us. These men deserve and receive no compensatory vail. They stand, impotent expectants as they are, at the door on the day of parting; they have unpacked no portmanteau nor laid out any shirts; they have let one go night after night suffering the aching void; yet they expect the final reward of wrong-doing in the shape of a hard-earned sovereign! Not these the men for our money: rather those who appreciate the varied tastes and discrimination of their master’s guests and “serve to palate,” as the recipe books say. Not those who fluster you at dinner with a “champagne-sherry-or-red-’ock,”