you, Elijah, shouting, 'Where is Glory?' Do you think she is to come here toozling about among the wittles in her best gown? She is upstairs getting her dress changed."
He was pacified.
Mrs. Sharland passed here and there, eager to be supposed useful, actually getting across Mrs. De Witt's path and interfering with her proceedings.
"I can't stand this," said the fishwife. "You go upstairs and see after Mehalah. I am going to dish up the pudding."
"I will take the gravy in the sauceboat," said Mrs. Sharland.
"Don't get your shivers on at the time, then, and send the grease over everyone," advised Mrs. De Witt.
"There now, Elijah!" exclaimed she, full of pride, when the table was spread. "Do look at them dumplings. They are round, plump, and beautiful as cherubs' heads on monuments."
"Where is Glory?" asked Rebow.
"Run up," said Mrs. De Witt to the mother, "tell the girl we are waiting for her. Bid her come at once before the gravy clots."
An Essex dinner begins with dumplings soused in gravy. When these have been demolished the flesh follows.
The guests sat, with black-handled knives and forks in hand, mouths and noses projected, and eyes riveted on the steaming puddings, ready to cut into them the moment the signal was given.
Mrs. Sharland was slow of foot. Every step was taken leisurely up the stairs and along the passage.
"I'm afeared," said Farmer Goppin, "the outer edge of the pudding, about an inch deep all round, is getting the chill."
"And there is a scum of fat forming on the gravy," said Reuben Grout, "just like cat-ice on my duck-pond, or like mardlins[1] in spring on a ditch. Had not I better set the gravy against the fire till the good lady comes down?"
"She is coming," said Rebow; and then he drummed
- ↑ "Mardlins" are duckweed.
