Restaurant Owners Uncorked Epub File
Libeniger Sa
I now passed a most agreeable six months; in factthey formed almost the only idle spell I have ever had. Iwas able to live at home with my mother and go down toHounslow Barracks two or three times a week by theUnderground Railway. We played polo at Hurlinghamand Ranelagh. The Roehampton grounds had not thencome into existence. I had now five quite good ponies,and was considered to show promise. I gave myself overto the amusements of the London Season. In those daysEnglish Society still existed in its old form. It was abrilliant and powerful body, with standards of conduct andmethods of enforcing them now altogether forgotten. Ina very large degree every one knew every one else and whothey were. The few hundred great families who hadgoverned England for so many generations and had seenher rise to the pinnacle of her glory, were interrelated toan enormous extent by marriage. Everywhere one met104friends and kinsfolk. The leading figures of Society werein many cases the leading statesmen in Parliament, and alsothe leading sportsmen on the Turf. Lord Salisbury wasaccustomed scrupulously to avoid calling a Cabinet whenthere was racing at Newmarket, and the House of Commonsmade a practice of adjourning for the Derby. In those daysthe glittering parties at Lansdowne House, DevonshireHouse or Stafford House comprised all the elements whichmade a gay and splendid social circle in close relation tothe business of Parliament, the hierarchies of the Army andNavy, and the policy of the State. Now Lansdowne Houseand Devonshire House have been turned into hotels, flatsand restaurants; and Stafford House has become theugliest and stupidest museum in the world, in whosefaded saloons Socialist Governments drearily dispense thepublic hospitality.