"'And besides?'
"'A little cheese.'
"'Go on.'
"'Some saffron.'
"'And then?'
"'Cloves, nutmeg, and a little thyme.'
"'Enough, enough! Take away your omelet.'"
The master of the hotel, who is an intelligent personage, now makes his appearance, and M. Dumas at last finds that, by ordering a dinner à la Française, he can get something eatable. Encouraged by this success, he ventures, when bedtime comes, to petition for a bed in which a Frenchman can sleep. This requires a little explanation, which will be best given in his own words.
"In France we are pretty much accustomed to sleep in a bed; that is to say, on a couch consisting of a frame some three and a half or four feet wide, and some six or six and a half feet long. On this frame or bedstead we place two or three mattresses and a feather bed, a pair of sheets, a counterpane, a pillow and bolster; we then tuck in the edges of these coverings, the person for whom the bed is intended slips in between the sheets, and if his health is good and his conscience clear, and he has not been drinking too much green tea or strong coffee, he goes to sleep. In a bed of this description any body can sleep, whether German, Spaniard, Italian, Hindoo, or Chinese, unless he makes up his mind not to do so. But in Germany things are very different. A German bed is composed as follows:—
"First, a bedstead two or two and a half feet wide, and five to five and a half feet long. Procrustes must decidedly have been a German. On the bedstead they place a sack of shavings, on the sack of shavings an enormous feather bed, and then a sheet, shorter and narrower than the feather bed, and which we should call a towel. Upon this sheet or towel comes a quilted coverlet of the same size, and a sort of cushion stuffed with feathers. Two or three pillows, piled up at the head of the bed, complete this singular edifice.