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Updated: June 16, 2025
"There was more than fifty people waiting outside the iron fence that surrounded the house and grounds. There was generals and agitators and epergnes in gold-laced uniforms, and citizens in diamonds and Panama hats all waiting to get an audience with the Royal Five-Card Draw.
But Miss Amelia, fluttery and undecided as a bird, was far too timid to do herself justice; and Zara spent so long arranging the flowers in the central epergnes that before she had finished with one of them it was lunch time. "I could have done it myself while she was cutting the stalks," Mary told her husband.
He entered eagerly into the canvass of the distinctions and celebrities asked to meet him at the reception made for him, but he had even a greater pleasure in compassionating his host for the vast disparity between the caterer's china and plated ware and the simplicities and humilities of the home of virtuous poverty; and he spluttered with delight at the sight of the lofty 'epergnes' set up and down the supper-table when he was brought in to note the preparations made in his honor.
The decanters are all full of wines glowing with every colour!... And the silver plate, the chased epergnes, the flowers, the lustres!... Never will such another midnight repast be seen. The noble marquis has invited all the lords of the neighbourhood.
For fruit, silver-gilt baskets, or epergnes of glass are especially pretty. The fruit may later constitute a part of the dessert, or may be merely ornamental in its office. Carafes containing iced water are placed here and there on the table, at convenient points. The next step is the laying of the covers; a cover signifying the place prepared for one person.
His neighbor on one side was a little elderly lady, an unmarried aunt of Franziska's; on the other side was the charming young niece who soon commended herself to him by her wit and gaiety. Frau Constanze sat between the host and her friendly guide, the Lieutenant. The lower end of the table was empty. In the centre stood two large epergnes, heaped with fruits and flowers.
The dinner was cooked and served in European style; the table decorated with gold and silver épergnes full of flowers, on velvet stands, and with heaps of small cut-flower glasses full of jasmine. We were waited on by the Malay servants of the establishment, dressed in grey and yellow, and by the Governor's Madras servants, in white and scarlet.
There must have been about one hundred persons seated at the table. I never saw such a tremendous long stretch of white linen. The flowers, stiffly arranged at intervals, alternated with white epergnes filled with bonbons, and larger fruit-dishes filled with the most delicious-looking fruit.
There were fifty covers laid; in the middle and at either end were shallow baskets, full of flowers; between these towered tall epergnes, filled to overflowing with crackers in gilded and colored paper.
There were thirty-four plates on the long table, in the centre of which was a plateau mirror, on which were roses and lilies of the valley. On either side of it were tall gilt candelabra bearing eleven wax lights each, and beyond these large gilt epergnes overflowing with Marechal Niel roses.
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