I ordered coffee and rolls as a
groundwork. I got over that part of my task very easily. With the
practice I had had during the last two days, I could have ordered
coffee and rolls for forty. Then I foraged round for luxuries, and
ordered a green salad. I had some difficulty at first in convincing
the man that it was not a boiled cabbage that I wanted, but
succeeded eventually in getting that silly notion out of his head.
I still had a little German left, even after that. So I ordered an
omelette also.
"Tell him a savoury one," said B., "or he will be bringing us
something full of hot jam and chocolate-creams. You know their
style."
"Oh, yes," I answered. "Of course. Yes. Let me see. What is the
German for savoury?"
"Savoury?" mused B. "Oh! ah! hum! Bothered if I know! Confound
the thing - I can't think of it!"
I could not think of it either. As a matter of fact, I never knew
it. We tried the man with French. We said:
"Une omelette aux fines herbes."
As he did not appear to understand that, we gave it him in bad
English. We twisted and turned the unfortunate word "savoury" into
sounds so quaint, so sad, so unearthly, that you would have thought
they might have touched the heart of a savage. This stoical Teuton,
however, remained unmoved.
