QUEER BANQUETS.

Hokitika Guardian, 2 June 1924, Page 4

QUEER BANQUETS.

(St. J. NY. in Daily Mail)

Kxperts of the restaurant world say that the 1U years’ twilight of the sensational banquet is about to lift. Vet it is hardly likely to have the vogue it did. Jioforo the war people lingered much more over their meals, (n-duv tiie strains from the ballroom

are too insidious and much too conquering to justify a very lavish setting for it banquet.

Perhaps the most remarkable banquet that was ever given in Loudon was that which .Mr George A. Kessler gave at the Savoy some years ago. It aroused more talk than any other banquet in the world.

lie decided to hold it ill a floating gondola, and to enable this to he done .he courtyard at the back of the hotel

was filled with water, after having been made water-tight. Then the gondola was limited ami the surroundings were transformed into it corner ol Venice. The courses had to he paddled aero's the ‘‘hike” to the gondola, where the dinner nits served—by waiters in Venetian costume.

The famous -‘Pod Dinner” at the same bote! was a weirdly strange experience. This was given by a man •i!in had won lieav'ly at roulette on the

iliviera: and rouge had been his for lunate colour.

Everything in the room was red: the ceiling, the door, and the tablecloth. The Winters were dressed entirely in red, even to their collars. The electric lights were red. The chief provided a menu of red, or reddish, feed, it ml the table itself represented a huge roulette table.

If the “freak” banquet comes back into its own, the reversed menu will probably bo called upon to do its share. That idea was instituted when Mr Gustave Hamel and Mr B. C. Mucks were entertained at the Boyal Automobile Club after looping the lerp, and they began their dinner with the coffee.

After this spell of comparative abeyance it is possible that the banquets of to-morrow will have a touch of real sensationalism. New \ork has already led in this respect. Lions Horn menagerie Merc introduced at one great feast held there not long ago. and they wandered round among the guests. And there are the annual banquet s of the New York Reptile Soei.tv. the members of which often take their net snakes to dine until them.