WHAT PARIS EATS AND DRINKS.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 125, 30 June 1870, Page 7

WHAT PARIS EATS A ND DRINKS.

The people of Paris, although many of them are obliged to live in an exceedingly frugal manner, in the aggregate eat a great deal. They consume annually about seventy million of dollars worth of 'sea fish, five million dollars' worth of poultry and game, ten million eggs, and an incalculable quantity of vegetables and snails. Yes, snails! those &limj molluscs, which thrive in clamp gardens and vine yards, and love the mould and moss which gather on stone walls and " round dead men's graves." These may be seen in the windows of the cheaper eating-houses in Paris, where they tiro exposed as" a tempting bait, and they may also be procured at some of the first-class restaurants. The man who first dared to eat an oyster was, no doubt, a hero deserving immortality ; but what extraordinary courage he m list have had who made the first essay upon those slippery gasteropods, now so much esteemed in the cuisine of the "most refined nation of the world!" V/ho he was, or where he made the heroic "gulp," which gave a new sensation to his palate we shall probably never know, for snaileating dates from a remote period. Pliny, indeed mentions one Fulvkis Hirpinus, who cultivated the snail, as well as a taste for him, and who constructed a grand snaillery, in which he fattened his pet with boiled barley, and served them wine to drink spiced with aromatic herbs. In the time of Pliny, snails, imported from abroad, were a popular article of food in Rome ; those coming from Sicily, the Balearic Isles, and Capri being esteemed as highly as in these degenerate days are "Cnicaroas," " Blue Points," " Princess Bays," and "East Rivers." During many centuries the fattening of snails for the table has been a profitable business on the Continent, the monasteries and convents of Ulin and Fribourg, where the delicate creatures were kept in shady court-yards, and furnished with mossy stones to lounge upon, and favorite plants on which to feed, while above the walls and around them a net was spred to prevent the lively animals from too freely indulging their vagabond propensities and straying away from home. The snails consumed in France ccme mostly from the ancient provinces of Burgund, Champagne, and the Franche Compte, where they are gathered from the grape vines, of the leaves of which they are particularly fond. The original producers sell themin the Paris market for about twelve sous a hundred, and the market men retail them at from one to two francs, according to size. After boiling in the shell, which is then stopped up with a batter made of butter, eggs, herbs, and pepper the animal is drawn out and eaten, batter and all. I tried a dozen one day. Abstractly speaking, they are not bad, but upon my uncultivated taste a flavor intruded itself which seemed a cross between that of a clam and a cockroach. The people of Paris, numbering 1,700,000, consume aunually about forty-four millions of gallons of wine of all descriptions; of alcohol and alcoholic liquors, about one milion seven hundred and sixty thousand gallons;; of cider, four hundred and forty thousands gallons ; and .of beer, six million six hundred and sixty thousands gallons ; which is nearly twenty-eight gallons of wine, beer, and spirits combined, annually consumed by each man, woman, and child within the city limits. The consumption of strong liquors, has been gradually increasing for some I years past, while that of wine has met with a proportionate diminution, and drunkenness,, with its attendant evils, follows in the track. It is a great mistake to suppose that there is no intoxication in the wine-growing countries of Europe ; although my observations correspond t with those of other travellers who state that, as a rule, the abuse of liquor j is confined almost entirely to t'io citifs and larger to ~ii-~ Certain it is that Paris is by no m^ „i, exempt from tliio vice, which, howi'.cr. does not exhibit its evil effects in :'?ything like the glaring colors tlm it does in London and the American c '.'J<>.*s. As a rule, also, drunkenness is coniln^d to the lower classes of the people A soldier will drink as long as his aV'ify to pay, or the good nature of the k r - ,}iw: of the cabaret, lasts ; and one may ji'i en see the representative of the br<,varmy of France reeling through t -.c streets of Paris. The chiffonnier-, or rag-pickera, seem to consider it a jvliuousdutyto get drunk daily; raid workmen who make tie half holMays on Sunday and Monday afternoon often go drunk tp bed on both 'Jiese occasions. Still, with the ao'cih.v,'led^tncnt of t!ie existence of in-^lcicty in Paiis to a considerable extuu, ii> is aafe to say that one will not sjo as many drunken men in tlie streets in a month as he will iv a cLiy in London.

In a breach of promise case on trial recenty in New York, the plai>tlff alleged that one night at her mother's house the defendant found a dry wishbone, and proposed that they shcuM pull it. The bone broke, each holding s. piece, and the central part fell upon tl;& floor. This, the plaintiff hoki.s, was interpreted by the defendant at; a sign that tbey should marry soon. He explains by saying that he rt-marV.L -'It yearns tfcat we avo to be married at iLe sumo time; would you like it" Tlic plantiff answered, modestly, "I'". L-i 3 would!" Tins is a warning for cr-v-'. 1 bachelors to keep shy of wish I. i-*?, /.. to pull tixem without any after cu_iiHsir:r