The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims' Progress • Paragraph 413
Stage 1 of 6

Read it through once

But the happiest regulation in French railway government is--thirty minutes to dinner! No five-minute boltings of flabby rolls, muddy coffee, questionable eggs, gutta-percha beef, and pies whose conception and execution are a dark and bloody mystery to all save the cook that created them! No, we sat calmly down--it was in old Dijon, which is so easy to spell and so impossible to pronounce except when you civilize it and call it Demijohn--and poured out rich Burgundian wines and munched calmly through a long table d'hote bill of fare, snail patties, delicious fruits and all, then paid the trifle it cost and stepped happily aboard the train again, without once cursing the railroad company. A rare experience and one to be treasured forever.