I am the only survivor of those delightful feasts.

Dinner and luncheon and supper must, I suppose, be reckoned among the
permanent facts of life; but there is, or was, one meal of which I have
witnessed the unwept disappearance. It had its roots in our historic
past. It clung to its place in our social economy. It lived long and
died hard. It was the Breakfast-Party. When I first lived in London, it
was, like some types of human character, vigorous but unpopular. No one
could really like going out to breakfast; but the people who gave
Breakfast-Parties were worthy and often agreeable people; and there were
few who had the hardihood to say them Nay.

The most famous breakfast-parties of the time were given by Mr.
Gladstone, on every Thursday morning in the Session; when, while we ate
broiled salmon and drank coffee, our host discoursed to an admiring
circle about the colour-sense in Homer, or the polity of the ancient
Hittites. Around the table were gathered Lions and Lionesses of various
breeds and sizes, who, if I remember aright, did not get quite as much
opportunity for roaring as they would have liked; for, when Mr.
Gladstone had started on a congenial theme, it was difficult to get in a
word edgeways. One of these breakfast-parties at 10, Downing Street,
stands out in memory more clearly than the rest, for it very nearly had
a part in that "Making of History" which was then so much in vogue. The
date was April 23, 1885. The party comprised Lady Ripon, Lord Granville,
Dean Church, and Miss Mary Anderson, then in the height of her fame and
beauty. We were stolidly munching and listening, when suddenly we heard
a crash as if heaven and earth had come together; and presently we
learned that there had been an explosion of dynamite at the Admiralty,
about a hundred yards from where we were sitting. The proximity of
nitro-glycerine seemed to operate as a check on conversation, and, as we
rose from the table, I heard Miss Anderson say to Miss Gladstone, "Your
pa seemed quite scared."

Other breakfast-givers of the time were Lord Houghton, Lord Arthur
Russell, Mr. Shaw-Lefevre (afterwards Lord Eversley), and Sir John
Lubbock (afterwards Lord Avebury); and there were even people so
desperately wedded to this terrible tradition that they formed
themselves into Clubs with no other object than to breakfast, and bound
themselves by solemn pledges to meet one morning in every week, and eat
and argue themselves into dyspepsia.