Their dinner
consisted of four dishes of different soups, each garnished with two
young paroquets, a large dish of bouille that weighed two hundred
weight, two roasted monkeys of a delicious flavor, three hundred
hummingbirds in one dish, and six hundred flybirds in another; some
excellent ragouts, delicate tarts, and the whole served up in dishes
of rock-crystal. Several sorts of liquors, extracted from the
sugarcane, were handed about by the servants who attended.
Most of the company were chapmen and wagoners, all extremely polite;
they asked Cacambo a few questions with the utmost discretion and
circumspection; and replied to his in a most obliging and satisfactory
manner.
As soon as dinner was over, both Candide and Cacambo thought they
should pay very handsomely for their entertainment by laying down
two of those large gold pieces which they had picked off the ground;
but the landlord and landlady burst into a fit of laughing and held
their sides for some time.
When the fit was over, the landlord said, "Gentlemen, I plainly
perceive you are strangers, and such we are not accustomed to
charge; pardon us, therefore, for laughing when you offered us the
common pebbles of our highways for payment of your reckoning. To be
sure, you have none of the coin of this kingdom; but there is no
necessity of having any money at all to dine in this house.
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