Crupp then said what she would recommend would be this. A pair of hot roast fowls⁠—from the pastrycook’s; a dish of stewed beef, with vegetables⁠—from the pastrycook’s; two little corner things, as a raised pie and a dish of kidneys⁠—from the pastrycook’s; a tart, and (if I liked) a shape of jelly⁠—from the pastrycook’s. This, Mrs. Crupp said, would leave her at full liberty to concentrate her mind on the potatoes, and to serve up the cheese and celery as she could wish to see it done.

I acted on Mrs. Crupp’s opinion, and gave the order at the pastrycook’s myself. Walking along the Strand, afterwards, and observing a hard mottled substance in the window of a ham and beef shop, which resembled marble, but was labelled “Mock Turtle,” I went in and bought a slab of it, which I have since seen reason to believe would have sufficed for fifteen people. This preparation, Mrs. Crupp, after some difficulty, consented to warm up; and it shrunk so much in a liquid state, that we found it what Steerforth called “rather a tight fit” for four.