John Hazelhurst Boneval Latrobe, the lawyer son of the architect of the US Capitol Benjamin Latrobe, saw a hail storm for the first time - a Mint Julep. His reminisces and images are in John Semmes' biography, John H. B. Latrobe and his Times, 1803-1891 (Baltimore: 1917) -
“White Sulphur is a pleasant place to live. There is something eminently aristocratic about the place, and you feel that you are with your fellows here, more than at any other place of its kind in Virginia, quite as much so as at Saratoga or Ballston [Springs in NY]…
Bell
Crowds collect around the dining room when the bell rings, and when they are opened there is a rush, like that at the booth at a contested election. Every man, woman and child rush to any seat which they may happen to find, and in a very short time the food upon the tables disappears consumed by the hungry mob.
Crowds collect around the dining room when the bell rings, and when they are opened there is a rush, like that at the booth at a contested election. Every man, woman and child rush to any seat which they may happen to find, and in a very short time the food upon the tables disappears consumed by the hungry mob.
Bribery
If you have a servant of your own, he must bribe the cook. If you have
no servant, you must bribe one of those attached to the place, or you run the
risk of getting nothing. Bribery furnishes you with the best of what is to be
gotten in the place, and avoids the rushes at meal time. Bribe high and you
live high; fail to bribe and you starve; look sharp and eat fast, you forget
good manners.
Fight - literally - a fight between waiters
The day after I arrived, two waiters quarreled over an apple pie; one
floored the other and neither got the pie, which was floored in the scuffle—and
this scene took place while the guests were seated at the table.
Order to eat
This is the motto of the dining-room of the White Sulphur. After the
guests have dined, then come the working men and laborers on the place. After
they have finished, then come the servants. Whatever a servant provides for his
master belongs to him if his master does not eat it.
And the hail storm
I saw here for the first time a hail storm so called, that is to say, a
mint julep made with a hail storm around it. The drink is manufactured pretty
much as usual and well filled with a quantity of ice chopped in small pieces,
which is then put in shape of a fillet around the outside of the tumbler where
it adheres like a ring of rock candy, and forms an external icy application to
your lower lip as you drink it, while the ice within the glass presses against
your upper lip. It is nectar, they say, in this part of the country.”
©2016 Patricia Bixler Reber
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