She declared that her mind was
filled with wild ideas of (and she quotes):
_"'The Cannibals that each other eat,
The anthropophagi, and men whose heads
Do grow beneath their shoulders!'"_
She had, she confesses, a vague notion that all savages ate human
beings, and--though this obviously was intended as a touch of grisly
humour,--had half a notion to procure a human head and have it served
up in state after the mediaeval fashion of serving boars' heads in Old
England!
However, she presented him with a most up-to-date and epicurean
banquet, and had the wit and good taste to include in her dinner party
such representative men as Bishop Moore, Dr. Bard and her father's
good friend Dr. Hosack, the surgeon.
When the party was over she wrote Burr quite enthusiastically about
the Indian Chief, and declared him to have been "a most Christian and
civilised guest in his manners!"
There were no ladies at Theo's dinner party. She lived so much among
men, and so early learned to take her place as hostess and woman that
I imagine she would have had small patience with the patronage and
counsel of older members of her sex.
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