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her friend replied. The first woman said, “Wasn’t you hungry? Why, you eat like a bird.” Then they threw their heads back and laughed. It was pleasant to watch the happy, unrestrained beefsteak-eaters. While the platters kept coming they did little talking except to urge each other to eat more.
    “Geez,” said a man. “These steaks are like peanuts. Eat one, and you can’t stop. Have another.” Presently the waiters began to tote out platters of thick lamb chops, too. (On souvenir menus, these lamb chops are called “canapé of elephant’s wrist.”)
    Then a man stepped up to the microphone and introduced a number of politicians. Each time he said “I’m about to introduce a man that is known and loved by each and every one of you,” a beaming politician would stand and bow and the constituents would bang the tables with their noisemakers. One of the politicians was Kenneth Simpson, the Republican leader of New York County. While bowing right, left, and center, he took bites out of a chop. There were no speeches. A politician would have to be extraordinarily courageous to make a speech at a beefsteak. When all the Republican statesmen of the Twentieth A.D. had been introduced, a band went into action and two singers stepped out on the dance floor and began singing numbers from
Show Boat.
By the time they got to “Ol’ Man River,” the 450 double lamb chops were gone and the waiters were bringing out the kidneys. “I’m so full I’m about to pop,” a man said. “Push those kidneys a little nearer, if you don’t mind.” Here and there a couple got up and went out on the dance floor. The lights were dimmed. Some of the couples danced the Lambeth Walk. Done by aproned, middle-aged people, ponderous with beefsteak and beer, the Lambeth Walk is a rather frightening spectacle. The waiters continued to bring out kidneys and steak to many tables. There was no dessert and no coffee. Such things are not orthodox. “Black coffee is sometimes served to straighten people out,” Mr. Wertheimer said, “but I don’t believe in it.”
    When the Republicans began dancing in earnest, the activity in the kitchen slackened, and some of the waiters gathered around the slicing table and commenced eating. While they ate, they talked shop. “You know,” said one, “a fat woman don’t eat so much. It’s those little skinny things; you wonder where they put it.” Another said, “It’s the Cat’lics who can eat. I was to a beefsteak in Brooklyn last Thursday night. All good Cat’lics. So it got to be eleven-fifty, and they stopped the clock. Cat’lics can’t eat meat on Friday.” The two weary chefs sat down together at the other side of the room from the waiters and had a breathing spell. They had not finished a glass of beer apiece, however, before a waiter hurried in and said, “My table wants some more steak,” and the chefs had to get up and put their weight on their feet again. Just before I left, at midnight, I took a last look at the ballroom. The dance floor was packed and clouds of cigar smoke floated above the paper hats of the dancers, but at nine tables people were still stowing away meat and beer. On the stairs to the balcony, five men were harmonizing. Their faces were shiny with grease. One held a pitcher of beer in his hands and occasionally he would drink from it, spilling as much as he drank. The song was, of course, “Sweet Adeline.”
             
    The West Side school of beefsteak devotees frequents the Terminal Hotel, a for-gentlemen-only establishment at Eleventh Avenue and Twenty-third Street. Its chef is Bob Ellis, an aged, truculent Negro, whose opinion of all other beefsteak chefs is low. Of them he says, “What they call a beefsteak ain’t no beefsteak; it’s just a goddam mess.” Mr. Ellis is also a talented clambake and green-turtle chef and used to make trips as far west as Chicago to supervise one meal. His most unusual accomplishment, however, is the ability to