Fortunately, however, the dessert is ready upon a neighboring table.
Adam, whose appetite and animal instincts are quicker than those of
Eve, discovers this fitting banquet.

"Here, dearest Eve," he exclaims,--"here is food."

"Well," answered she, with the germ of a housewife stirring within
her, "we have been so busy to-day, that a picked-up dinner must
serve."

So Eve comes to the table and receives a red-cheeked apple from her
husband's hand in requital of her predecessor's fatal gift to our
common grandfather. She eats it without sin, and, let us hope, with
no disastrous consequences to her future progeny. They make a
plentiful, yet temperate, meal of fruit, which, though not gathered
in paradise, is legitimately derived from the seeds that were
planted there. Their primal appetite is satisfied.

"What shall we drink, Eve?" inquires Adam.

Eve peeps among some bottles and decanters, which, as they contain
fluids, she naturally conceives must be proper to quench thirst.
But never before did claret, hock, and madeira, of rich and rare
perfume, excite such disgust as now.

"Pah!" she exclaims, after smelling at various wines. "What stuff
is here? The beings who have gone before us could not have
possessed the same nature that we do; for neither their hunger nor
thirst were like our own."