[A Dickens Fellowship dinner in wartime London.] Autograph Signatures of James Agate, Walter Dexter, Humphrey House and Lewis B. Frewer to menu for dinner celebrating the ‘130th Anniversary of the Birthday of Charles Dickens’.

It seems extraordinary that they were able to pull this off during wartime restrictions, and Dickens would have relished the shabby-genteelness of it. The menu is shakily printed in a faded blue on a 10 x 16.5 cm piece of cream card, with rounded edges. At foot: ‘Holborn Restaurant 7th February 1942’. The menu is headed: ‘THE DICKENS FELLOWSHIP / 130th Anniversary of the / Birthday of Charles Dickens / Chairman: WALTER DEXTER, Vice-President / Speakers: HUMPHREY HOUSE, JAMES AGATE’. The description of the fare follows in silk-purse style: ‘Hors-d’Œuvre / - / Potage Garbure / Poisson poché Boistelle / Choux de Bruxelles / Pommes Vapeur / - / Bombe glacée Fraisette / Gaufrettes / - / Café’. The four signatures are as follows. At top right: ‘Louis B. Frewer’. In right-hand margin: ‘Humphrey House.’ And in left hand margin: ‘James Agate.’ and ‘Walter Dexter’. See image.