Fasting Food

Not many people today know why Mr Pickwick set out on the 22nd December with a huge cod insinuated into the fore-boot of the Muggleton Telegraph en route for Dingley Dell. The cod was successfully disinterred on arrival at the Blue Lion in the presence of the fat boy, who, handing the reins to Sam Weller, promptly went to sleep beside it, his head pillowed on a barrel of oysters, once these vital supplies had been transferred to Mr Wardle’s chaise. This giant cod, mysteriously never mentioned again, we must presume was destined to be the central element in the dinner on Christmas Eve, traditionally a night of fasting.