And then we were invited to step into the house. Through a hallway we went, and into a large room. The room was hung with woven materials in brilliant colors; some of the designs reminded us of Indian blanketry. The floor was covered with a kind of matting, rather like Mexican petate. It was the vision of the table that nearly killed us. It was about fourteen feet long, and it was loaded with food, and there were about twenty guests. I think it is the only meal or dinner we ever attended where fried chicken was an hors d’oeuvre, and where each hors d’oeuvre was half a chicken. It went from there to a cold boiled chicken over which was poured a cold green sauce, delicious with spices and sour cream. And then there were cheese sticks and tomato salads and Georgian pickles. And then there was a savory stew of lamb, with a thick sauce. And then there was a kind of fried country cheese. There were loaves of flat Georgian rye bread piled up like poker chips, and the center of the table was loaded with fruit, with grapes, and pears, and apples. And the frightful thing about it was that everything was delicious. The flavors were all new, and we wanted to taste all of them. And we were nearly dying of overeating. Capa, who prides himself on a thirty-two-inch waist, and who will not let out his belt, no matter what happens, was getting a puffed look under the chin, and his eyes were slightly popped and bloodshot. And I felt that if I could just go two or three days without eating anything, I might return to normal.

I remembered and finally understood a story that had been told me by an Englishman. He was sent to America during the war on some kind of purchasing job, and he had headed toward the Middle West. And every place he went he was stuffed. He ate three and four dinners a day. His luncheons sank him, and between meals people slipped things into his mouth. They were sorry for him because there was so little food in England. They wanted to feed him up so that he could last a while just on his accumulated fat. At the end of three days he was ill, but he had to keep going. At the end of a week he was in desperate condition. His stomach, which was used to the austere food of England, was in complete revolt, and as he got sick the people got sorrier and sorrier for his hunger, and fed him more and more. At first, being an honest man, he tried to explain that so much food was killing him, but that was just disbelieved. And then he lied a little bit, and said he didn’t feel right about eating so much food when his people at home did not have such good things. And they laughed at him for that, and he had to go on eating. He said that at his approach to a farm the massacre of chickens was pitiful, and that he himself had found feathers on his razor when he shaved in the morning. At the end of a two weeks’ visit, he collapsed and was taken to a hospital where they pumped him out. And the doctor warned him that in his condition, even though he felt terribly hungry, he shouldn’t eat too much. And he laughed crazily, and turned over, and buried his head in the pillow. At the time I had thought this story was an overstatement, but more and more I was beginning to believe that it was an exact story.