Doctor Johnson used to say that he regarded a chair in a tavern as the throne of human felicity, and he certainly spent enough time there to know what he was talking about. I understand his view, but I would amend his dictum, and say “a chair in a restaurant”; taverns tend to be a little too robust, too noisy. Restaurants provide the perfect ambience for what Gibbon called “the cheerful flow of unguarded conversation”. Guests gathered round a restaurant table can all see and hear each other, can employ the silent eloquence of body language, exchange wordless confidentialities from…