Gatti's in those days [late 1880s, ed.] was very different from what it is now. It had an Italian air, but it also had the air of an eating-house. Where now there are chairs were then plush banquettes. There has been the same change at the Monico. At Gatti's, the Brothers Gatti, in spite of all their success and wealth, seemed always to be at the receipt of custom: they occupied seats in the central hall. But that central hall - which, by the way, had tables and chairs instead of plush banquettes - was no place for my sixteen-year-old purse. We, my friends and I, went always to the Adelaide Street end, where a waiter with a broken nose had already learned that I liked a particular kind of roll. A plate of beef and potatoes and bread and butter an a tip of twopence!

Grant Richards, Memories of a Misspent Youth, 1932

see also Lieut.-Col. Newnhan-Davis' Dinners and Diners, 1899 - click here