Catholic Church, especially the upper classes thereof, in long bygone
times, did not always submit patiently to the stricter ethics of
fasting. Kings and princes used to send medical and theological
certificates to the Pope, begging humbly to be allowed to eat meat. The
Holy Father was even begged to adjudicate on individual dishes. Pope
Zacharias forbade roast hare. Under Pope John XXII the Franciscans were
much vexed as to whether they really owned the soup that they ate, or
whether they only had the bare _usufruct_ thereof. As only three or
four of them were burned as martyrs, and no thrones were overset nor
provinces ravaged, Voltaire termed these debates about niceties of diet
_des sottises paisibles_.
In the reign of Henry VIII the minutes of the Lenten dinner included
such fish as: a whole ling, great jowls of salt salmon, great salt
eels, great jowls of salt sturgeon, fresh ling, fresh turbot, great
pike, great jowls of fresh salmon, great rudds, baked turbots, salmon
chines, roasted lampreys and roasted lamprons, great burbutts,
and--when the fishing season was favourable--porpoise, sea-wolf,
grampus, and whale.
A fairly compendious epitome of fish-food, but information is lacking
as to the modes of preparation.
The most sensible remark on the fasting question was probably made by
Erasmus, who said, when he was asked why he did not fast: “My mind is
Catholic, but my stomach is Lutheran.” But then Erasmus was a very
broad-minded sort of person. It is only necessary to read the finest
novel in the English language, Charles Reade’s “Cloister and the
Hearth,” to realize that fact.
For the dozenth time I was rereading “Eothen” the other day, and
came upon a curious passage. Speaking of Smyrna, Kinglake says: “The
number of murders committed during Lent is greater, I am told, than
at any other time of the year. A man under the influence of a bean
dietary (for this is the principal food of the Greeks during their
fasts) will be in an apt humour for enriching the shrine of his saint,
and passing a knife through his next-door neighbour.” _Que Messieurs
les végéteriens commencent!_ What do they say to this? Do they feel
especially bloodthirsty during Lent, or--being all-the-year-round
vegetarians--do they lust after gore with any peculiar avidity?
It is curious to note that our favourite Lenten fare, salted cod and
egg-sauce, to wit, is, strictly speaking, quite wrong. Eggs are not
permissible food, and the orthodox eschew them altogether during their
_jejunium_.
In Spain, during the crusades and the war with the Moors, a
practice arose of permitting, in certain cases, the substitution
of a contribution to the holy war for the observance of the Lenten
abstinence, and although the object has long since ceased, the
composition is still permitted under the same title of _Cruzada_.
In the seventh century a Council sitting at Toledo declared those
who ate meat during Lent to be sinners unworthy to take part in the
Resurrection. From that time until the eleventh century, when a gradual
reaction set in, the laws of fasting and the punishments inflicted
upon the transgressors became more and more strict; interdict and
excommunication were among the penalties.
By degrees these became so numerous and different in kind that they
were divided into
_Jejunium generale_--a fast binding for all.
_Consuetudinarium_--local fast.
_Penitentiale_--atonement for all transgressions.
_Votivum_--consequent upon a vow.
_Voluntare_--for the better carrying out of an undertaking.
These again were kept as
_Jejunium naturale_--an entire abstinence from food or drink.
_Abstinentia_--certain food only, but several times a day.
_Jejunium cum abstinentia_--the same food, but only once a day.
_Jejunium sine abstinentia_--all kinds of food, but only once a day.
The prohibited food on partial fast days included, during certain
periods, not only the flesh of quadrupeds, fowl, and fish, but also the
_lacticinia_, which means all that comes from quadrupeds and birds,
such as eggs, milk, butter, and the like.
There are many allusions in old plays to those folk who do not fast
through Lent. For instance, in Skelton’s “Colin Clout” (1500) is the
following passage:--
Men call you thereforr prophanes,
Ye pieke no shrimps nor pranes;
Salt fish, stockfish, nor herring,
It is not for your wearing.
Nor in holy Lenten season,
Ye will neither Beanes nor Peasen,
But ye look to be let loose,
To a pigge or to a goose.
There is comparatively little strictness now as to Lenten food, but it
is always an excuse for excellent _maigre_ dining, and the cook who
cannot prepare a thoroughly good appetising and satisfying _maigre_
menu is unworthy of his calling.
One Good Friday I was dining at a very excellent French provincial
hotel, the Hôtel du Chapeau-Rouge at Dunkirk, and the following most
cleverly fashioned menu confronted me at dinner:--
MENU
Huîtres.
Potage Longchamps.
Bouchées Dunkerquoises.
Barbue, Sauce d’Isigny.
Pommes Nouvelles.
Petit Pois à la Française.
Salade Primeur.
Saumon à la Russe.
Ecrevisses de la Meuse.
Gâteau Pitheviers.
Fruits.
Here is another Lenten dinner, quite different in conception, but
equally good in execution. It is a very artistic little production.
MENU
Caviar d’Astrackan.
Bisque d’Ecrevisses.
Truite braisée au Clicquot.
Sarcelle Rôtie.
Salade.
Petits Pois nouveaux à la Française.
Coupe Petit Duc.
Corbeille de Friandises.
Dessert.
A few years ago a noted French gourmet was taunted with the alleged
fact that it was quite impossible to order a really expensive _maigre_
dinner; he retorted, as any sane gourmet naturally would, that it was
the easiest thing in the world. He was given _carte blanche_, and the
following was the result:--
Caviar frais.
Huîtres (Natives).
Œufs Grand-Duc.
Bouchées Joinville.
Truite saumonée au Chambertin.
Sarcelles rôties.
Salade Espérance.
Aspic de homard en Bellevue.
Asperges sauce Mousseline.
Soufflé au kirsch.
Corbeilles de fruits.
Café.
VINS.
Eau-de-vie russe.
Chablis, 1890.
Johannisberg, 1886.
Château-Léoville Poyferré, 1878.
Romanée-Conti, 1865.
Champagne frappé Baïkal (extra-dry), ’84.
Château-Yquem, 1869.
Grande fine-champagne Napoléon, 1800.
The dinner for four was exquisite, and the wines extraordinary. The
total cost was just over twenty-five pounds.
In that delightful book, “Mrs. Brookfield and Her Circle,” by Charles
and Frances Brookfield, there is this postscript to a letter written
by the husband to his wife: “On the carte of the Carlton Club the day
before yesterday (the General Fast) was to be seen these words: ‘The
Committee, taking into consideration that the observance of a General
Fast has been ordained, have directed that the coffee-room dinner shall
be confined strictly to--Two Soups. Fish. Plain Joints. Spring Tarts.
Omelettes. Cheese.’”
Another story from the same book, which although it has nothing
whatever to do with Lent, has, perhaps, with food and feeding, runs as
follows: “The new bishop of New Zealand, in a farewell and pathetic
interview with his mother, after his appointment, was thus addressed by
her in such sequence as sobs and tears would permit: ‘I suppose they
will eat you, my dear--I try to think otherwise, but I suppose they
will. Well!--We must leave it in the hands of Providence. But if they
do--mind, my dear, and disagree with them.’”
That some at least of the less abstinent monks made very hearty meals
and were quite valiant trenchermen, whether it were fast day or no,
is a matter of history. At a splendid dinner given by the Legate of
Avignon to the Prior of Chartreux, a superb fish, cooked to perfection
and likely to have tempted the Pope himself had he been present, was
handed to the Prior. He helped himself and was on the eve of eating,
when one of the brothers said to him: “My father, do not touch that, it
is not _maigre_. I went into the kitchen, and I saw things that would
make you shudder; the sauce that you fancy is made from carrots and
onions is made from ham and rabbits.” “My brother, you talk too much
and are too curious,” replied the father; “the kitchen is not your
place, and curiosity is a grievous sin.”
Beckford of “Vathek” fame gives a glowing account of the monastery of
Alcobaça, and particularly of the kitchen thereof: “Through the centre
of the immense and groined hall, not less than sixty feet in diameter,
ran a brisk rivulet of the clearest water, flowing through pierced
wooden reservoirs, containing every sort and size of the finest river
fish. On one side loads of game and venison were heaped up; on the
other vegetables and fruit in endless variety. Beyond a long line of
stores, extended a row of ovens, and close to them hillocks of wheaten
flour, whiter than snow, rocks of sugar, jars of the purest oil, and
pastry in vast abundance, which a numerous tribe of lay-brothers
and their attendants were rolling out and puffing up into a hundred
different shapes, singing all the while as blithely as larks in a
cornfield.” After describing the elaborate composition of the daily
banquet of the monks, the author describes “a certain truffle cream
which was so exquisite that the Lord Abbot piously gave thanks for it.”
A famous London character in the time of “Frazer’s Magazine” was
Serjeant Murphy, M.P. for Cork. An acquaintance of Murphy’s was
constantly addicted to boasting of his aristocratic friends. At a
dinner-party where there were several Roman Catholics present,
conversation centred round the subject of fasting, when the serjeant’s
friend struck in: “It is very strange how little the highest ranks
regard fast days. I was dining at the Duke of Norfolk’s on a fast
day three weeks ago, and there was not a bit of fish at dinner.” “I
suppose,” said Murphy, in the midst of the deep silence that followed,
“that they had eaten it all in the dining-room.”
Chaucer writes of a man who
Full many a patrich had he in mewe,
And many a breme and many a luce in stew.
The stew was, of course, the monkish fish-pond, which has almost
disappeared since the Reformation. The luce is the jack or pike of the
fishermen, and is often found as a pun upon the family name of Lucy,
which bears the pike as a charge. Richard de Lucie, who defended the
castle of Falaise against Geoffry of Anjou, was Lord Diss in Norfolk;
he was also Sheriff of Essex in the reign of Henry II, and built the
castle of Ongar. Sir Richard Lucy, Lord Chief Justice of England,
founded Lesnes Priory, near Erith, and dying in 1179, was buried within
its walls. An antiquary named Weever, who had seen his tomb in 1630,
states that upon the belt of the figure of the knight the fleur-de-lis,
or fleur-de-luce, the rebus or name device of the Lucys, was sculptured
in many places. The fleur-de-lis was here used in a doubly figurative
sense for a pike or spear, to the head of which it bears some
resemblance.
This is more particularly shown in the Cantelupe arms, gules, a fess
vaire between three leopards’ heads jessant fleur-de-lis. The arms of
Lucy are also among the quarterings borne by the family of Lowther, the
head of which is, of course, Lord Lonsdale.
Certain fish, evidently intended for pike or luces, in the pavement
of the Chapter House at Westminster may possibly allude to the early
tradition that St. Peter’s Church was first built by King Lucius.
The ged and the pike are synonymous in North Britain, whence the Scots
family of Ged bear for arms, azure, three geds, or pike, hauriant
argent; Sir Walter Scott alludes to this play upon the name in Red
Gauntlet. “The heralds,” he says, “who make graven images of fish,
fowls, and beasts, assigned the ged for their device and escutcheon,
and hewed it over their chimneys, and placed above their tombs the fish
called a jack, pike, or luce, and in our tongue, a ged.”
Of this family was William Ged, an Edinburgh printer, who employed
a stereotyping process as early as 1725. The Geddes, a very ancient
family of Tweeddale, bear for arms, gules, an escutcheon between three
luces’ heads couped argent.
Much of the good purpose of a close adherence to strict Lenten fare has
no doubt been lost by our continued neglect of the manifold uses of
herbs.
Amid all the talking and writing about vegetarianism very little
attention seems to have been paid to the undoubted importance of the
herb garden.
Our forefathers believed implicitly in the virtues of herbs, and
extolled them in prose and verse. According to one of the old
Roxburghe Ballads:--
Here’s pennyroyal and marygolds,
Come, buy my nettle-tops.
Here’s water-cresses and scurvy-grass,
Come, buy my sage of virtue, ho!
Come, buy my wormwood and mugworts.
Here’s all fine herbs of every sort;
Here’s southernwood that’s very good,
Dandelion and horseleek.
Here’s dragon’s-tongue and wood-sorrel,
With bear’s-foot and horehound.
Let none despise the merry, merry cries
Of famous London Town!
Most of these formerly well-known herbs, each having its own peculiar
curative quality, are nowadays practically unknown, but a reference
to old John Parkinson, or the herbals of Gerard or Turner, or the
“Acetaria” of John Evelyn, would readily show that they were good
for the various ills to which flesh is heir. The very earliest
medicaments were largely composed of herbs, and even to-day the learned
prescription of a Harley Street two-guinea specialist usually contains
at least one ingredient which, under a more formal Latin name, is
neither more nor less than a “garden simple” or herb.
The common marigold, for instance, which Gerard calls “the
Jackanapes-on-Horseback,” was at one time much used for soups or
“pottages.” In Miss Edgeworth’s story of “Simple Susan” she explains
how the petals of marigolds were added, as the last touch, to the broth
made for an invalid mother. Evelyn compares the common bugloss to the
nepenthe of Homer, but adds that what we now call bugloss was not that
of the ancients, but rather borage, “for the like virtue named corrago.”
Smallage was, of course, simply wild celery, which Parkinson says is
“somewhat like parsley, but greater, greener, and more bitter.” Sweet
cicely, or sweet chervil, is a kind of myrrh--“it adds a marvellous
good relish to a sallet,” and the roots may be preserved or candied.
The genial Culpepper, in his “English Physician Enlarged” (1565), has
much to say as to the astrological virtues of the different herbs, and
although his ascription of plants to their respective planets must be
taken _cum grano salis_, yet he is wonderfully near the mark in many
instances which he quotes as to the effect of the herb if taken as a
medicine. This, for instance, is what he has to say about balm: “It is
a herb of Jupiter and under Cancer, and strengthens nature much in all
its actions. It causeth the mind and heart to become merry and reviveth
the heart, especially of such who are overtaken in sleep, and driveth
away all troublesome cares and thoughts out of the mind arising from
melancholy or black choler.”
Nowadays we certainly neglect herbs, although here and there an
old-fashioned gardener plants his herbs from year to year. There are
still quaint old herb shops in Covent Garden, where the “simples” of
our grandmothers may be bought; and there are curious customs at the
Guildhall and the Old Bailey of the presentation of bunches of herbs to
the presiding justices as a reminiscence of the time when their perfume
was supposed to counteract the germs of plague.
It is easy to cultivate a herb garden, and amid modern “improvements”
of flowers of all sorts it imparts a delightful old-world fragrance
to the completeness of the pleasaunce. Moreover, herbs make the most
exquisite addition to nearly every form of cookery.
Reverting to Lent and its customs, it is notable, according to old John
Selden’s “Table Talk” (1689), that “our meats and our sports, much
of them, have relation to Church works. The coffin of our Christmas
pies in shape long, is in imitation of the cratch; our choosing
kings and queens on Twelfth-night hath reference to the three kings.
So, likewise, our eating of fritters, whipping of tops, roasting of
herrings, Jack of Lents, etc.--they are all in imitation of Church
works, emblems of martyrdom. Our tansies at Easter have reference to
the bitter herbs; though at the same time, it was always the fashion
for a man to have a gammon of bacon to show himself to be no Jew.”
We have it (on perhaps somewhat doubtful authority) that the most
ingenious method of fasting is that recorded in the “Mappemonde
Papistique,” wherein it appears that a Venetian saint had certain
boxes made like mass books, and these book-boxes were filled, some
with Malmsey wine, and some with the fleshiest parts of capons and
partridges. These were supposed to be books of devotion, and the saint
is said to have lived long and grown fat on them.
A peculiarly villainous form of torture was invented by Galeazzo
Visconti (1355), which was known as Galeazzo’s Lent, because it was
guaranteed to prolong the life of the unfortunate victim for forty
days. This seems to have been one of the few traits of inherited family
cruelty in a man who otherwise was a sort of Mæcenas of his time. He
was a friend and patron of Petrarch, founded, under his direction, the
University of Pavia, and brought together a considerable library.
According to Walsh, it is not generally known that the use of flesh,
meat, eggs, and milk during Lent was forbidden in England, not only by
ecclesiastical but also by statute law, even into the time of William
III. Any violation of the law was followed by dire penalties. There
is the case of the landlady of the Rose Tavern, St. Catherine’s Tower,
London, in whose house during the Lent of 1563 was found a quantity of
raw and cooked meat. She and four other women who were proved to have
partaken of the forbidden viands were put in the stocks all night. In
1570 was passed a statute making the penalties for violating the Lenten
laws sixty shillings and three months imprisonment.
Finally, as an apposite curiosity, I will quote a curious dispensation
granted two hundred and seventy-six years ago and formally recorded in
the parish register of Wakefield.
“To all people to whom these presents shall come, James Lister, Vicar
of Wakefield, and preacher of God’s word, sendeth greeting: Whereas
Alice Lister wife of Richard Lister Clerke who now soiourneth with
her sonne Willm Paulden of Wakefield, by reason of her old age & many
years & state, and long-contynued sickness is become so weake, and her
stomack so colde, not able to digest colde meates and fish, who by
the counsell of Physicions is advised to absteine from and to forbeare
the eateng of all manner of fruits, fish and milk meates: Know yee
therefoor for the causes aforesaide and for the better strengthening &
recovery of her health, I the saide James Lister do hereby give & grant
libertie and licence to her the saide Alice Lister att her will and
pleasure att all tymes, as well during the tyme of Lent, as upon other
fasting daies and fish daies (exhibiting by the laws to eate flesh)
to dresse and eate such kind of fleshe as shal be best agreing to her
stomach & weake appetite. In witnes hereof I the saide James Lister
have hereunto sett my hand the eight day of ffebuary in the sixt year
of the Reine of our Soveraigne Lord Charles by the Grace of God King of
England Scotland ffrance and Ireland Defender of the Faith &c and in
the yeare of our Lord god 1630 James Lister.”
INDEX
A
Aberdour oysters, 166
Abstinence, 247
“Academy” menu, 139
“Accomplish’d Housewife,” 84
“Accomplish’d Lady Rich’s Closet,” 109
“Acetaria,” 64, 257
Acrostic dinner, 138
Acton, Eliza, 151
“Adam’s Luxury and Eve’s Cookery,” 84
Addison, 106
Ætius, 176
Agris of Rhodes, 112
“Alarm to all Persons,” 84
“Alchemist, The,” 39
“Alice in Wonderland” menu, 142
“All’s Well That Ends Well,” 86
“Almanach des Gourmands,” 44, 225
America and snails, 207
American dinner, 117
„ oysters, 183
Amory, Blanche, 23
Angel pie, 151
Anthony, Saint, 63
Apprenticeship of cooks, 239
“Archidipno,” 71
“Art of Cookery made Plain and Easy,” 85
“Art of Dining,” 88
Artificial snails, 213
Arundel, Earl of, 206, 209
Ashburn (or Ashburner), Mrs., 85
“Atall, Dr.,” 83
Athanasius, Saint, 63
Athenæus, 39, 178
Athenian waiters, 201
Atlantus, 112
Austen, Jane, 22, 27
Austrian snails, 215
Autun, Bishop of, 206
Avignon, Legate of, 252
Ayen, Duc d’, 225
Azèma, 227
B
Baba, 226
Babiroussa, 233
Ball-supper menu, 147
“Ballade of Simpson’s,” 53
Ballantyne, James, 105
_Ballotine de Perdreau Souvaroff_, 152
Banana menu, 142
Banks, Sir Joseph, 71
Banville, Th. de, 42
_Barbe de Capucin_, 103
Barlow on hasty pudding, 43
Baskets, Luncheon, 99
Bavarian menu, 150
“B.C. The First Oyster,” 168
Beans as incentive to murder, 245
Beaufremont, Prince de, 225
Beaumont and Fletcher, 87
Béchamel, Marquis de, 223
Beckford, 252
Beef, Corned, 37
Beef Steaks, Society of, 57
_Béhague_, 12, 13
Bell, Peter, 32
Benger, 156
Bennett, Mrs., 27
Béranger, 42
Berchoux, J., 46, 48
Beresford, Rev. Mr., 82
Berkeley Hotel, 25
Berri, Duchesse de, 222
Bertrand, 223
Besant, Sir Walter, 104
_Bibliophile, Jacob le_, 231
Bill of fare, 139
Bingley, 27
Birch of Cornhill, 31
Black, Professor, 217
Blair, Mrs. Hy. W., 118
Blake, Wm., 93
_Blinis_, 115, 149
Blue Posts, Cork Street, 31
“Book of Menus,” 16
“Book without a Name,” 3
“Book of the Table,” 14
Booth, J. L. C., 202
Borodino, Battle of, 90
_Bortsch_, 22, 115
Boswell, 82
_Boudin de Poulet à la Richelieu_, 225
_Bouillabaisse_, 42
Boulanger, 236
“Bourgeois Gentilhomme,” 234
Bradyphagia, 90
Braithwaite, 239
Brallaghan, 45
Briggs, Richard, 126
Brillat-Savarin, 11, 23, 175, 226
Bristol Waters, 40
“British Birds,” 45, 60, 72
British boy cooks, 239
British Waiters’ Association, 200
Brookfield, Chas., 75, 251
“Brookfield, Mrs., and Her Circle,” 251
Browne, Sir Thomas, 62
Browning, 42
Burke, Edmund, 7
Burns, 42
Byron, Lord, 62, 68
C
Cade, Jack, 63
Cadmus, 15
Café de la France, 232
_Cailles à la Mirepoix_, 222
“Cakes and Ale,” 151
_Canard à la Rouennaise_, 146, 147
Capus, Alfred, 147
Caraffa, Cardinal, 68
Carême, 5, 97, 135, 227, 234
Carlingford oysters, 166
Carlton Club, 251
„ Hotel, 22, 93, 138, 149
Carr, 88
Carroll, Lewis, 170, 189
“Causerie Culinaire,” 228
C. C. R., 61
Cecil, Hotel, 26
Cedd, Saint, 243
Celsinius, 224
Cervantes, 29
Champeaux’ Restaurant, 132
Chapelle, Vincent de la, 225
Chaptal, 70
Chariades, 112
Charles V of Spain, 206
_Chartreuse à la Cardinal_, 225
_Chartreuse à la Mauconseil_, 223
Chartreux, Prior of, 252
Chateaubriand, Origin of, 132
Chatillon-Plessis, 47
Chaucer, 62
Cheese recipe, 52
Cheremetoff, Prince, 187
“Cheshire Cheese,” Fleet Street, 31, 46
Chesterton, G. K., 129
_Chicorée de Bruxelles_, 103
Chinese Books on Behaviour, 110
„ menu, 119
„ restaurant, 118
Christmas cookery, 125
„ dinner, 128
„ menus, 127, 128
Cicero, 176
Clams, 117
Clark, Sir Andrew, 157
Cleopatra, 63
“Clinker, Humphry,” 6, 40
Close, 148
Clough, Arthur Henry, 43
Cochin, 49
Cogan, 67
Coigny, Duc de, 225
“Cloister and the Hearth,” 245
Colchester epitaph, 166
„ Oyster Feast, 180
Coleridge, S., 42
“Colin Clout,” 248
Collins, Mortimer, 45, 59, 72
Commodus, 224
“Compleat Cook,” 84
_Consommé Sarah Bernhardt_, 227
“Cook Book, The Poetical,” 43
“Cookery, Art of,” 44
Cookery and Food Association, 90
Cookery of snails, 211
„ Roman, 40
“Cook-maid’s Garland,” 54
“Cook’s Director,” 84
Cooper, E. H., 238
_Cordon Bleu_, 3
Corks, 193
Corned Beef, 37
Corneille, 108
_Cornez le diner_, 37
Cosmopolitan dining in London, 113, 117
_Côtelettes de Mouton à la Maintenon_, 221
Coventry, Lady, 104
“Coy Cook Maid, The,” 55
Crabbe, 42
“Cranford,” 28
_Crêtes de Coq_, 102
Criterion Restaurant, 34
_Croustades à la Coquelin_, 227
_Cruzada_, 246
_Cuisinière Poétique, la_, 42
“Culina Famulatrix Medicinæ,” 88
Culpepper, 258
“Cupboard Papers,” 16
Curry, 123
D
D’Albignac, 71
Dallas, E. S., 11, 14
_Dampfnudeln_, 115
Dartmoor mutton, 204
D’Aubigné, 71
Decoration of dinner-table, 159, 161
Defoe, Daniel, 212
“Deipnosophists, The,” 45
Delaney, Mrs., 206
“Délices de la Campagne,” 178
_Demi-deuil_, 23
“De Opsoniis,” 224
Derby-day dinner, 134
„ menu, 134
Desvergers, 75
“Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift,” 201
Dickens, Charles, 179, 180
Didius Julianus, 224
Didsbury, P. Z., 190
Dieting, 157
Dieudonné’s Restaurant, 114
Digestion, 92
Dilly, Edward and Charles, 82
_Diner, Le_, 43
Dining fads, 157
Dining in the open air, 95
Dinner, American, 117
„ Christmas, 128
„ Derby-day, 134