the transaction of the brethren with respect to Joseph. The general
proposal was to slay him; but it was Judah, first of his race, who,
with a strong eye to business, exclaimed, “What _profit_ to slay
our brother, and conceal his blood? Come, let us _sell him_ to the
Ishmaelites.” The opposition to fratricide, on the part of Judah,
was not on the principle that it was a crime, but that it brought
nothing. But, no sooner had he pointed out how they might get rid of
the troublesome brother, and put money in their purses to boot, than
the profligate kinsmen adopted the project with alacrity, preferring
lucrative felony to downright profitless murder.--Do I hear you remark,
Sir, that it has ever been thus with this rebellious Jewish people?
Well, let us not be rash in assertions. Judah was a very mercenary
fellow, no doubt; but it was better to sell a live brother into a
slavery which gave him the chance of sitting at the table of Pharaoh
Phiops, than to murder one for the mere sake of making money by the
sale of the body, as was done by a Christian gentleman of the name of
Burke.
There are some plants used in seasoning which have been esteemed for
other virtues besides lending a fillip to the appetite. Others of these
seasoning plants have acquired an evil reputation. Thus orach was said
to cause pallor and dropsy. Rocket had a double use: it not only was
said to remove freckles, but an infusion of it in wine rendered the
hide of a scourged convict insensible to the whip. Fennel was, unlike
asparagus, held to be good for the sight. Dill, on the other hand,
injured the eyes, while it strengthened the stomach. Anise-seed was in
great favour with the medical philosophers, who prescribed it to be
taken, fasting, in wine; and hyssop wine was a specific for cutaneous
eruptions, brought on by drinking wine of a stronger quality. Wild
thyme cured the bite of serpents,--if the sufferer could only collect
it in time; and pennyroyal was sovereign for indigestion. Rue cured the
ear-ache, and nullified poisons; for which latter purpose it was much
used by Mithridates. Mint was gaily eaten, with many a joke, because
it was said to have been originally a pretty girl, metamorphosed by
Proserpine. The Romans, now and then, ate camomile at table, just as
old country ladies, when tea was first introduced, and sent to them as
a present, used to boil the leaves, and serve them, at dinner, like
spinach. Capers, in the olden time, were vulgar berries, and left for
democratic digestion. “I once saw growing in Italy,” said an Irish
traveller, fit to be “own correspondent” to one of the morning papers,
“the finest anchovies I ever beheld!” A listener naturally doubted the
alleged fact; and the offended Irishman not only called him out, but
shattered his knee-cap by a pistol-shot. As he was leaping about with
intensity of pain, the Irishman’s second remarked to his principal,
that he had made his adversary cut capers, at any rate. “Capers!”
exclaimed the Hibernian, “capers! ’faith, that’s it. Sure, Sir,”
he added, advancing to his antagonist, “you were right; it was not
anchovies, but capers, that I saw growing. I beg pardon: don’t think
any more about it.” Let us add, that, if the aristocratic ancients
deeply declined capers, they were exceedingly fond of assafœtida, as a
seasoning ingredient. Green ginger was also a popular condiment; and it
is commonly eaten in Madagascar at this day. I suppose that, in former
times, Hull imported this production in large quantities, and that
therefore one of her streets is called “the Land of Green Ginger.” The
Romans gave wormwood wine to the charioteers, perhaps considering that
the stomachic beverage would secure them from dizziness.
I have mentioned above that Mithridates patronized rue as a nullifier
of poisons. He was in the habit of swallowing poisons, as people in
the summer swallow ices; and he was famous for inventing antidotes, to
enable him to take them with impunity. One consequence is, that he has
gained a sort of immortality in our pharmacopœia; and “Mithridate,”
in pharmacy, is a compound medicine, in form of an electuary, serving
as either a remedy or a preservative against poisons, being also
accounted a cordial, opiate, sudorific, and alexipharmic. “Mithridate”
is, or rather, I suppose, was, one of the capital medicines in the
apothecaries’ shops. The preparation of it, according to the direction
of the College, is as follows; and I request my readers to peruse it
attentively, and to get it by heart, in case of necessity supervening.
Here is the facile recipe: “Take of cinnamon, fourteen drachms; of
myrrh, eleven drachms; agarick, spikenard, ginger, saffron, seeds of
treacle-mustard, frankincense, Chio turpentine, of each ten drachms;
camel’s hay, costus, Indian leaf, French lavender, long pepper, seeds
of hartwort, juice of the rape of cistus, strained storax, opopanax,
strained galbanum, balsam of Gilead, or, in its stead, expressed oil
of nutmegs, Russian castor, of each an ounce; poly-mountain, water
germander, the fruit of the balsam tree, seeds of the carrot of Crete,
bdellium strained, of each seven drachms; Celtic nard, gentian root,
leaves of dittany of Crete, red roses, seed of Macedonian parsley, the
lesser Cardanum seeds freed from their husks, sweet fennel seeds, gum
Arabic, opium strained, of each five drachms; root of the sweet flag,
root of wild valerian, anise-seed, sagapenum strained, of each three
drachms; spignel, St. John’s wort, juice of acacia, the bellies of
scinks, of each two drachms and a half; of clarified honey, thrice the
weight of all the rest: dissolve the opium first in a little wine, and
then mix it with the honey made hot. In the mean time, melt together,
in another vessel, the galbanum, storax, turpentine, and the balsam of
Gilead, or the expressed oil of nutmeg,” (I have no doubt that one will
do quite as well as the other; and this must be highly satisfactory for
sufferers to know,) “continually stirring them round, that they may
not burn; and, as soon as these are melted, add to them the hot honey,
first by spoonsful, and afterwards more freely. Lastly, when this
mixture is nearly cold, add by degrees the rest of the spices reduced
to powder,”----_and_, as the French quack used to say of his specific
for the toothache, if it does you no harm, it will certainly do you no
good. For my own part, I think the remedy worse than the disease; but a
gentleman just poisoned may be of another opinion; and I can only say,
that if, with prussic acid knocking at his pylorus, he has leisure to
wait till the above prescription is made up for him,--till the bellies
of scinks and the camel’s hay are procured, and till the ingredients
are amalgamated “by degrees,”--he will, _if_ he survive the poison, the
waiting, and the remedy, have deserved to be called, κατ’ ἐξοχὴν, the
“patient.” But here are the pastry and the fruits; and there ARE people
who are given to believe that pastry and poison are not very wide
asunder.
When Murat wished to instigate the Italians to labour, he cut down
their olive-trees. The Jews were forbidden to destroy fruit-trees, even
in an enemy’s country; and it used to be a law in France, and may be
so still, that when an individual had received permission to cut down
one of his trees, it was on condition of his planting two. The planters
of vineyards enjoyed many privileges under the Jewish dispensation,
and heathen governments placed both vineyards and orchards under the
protection of the most graceful of their deities, and these deities
were supposed to have an especial affection for particular trees. The
Romans were skilled in forcing their fruits, which were produced at the
third course, and not, as with the Greeks, at the second.
Minerva is popularly said to have given birth to the olive, which was
the emblem of Peace, the latter being naturally born of Wisdom. But
the poisoned shafts of Hercules were made of the olive, perhaps to
symbolize those armed neutralities which are generally so fatal to
powers with whom the neutrals affect to be at peace. The Autocrat of
Russia, for instance, has been dealing very largely in olive shafts,
tipped with death. But the olive was known to the world before Wisdom,
taking flesh, sprang in her bright panoply from the brain of her sire,
and was called Minerva. From Judea the olive was taken into Greece;
it was not planted within the territory of Rome until a later period;
and, finally, in Spain it found a soil as favourable to cultivation as
that of Decapolis, on holy ground. The Ancona olives were the most
highly esteemed by the Roman Patricians, at whose tables they opened
and closed the banquet. While the olives were greedily swallowed,
the expressed oil was distributed by way of largess to the people.
It was declared to possess, if not a vital principle, something
that stimulated and maintained vitality. Augustus, who was for ever
whiningly hoping that he might die easily, and for ever chanting the
prayer, “Euthanasia!” asked Pollio how he might best maintain his
health and strength in old age. “You have nothing in the world to
do,” said Pollio, “but to drink abundance of wine, and lubricate your
imperial carcase with plenty of oil!”--a prescription which does not
say much for the medical instruction of Pollio. Olive oil was so scarce
at one time, in Europe, that in 817 the Council of Aix-la-Chapelle
authorized the priests to manufacture anointing oil from bacon. With
regard to the fruit itself, it has not even yet undisputed possession
of the public approval; and I am very much of the opinion of the
farmer who, having taken some at his landlord’s table, expressed his
indignation on reaching home, that he had been served with gooseberries
stewed in----brine.
The palm-tree wine of the Hebrews inspired song, and thence, perhaps,
did the palm itself pass into the possession of the mythological Muses.
The palm-tree deserved to be a popular tree: its wood furnished man
with a house, its branches with fuel; its leaves afforded him garments,
and a bed; and from them he could manufacture baskets, wherein to
carry the fruit, bread, and cakes which he could make from its dates.
I am only astonished that tradition has not made the palm, rather than
the beech or the oak, the original tree which first fed, clothed, and
sheltered man.
The cherry, compared with the palm, is but as a rustic beauty,
compared with Cleopatra. Mithridates and Lucullus share the glory of
making men acquainted with its fruit. From Cerasus, in Asia, Lucullus,
no doubt, transplanted a cultivated fruit-tree, of a peculiarly fine
sort; but the fruit itself was not unknown to the Romans long anterior
to the time of Lucullus. It was slow in acquiring an esteem in Italy.
The most extraordinary species of cherry with which I am acquainted,
is the Australian cherry, which grows with the stone on the outside.
But Nature, in Australia, is distinguished for her freaks. There the
pears are made of wood, and salt-water fish abound in the fresh-water
rivers! The nastiest species I know of, grows in the vicinity of, and
some of them within, the cemetery of Père-la-Chaise, at Paris. They are
magnificent to the eye, and are not ill-flavoured; but, at the heart of
each there is a maggot, as fat as one of Rubens’s Cupids, and, saving
a slight bitterness, with as much of the taste of the cherry in him as
a citizen of ripe Stilton has of the cheese of which he is so lively a
part. There is not a bad story told of an old and poor Spanish Grandee,
who used to put on spectacles when he sat down to his modest dinner of
bread and cherries, in order that the fruit might gain, apparently,
in magnitude. There was philosophy in this pleasant conceit! If the
poor nobleman had had a dish of our cherries, from Kent, Berks, or
Oxfordshire, he would not have stood in need of his merry delusion.
How grateful to the palate is the Armenian apricot, blushing, in its
precocity, like a young nymph; or the Persian peach, for a couple
of which the Romans would give a score of pounds! The peach has an
evil tradition with it. It is said to have been originally poisonous,
but to have lost its deadliness when it was transplanted. Perhaps
the peculiarly peachy odour of prussic acid may have contributed to
give currency to a very long-lived, but entirely foundationless,
tradition,--except, indeed, that poison may be extracted from the
kernel; but so may arsenic from a Turkey carpet, and, indeed, from
apple-pips also, as Sir Fitzroy Kelly told the jury, when endeavouring
to save from the gallows a man who had murdered his mistress, in
order that he might not put in peril his respectability! Perhaps the
plum-tree, whether of Africa or Asia, from Egypt or Damascus, has
been more fatal to health, if not to life, than any other of the
stone-fruits. When Pliny complained of their superabundant propagation
in Italy, he probably had in view the usual consequences of a very
plentiful plum season.
The apricot was not known in France till the eleventh century, and
then they were accounted dear at a farthing each. In the same century
cherries used to appear at the royal table in May. To effect this, lime
was laid at the roots of the tree, which was irrigated with warm water!
Louis XIII. was fond of early fruit, and he had strawberries in March,
and figs in June: this is more than the most expert fig-rearers in
Sussex ever accomplished! The fig used to be esteemed as only inferior
to that compound of luscious savours, the pine,--a fruit which, in the
seventeenth century, was religiously patronized by the Jesuits. The
same sort of sanction was given in the East to dates, though these were
fashionable in Rome, after a basket of them had been sent from Jericho
to Augustus. The Tunis dates are the best; but indulgence in them is
said to loosen the teeth, and produce scurvy. The Tunisian ladies,
however, were as fond of them as the French ladies were of sweet
citrons, before oranges were patronized by Louis XIV. The ladies used
to carry them about, and occasionally suck them, the operation being
considered excellent to produce ruby lips. The citron was hardly less
popular than the Reine Claude plum, which received its pretty name from
the Queen of Francis I., and daughter of Louis XII. I have noticed
the Sussex fig: the white fig of the Channel Islands is also highly
prized; and there is a tree at Hampton Court renowned for its fruit,
but they who eat had better not too curiously inquire as to where the
root of that productive tree penetrates, in order to accomplish its
productiveness. In Sicily, they acupuncture the tree, and drop into it
a little oil, and this is said to improve the flavour of the fruit.
To what I have previously said of the peach, I may add here what the
Chinese say of it; namely, that it produces eternity of life, and
prevents corruption until the end of the world. This species would be a
popular one in England.
Some writers assert that the apple was originally an African; but a
Negro with a red nose would be an anomaly; and the apple-tree does
not look as if it came from the country of the children of the sun.
Nevertheless, historians assert that it crossed the Mediterranean,
and reached Normandy through Spain and France. The apple has been as
productive of similes as of cider; and perhaps the prettiest is that
of Jeremy Taylor, who says, in his Sermon on the “Marriage Ring,”
that the “celibate, like the fly in the heart of an apple, dwells in
a perpetual sweetness; but sits alone, and is confined, and dies in
singularity:”--a figure of speech, by the way, not highly calculated
to frighten a bachelor. But, after all, the sentiment of Jeremy Taylor
is preferable to that of Gregory of Nazianzum, who calls a wife “an
acquired evil; and, what is worse, one that cannot be put away.”
However this may be, apples were once productive of matrimony in Wales.
When the fruit-dealers there could not find a market, they proclaimed
a dance. The revellers paid entrance-money, and received apples in
return. These meetings were called “apple lakings;” and the fruit was
sauce for many a consequent wedding-dinner. The finest used to be
kept for accompaniment to the roast goose eaten on St. Crispin’s Day.
Brides, in remote times, used to carry a love-apple in their bosoms;
as fond thereof as the pitman’s wife of Northumberland was of the
two lambs which she suckled, after their dams had been killed in a
storm. This was a more creditable affection than that of Marc Antony’s
daughter for a lamprey, which she adorned with ear-rings, and which she
exhibited at dinner; as Lord Erskine did the leeches which had cured
him of some complaint, and which, enclosed in a bottle, he sent round
with the wine. He called one “Cline” and the other “Home,” from the
great surgeons of those names; and noble guests, before filling their
glasses, gravely inspected the leeches, and then duly passed on the
reptiles and the wine.
This is what a Frenchman would have called a “_triste plaisanterie,
à l’Anglaise_;” and, by the way, I may remark, that Théophile de
Garancières imputes the alleged melancholic nature of Englishmen to the
great use which we make of sugar. Our sires used to make one curious
use of sugar, undoubtedly; namely, when they put it into the mouth
of the dying, in order that their souls might pass away with less
bitterness!
There is a German proverb which says, that “it is unadvisable to eat
cherries with potentates.” In English this might mean, “Do not make too
free with your betters.” Few royal families, however, have given their
inferiors more frequent opportunities to “eat cherries” with them,
than that of Prussia. I am reminded of this while upon the subject of
pine-apple, a slice of which was once given by Frederick William III.
to a lad employed in the gardens at Sans Souci. “Here,” said the King,
pleasantly, “eat, enjoy, and reflect while thou art eating. Now, what
does it taste like?” The boy looked puzzled, as he munched the pine;
thought of all the most delightful things that had ever passed over
his palate and clung to his memory, and, at last, with a satisfied
expression, exclaimed, “I think,--yes, it does,--it tastes like
sausage!” The courtiers laughed aloud; and the King, philosophizing on
the boy’s answer, said, “Well, every one has his own standard of taste,
guiding his feelings and judgment, and each one believes himself to be
right. One fancies he discovers in the pine-apple the flavour of the
melon; another, of the pear; a third, the plum. Yon lad, in his sphere
of tastes, finds therein his favourite food--the sausage.”
The lad’s answer was as much food for mirth at Sans Souci, as was that
of the Eton boy who was invited by Queen Adelaide to dine at Windsor
Castle, and who was honoured with a seat at Her Majesty’s side. The boy
was bashful,--the Queen encouraging; and, when the sweets were on the
table, she kindly asked him what he would like to take. The Etonian’s
eyes glanced hurriedly and nervously from dish to dish; pointing to
one of which, he, in some agitation, exclaimed, “One of those twopenny
tarts!” His young eye had recognised the favourite “_tuck_” he was in
the habit of indulging in at _the_ shop in Eton, and he asked for it
according to the local phrase in fashion. Reverting to the lad who
compared pine-apple to German sausage, I may remark, that pine-apple
is most to be enjoyed when the weather is of that condition which made
Sydney Smith once express a wish, that he could “slip out of his fat,
and sit in his bones.”
The quince is a native of Cydon, in Crete; and first Greece, and then
Rome, Gaul, and Spain, learned to love the fruit, and drink a quince
wine, which was said to be excellent either as a stomachic or as a
counter-poison.
Galen recommended the pear as an astringent, which is more than a
modern practitioner will do. St. Francis de Paul introduced one sort
into France when he paid a medical visit to Louis XI. The species was
named from the saint, “_le bon Chrétien_.”
The apple may lay fair claim to antiquity of birth. The fruit has
been diversely estimated by divers nations; but the general favour
has usually awaited it. In ancient times, both in Greece and Persia,
it was the custom for a bridegroom at his nuptial feast to partake
of a single apple, and of nothing else. The origin of the custom is
said to arise from a decree issued by Solon. It was the sight of an
apple that always put Vladislas, King of Poland, into fits. It is the
best fruit that can be taken as an accompaniment to wine; and the
best sorts for such a purpose are the Ribstone Pippin and the Coster
Pearmain. The golden apples stolen by Hercules were lemons; and they
are suspected to have been the “Median apples” of Theophrastus. The
Romans, at first, employed this Asiatic fruit only as a means for
keeping moths out of garments; from this household use it passed into
the ancient pharmacopœia, and it took rank among the counter-poisons.
Its acknowledged reputation in scurvy and punch, if I may so express
myself, was not made until a much later period of civilization. The
orange disputes with the lemon the honour of being the “Hesperides
apples,”--which is a dispute of a very Hibernian character. China
was probably its native place; and the Portuguese oranges are merely
descendants of the original “Chinaman.” It was not known in France
until introduced there by the Constable de Bourbon. In England, an
orange, stuck full of cloves, was a fitting New Year’s present from a
lover,--being typical of warmth and sweetness.
The fig-tree appears to have been, like the vine, very early used as a
symbol of peace and plenty. It was a tree of Eden; yet the Athenians
claimed it as a native tree, asserting, by way of proof, that it had
been given them by Ceres,--not reflecting that Ceres _may_ have brought
it from a region farther east. If it be commonly employed in Scripture
as a symbol, so an American poet has taken it, with its scriptural
allusions, to illustrate worldly marriages, of which he says, that--
----they are like unto
Jeremiah’s figs:
The good are very good indeed;
The bad, not fit for pigs.
The authorities of Attica were so fond of _their_ figs, that they
passed a law against the exportation of the fruit. The advocates of
free trade in figs broke the law when they could do so with profit;
and the men who affected to be on friendly terms with them, in order
to betray their proceedings to the Magistrates, were called by a
name which is now given to all fawning traitors,--they were styled,
_sycophants_, or “fig-declarers.” Even the philosophers in Greece
became greedy in presence of figs; and with figs famished armies have
been braced anew for the fight. The _athletæ_ ate of them before
appearing in the arena; and more than one invasion has been traced to
the taste of the invader for figs. Medical men were divided in opinion
as to the merits of this fruit. It was considered indigestible; but, to
remedy that, almonds were recommended to be eaten with it! The Romans,
perhaps, were wiser, who took pepper with them, as we do with melon;
and Dr. Madden says that we should never eat figs at all, if we could
only spend half an hour in Smyrna, and see them packed. So, as I have
before said, a sight of the kitchen, just before dinner, would take
away appetite; but as people do not commonly go to Smyrna, or sit with
their cooks, why, figs and dinners will continue to be eaten. Modern
professors have resembled ancient philosophers in an uncontrollable
appetite for figs. Who has not heard of the famous Oxford fig, which,
in its progress to luscious maturity, was protected by an inscription
appended to it, conveying information to the effect that “this is the
Principal’s fig!” which a daring Undergraduate one day devoured, and
added insult to injury by changing the old placard for one on which
was written, “A fig for the Principal?” The felonious fig-stealer
must have been more rapid in his sacrilege, than the poet Thomson
was in his method of enjoying his own peaches in his garden at Kew.
Attired in the loosest and dirtiest of morning-gowns, the author of the
“Castle of Indolence” used to watch his peaches ripening in the sun.
When he saw one bursting with liquid promise, he was too lazy to take
his unwashed hands from his well-worn pockets, and pluck the blushing
treasure. No; “Jamie” simply sauntered up to it, contemplated it for a
moment with a yawn, and finished his yawn by biting a piece out of the
fruit,--leaving the ghastly remains on the branch for wasps and birds
to divide between them.