feathers. Ælius Verus reclined on cushions of lily and rose-leaves.
The first-named monster had his funny moments; and sometimes he would
invite a certain number of bald men, or of gouty men, or grey-headed
men, and he was particularly amused at a company of fat men, so crowded
together that they could find room only to perspire. “One of his
favourite diversions consisted in filling a leathern table-couch with
air instead of wool; and while the guests were engaged in drinking,
a tap, concealed under the carpet, was opened, unknown to them,--the
couch sank, and the drinkers rolled pell-mell under the sigma, to the
great delight of the beardless emperor.” He was the first Roman emperor
who wore garments of pure, unmixed silk. He cared little for poets or
philosophers; but he gave liberal premiums to the inventors of new
sauces, provided these pleased his palate. If he disliked them, the
inventor was condemned to eat of nothing else, until he had discovered
a new condiment to win the imperial sanction. Heliogabalus and George
I. had this in common, that they both liked fish a trifle stale. Thus,
it is known that George never cared for oysters till their shells began
spontaneously to gape; and the Oriental master of the Roman empire,
who made a barber prefect of the provisions, would never eat sea-fish
except at a great distance from the sea, when they acquired the taint
he loved. His delight then was to distribute vast quantities of the
rarest sorts, brought at an immense expense, to the peasants of the
inland country. The table of his successor, Alexander Severus, was
that of a gentleman. Its master was the first Roman emperor to whom
that title can be incontestably given; and he loved to have around
him accomplished guests of all varieties of opinion; and this is much
more than can be said for that huge and hungry Goth, Maximin. The
Gordians brought back some of the elegances of social life, which the
uncleanness and severity of Maximin had banished; but at both the
private and public, the humble and the imperial, tables of Rome, there
must have been small ceremony and permanent fear during the brief and
troubled reigns of the foolish men who purchased the right of dining
in an imperial mantle by being speedily enveloped in a bloody shroud.
Gallienus, alone, shines out upon the list as the very prince of cooks;
and if Carême had possessed half the enthusiasm which he so warmly
affected, he would have named his son and heir after this imperial
inventor of _ragoûts_,--who was also the accelerator of the ruin of
Rome. All the temperance of the Gothic Claudius could not restore
the remnant of ancient moderation, which had been destroyed by that
imperial maker of stews, the ever hungry and cruel Gallienus. Aurelian
failed, like Claudius, but the emperor Tacitus was more successful,
and the descendant of the great historian, even during _his_ short
reign, roused the nobles to a sense of dignity, and honoured science by
inviting its disciples to his well-ordered table.
A subsequent emperor, Carus, was perhaps one of the most frugal, by
habit and inclination, that ever wore the imperial sword upon his
thigh. Carus was at once moderate and mirthful. He was seated on the
grass, supping on dry bread and grey peas, when the Persian ambassadors
came to him, suing for peace. “The matter just stands thus, gentlemen,”
said the emperor, opening his mouth widely, at the same time, to insert
a shovel-like spoonful of peas; “if your master does not acknowledge
the superiority of Rome, I will render Persia,”--and here he took off
the cap which he wore to conceal his entire baldness,--“I will render
Persia as destitute of trees as my head is of hair.” Having said which,
he resumed swallowing his peas, and left the delegates to digest his
remark.
We are accustomed to consider Diocletian dining at Salona, on the
cabbages he had reared there, as an emperor in reduced circumstances;
but the truth is, that the palace, gardens, and table of the ex-emperor
were all of a splendid character, and if his table was adorned by the
cabbages he had tended to a prize perfection, he was far too wise an
epicure to confine himself to that dish alone.
The great Constantine appears under a double aspect, and the least
favourable one is offered to us in his maturer years, when he
surrendered himself more unreservedly than before to good living, for
which he had peculiar facilities at Byzantium, took to wearing false
hair, and became altogether a ridiculous old dandy and _bon vivant_;
the ridicule of whom, by his clever and unscrupulous nephew, Julian,
I am not at all surprised at; for what is so eagerly seized upon by
affectionate nephews as the foibles of their indulgent uncles? Julian
was possessed just of that scampish sort of nepotism which leads the
modest young relative to eat an uncle’s dinners and deride the donor.
Julian’s own table would have gained the contempt of an editor of the
_Almanach des Gourmands_. Its frugality was frigidly parsimonious in
its character. The philosophic emperor was a vegetarian, and even of
vegetables he ate sparingly, but swiftly, leaping up, as it were, from
dining thereon, to hurry to his books or the public business, which
he quitted reluctantly when the hour of supper summoned him even to a
more frugal meal than the dinner, which he despatched with a celerity
not at all admired by those who dined with him. Nothing disgusted
him so much as a gross feeder, and probably nothing ever so greatly
surprised him as when, on taking possession of Constantinople, he found
one thousand cooks waiting to prepare the imperial dinner! A thousand
cooks for a man who could dine on a boiled turnip! The Constantines had
been accustomed to dine upon birds from the most distant climates, fish
from the most remote seas; to have a dessert of fruits out of their
natural seasons, and to drink foreign wines cooled in the summer snows
of the lofty hills. All this was as useless to a man who needed but
a crust and an apple to calm his appetite, as were the golden basins
and the jewelled combs to an emperor like Julian, who seldom washed
even his face, and who not only never cleaned his hair, but _felt_
the lively luxury of leaving it undisturbed. Julian in this respect
was like Anthony Pasquin, who was said to have died of a cold caught
by washing his face. There was a famous Irish member of Parliament,
who, unlike Julian, was a glutton at dinner, but who was remarkable
for his religious abstinence from all ablution. His son was one day
standing in the bow-window of White’s, when the sire was passing down
the opposite side of the street. I believe it was the noble lord who,
when Mr. Gunter in the hunting-field remarked that his horse was too
“hot” to ride comfortably, suggested to the equestrian pastrycook
that he should _ice_ him.--I believe it was the same noble lord who,
on the first occasion alluded to above, said to “Jack T----,” “Jack!
what _does_ make your father’s hands so dirty?” “Well!” said the old
Colonel’s affectionate son, “I believe it arises from a bad habit he
has of putting them up to his face!” And so of Julian we may say, that
if his hands were innocent of water, his famous beard was dirtier than
his hands, and that it was not pleasant to lie near the emperor at
dinner, unless guardedly ensconced to the leeward of his sacred and
dirty person.
If Gratian, who was the first Roman emperor who refused the pontifical
robe, had lived but as became the master of an imperial household, his
sacrifice would have had more merit; but the emperors of these times
had curious ideas as to duties. Thus the second Valentinian delighted
in giving splendid dinners, but at these entertainments he always,
himself, fasted;--a most discouraging course for the guests,--but
he thought there was merit in the work. But Theodosius was at least
as good a man, and we know that _he_ enjoyed the sensual and social
pleasures of the table without excess; and the same taste was shown by
that emperor Maximus, who is said to have espoused Helena, the daughter
of a wealthy Caernarvonshire lord, and to have renewed the popularity
of boiled leeks in Rome; and this was a better taste than that of
Honorius, who took to feeding poultry and eating them, while Stilicho
ruled the empire, and the eunuchs lived on the very fat of the land.
It was decidedly better too than the taste which led Valentinian the
third, after dining with Petronius Maximus and winning his money, to
carry off his wife; a Tarquinian insult, which he paid for, however,
with his life. Avitus could indulge in such freaks, however, with
impunity; and he not only seduced Roman matrons, but invited their
husbands to dinner, where the slaves smiled at the imperial raillery
directed against them while the courses were changing! His successor,
Majorianus, was a man of another stamp, and I would fain believe the
pleasant anecdote which says of him that he went to Carthage in the
disguise of his own ambassador, and dined with Genseric the king,
who was especially chafed when he afterwards discovered that he had
entertained, without knowing it, the Emperor of the Romans. Anthemius,
if he be famous for little else, is at least famous for the superb
wedding-dinner with which he celebrated the nuptials of his daughter
with Count Ricimer, a wicked son-in-law who devoured the dinners of
his “beau père,” and robbed him of his estate;--no uncommon course for
sons-in-law to take. The count placed on the uneasy and vacant throne
the epicurean Glycorius, who, having murdered Julius Nepos after a
banquet, was made Archbishop of Milan, as one of the recompenses of
the act. And then the empire fell into the delicate hands of the weak
and beautiful Augustulus, who could not find wherewith in the treasury
to maintain a decent table, and who was glad to accept clemency and
an annuity from Odoacer, whereby he was enabled, upon six thousand
pieces of gold annually, to keep such state in the Castle of Lucullus
in Campania, that the surrounding gentry visited him in shoals, and ate
his dinners by way of proof that they looked upon him as a man of the
highest respectability.
And this was the end of the “twelve vultures,” seen by Romulus,
foreshadowing the “twelve centuries,” more or less, that were to mark
the duration of the dominion which he founded; a dominion commenced
by a hungry adventurer, and which crumbled to nothing in the hand of
that Augustulus, who was but too rejoiced to take in exchange for it,
the bed, board, and six thousand a year with which he set up as a
hospitable country gentleman, in his rustic villa, on the slopes of
Campania.
* * * * *
As for the Cæsars of the Eastern Empire, they were rather Oriental
despots than either Greek or Roman monarchs, just as the Byzantines
were ever more Asiatics than Europeans. The sovereigns, for the most
part, ate at golden tables, and were served like gods. Some of them,
like Romanus, were respectable cooks, and more than one was discussing
the merits of a new sauce or dish, when the Saracens were knocking at
the frontier gates of the empire. The sort of merry humour indulged in
by others may be judged of by a single trait of Michael the Drunkard.
This amiable sovereign started up, one day, from table, ere the
imperial dinner was well over, and assuming an episcopal dress, he
descended into the streets followed by his courtiers. The latter bore
the vinegar and mustard that had been on the monarch’s side-board,
and mixing the condiments together, they stopped all passers-by,
compelled them to kneel, and with horrible profanity and mock psalmody,
administered the Sacrament with the above-named horribly compounded
elements. Such was one of the Eastern Cæsars at and after dinner, and
the easy Byzantines were not much scandalized thereat. Indeed, they
troubled themselves very little about the affairs of the government, or
the doings of the governors; and it would never have entered the head
of a Byzantine subject to say of his son what the American citizen
once remarked, touching his heir, to Mrs. Trollope, namely, that he
would much sooner that his son got drunk three times a week than that
he should refrain from meddling with the politics of his times.
From the palaces of the Cæsars, let us now pass into the mansions of
miscellaneous majesties, and see how the first gentlemen of their
respective days comported themselves “at meat.” Yes, at _meat_; for “la
viande du Roi” was the consecrated phrase, and guards presented arms,
and courtiers bowed low, as the king’s “meat” was solemnly carried to
the royal table, or borne to the bed-side, where it remained under the
name of an _en cas_, “in case” the august appetite should be lively
before morning.
THEIR MAJESTIES AT MEAT.
There was an old custom at Pisa, the origin of which may be traced to
the anti-judaical days of persecution. On a certain day in the year,
I believe, Good Friday or Easter Sunday, every Jew discovered in the
streets, was hunted down by the populace. When the game was caught he
was weighed, and compelled to ransom himself by paying his own weight
of sweetmeats. It was an advantage, then, at Pisa for a Jew to be of a
Cassius cast. It was different in other days, and climes, with regard
to kings. Nations used to weigh their monarchs yearly, and if the
register showed an increase of dignified obesity, great was the popular
rejoicing thereat. If, on the other hand, the too, too solid flesh of
the potentate had yielded to irresistible influences, and the father
of his people exhibited a falling away in his material greatness, the
body of loyal subjects went into mourning and tears, and deplored the
evil days on which they had fallen, when monarchs could not be kept
up to the old monarchical standard of corpulency. Kings who cared for
the affections of their people were, accordingly, disinterestedly
solicitous to support their corporeal requirements; for to be fat was
to be virtuous, and he was really the greatest of monarchs who required
the greatest circumference of belt. You must understand, however, that
if kings encouraged their own increase, it was disloyal in the people
to imitate them. The monarchs of old, in this respect, were like our
Henry VIII, who never stinted his own appetite, but who imprisoned the
Earl of Surrey in Windsor Castle, for daring to touch a lamb chop on a
Friday.
The most gigantic of royal feeders placed on the record of ancient
history, was Thys, king of Paphlagonia, at whose table “the entire
animal” was served by hundreds. When he fell into the power of Persia
he exhibited more appetite than grief, and banqueted in such a style
that the courtiers spoke of it wonderingly to their king Artaxerxes.
He replied significantly, “Thys is making the most of the shortness of
life.”
The kings of Persia were but sorry hosts to dine with. Their table was
in a little recess divided from the outward hall by a low curtain. The
king sat alone in his alcove, and could behold, without being seen, the
guests in the outer hall. The latter were of the highest rank; mere
younger brothers, civilians, and undignified people of that sort, sat
at meat in the galleries. It was only on two or three high days that
the king sat at the same table with his subjects. The royalty of old
Persia had once a reputation for temperance, but to be “royally drunk”
was no uncommon characteristic of his majesty and the princes of the
blood. He generally made drinking parties of a dozen favourites. These
sat on the ground, while the king lay on a gold couch, and the conclave
drank like dragoons, and got infinitely more tipsy.
In the banquets of state there were a few singularities. Horses and
ostriches appear in the bill of fare, among a hundred other delicacies;
but no guest did more than just taste what was placed before him; and
what he did not eat, he carried home with him. A dainty bit from the
king’s table was a present meet for lover to make to his lady; and a
wooer who brought a rump-steak of horse-flesh in his hand, straight
from the regal banquet, was scarcely a man to be refused anything.
There was something of grandeur in the banquets of Cleopatra, when
Antony dined with her. The service was in gold, and she made a present
of it to her visitor. On the following day there was a new service,
and it was again presented to “the favoured guest.” Antony himself
exhibited infinitely less taste at Athens. He erected in the public
theatre a scene representing the grotto of Bacchus, dressed himself
like the god, and, with a party of followers as worthless as himself,
sat down at day-break, in presence of an admiring and crowded “house,”
and got dreadfully drunk before breakfast-time. And this knave aspired
to rule in Rome!
Alexander, and, as may be seen in another page, Augustus, was given
to this sort of theological masquerading. The first-named accepted
banquets from his great officers; and these exhibited their taste by
having all the fruit on the table covered thickly with gold, which,
when the fruit itself was presented to the guests, was torn off and
flung on the ground, for the benefit of the servants. The father of
Alexander had shown in his time a better example of economy. He had but
one gold cup, and to prevent that from being stolen, he placed it every
night under his pillow, and went to sleep upon it. The mad Antiochus,
of Syria, was of another kidney, for whenever he heard of a drinking
bout in his own city, he used to order his chariot, and taking with him
a measure of wine and a goblet, he would rush down to the place and
take a seat uninvited. He was such indifferent company, however, that
the guests could not be prevailed upon to tarry, and even the offer of
his golden goblet was unable to bribe a man to sit and get drunk with a
witless king.
But the most extraordinary meal I have ever heard of was that made by
Cambes, king of Lydia. He was a great eater, a great drinker, and of
insatiable voracity. It is told of him that he one night cut up his
wife and devoured her, and that he awoke the next morning, with one of
her hands sticking in his mouth. But I have little doubt that something
of an allegory lies under this royal story. Cambes probably had had an
argument with his consort,--a lady of the sort spoken of by Dr. Young
as one who
Shakes the curtain with her good advice.
His logic “cut up” her assertions, and thereon he addressed himself to
sleep; but he no sooner awoke in the morning than her hand was upon his
mouth, to prevent his speaking while she reiterated her follies of the
previous night. Poor Cambes! he cut his throat in order to escape from
a too loquacious consort, of whom he is accused of being the murderer
by the libelling Xanthus.
I may add to the record of these exemplary persons, the name of
Dionysius of Heraclea, who, through good living, fell into such
a condition of obesity and somnolency that he could only be made
conscious by running fine gold needles into his flesh. What a droll
thing it must have been for his morning visitors who found the huge
mass fast asleep at table! Shaking hands with him, or any other
equivalent ceremony, would have been useless. They accordingly took
a gold needle from his girdle and tenderly run it into his fat. When
it reached a vital point, the uneasy monarch snorted and opened one
eye; and this being taken as an acknowledgment of their presence, he
straightway went to sleep again. Ptolemy, the seventh king of Egypt,
was in nearly as deplorable a condition, and Magas of Cyrene was
perhaps even worse. The Ephori, it will be remembered, had a horror
of the Lacedæmonians getting fat, and to prevent this undesirable
consummation, the youth were obliged to present themselves undraped
to the magistrates. Woe to the offenders with prominent stomachs, for
they had them punched till the owners hardly knew whether they stood
on their head or their heels, and could not digest a dinner for a month
afterwards.
They were beaten almost as badly as the unlucky official who went, in
Parthia, by the name of the king’s friend. It was the duty of this
minister to seat himself on the ground at the foot of the lofty couch
on which the king lay, and from which the sovereign flung refuse bits
to his “friend.” If the latter ate too voraciously, his meat was
snatched from him, and he was beaten with rods till he had hardly
strength left to thank his majesty for the entertainment. Of course, if
he ate too slowly, he was subject to similar castigation. The moral,
perhaps, is, that “fast” or “slow,” it is safer not to be “friends”
with the king--of the Parthians.
But let us turn from the ancient records of how the monarchs of old
deported themselves at their solemn boards, and contemplate a few brief
table traits in connexion with the sovereigns of more modern times.
Clovis was a Christian king, but his behaviour at dinner was not always
so exemplary as might have been desired. But the Chesterfields of his
time were not exacting, and they probably thought Clovis a gentleman
when, on Bishop (St. Gerome) taking leave of him after dinner, the
monarch pulled out a hair and placed it in the bishop’s palm; the civil
ceremony was imitated by the courtiers, and the prelate left the rude
palace with more hairs on his hand than he had on his head.
But dismissing the idea of running regularly through the “Tables of
the Sovereigns of Europe,” and elsewhere, I will simply relate such
incidents as are exemplary of royal table life, without pausing to be
very nice with regard to chronological order. Thus it occurs to me that
Russia, in modern times, exhibits as much barbarism as the court of
Clovis, where Christianity and civilization were, as yet, hardly known.
When Peter the Great and his consort dined together, they were waited
on by a page and the empress’s favourite chambermaid. Even at larger
dinners, he bore uneasily the presence and service of what he called
listening lacqueys. His taste was not an imperial one. He loved, and
most frequently ordered, for his own especial enjoyment, a soup with
four cabbages in it; gruel; pig, with sour cream for sauce; cold roast
meat, with pickled cucumbers or salad; lemons and lampreys; salt meat,
ham, and Limburgh cheese. Previously to addressing himself to the
“consummation” of this supply, he took a glass of aniseed water. At his
repast he quaffed quass, a sort of beer, which would have disgusted
an Egyptian; and he finished with Hungarian or French wine. All this
was the repast of a man who seemed, like the nation of which he was
the head, in a transition state, between barbarism and civilization;
beginning dinner with cabbage water, and closing the banquet with
goblets of Burgundy.
Peter and his consort had stranger tastes than these. This illustrious
pair once arrived at Stuthof, in Germany, where they claimed not only
the hospitality of the table, but a refuge for the night. The owner
of the country-house at which they sought to be guests was a Herr
Schoppenhauer, who readily agreed to give up to them a small bed-room,
the selection of which had been made by the emperor himself. It was a
room without stove or fire-place, had a brick floor, the walls were
bare; and the season being that of rigorous winter, a difficulty arose
as to warming this chamber. The host soon solved the difficulty.
Several casks of brandy were emptied on the floor, the furniture being
first removed, and the spirit was then set fire to. The czar screamed
with delight as he saw the sea of flames, and smelt the odour of the
Cognac. The fire was no sooner extinguished than the bed was replaced,
and Peter and Catherine straightway betook themselves to their repose,
and not only slept profoundly all night in this gloomy bower, amid the
fumes and steam of burnt brandy, but rose in the morning thoroughly
refreshed and delighted with their couch, and the delicate vapours
which had curtained their repose.