England has produced some eminent epicures. As prominent among them
as among her novelists is William Makepiece Thackeray. In a magazine
article on Greenwich and Whitebait, dated 1844, he expressed his scorn
for those who do not appreciate good food. "A man who brags regarding
himself; that whatever he swallows is the same to him, and that his
coarse palate recognizes no difference between venison and turtle,
pudding or mutton-broth, as his indifferent jaws close over them,
brags about a personal defect--the wretch--and not about a virtue. It
is like a man boasting that he has no ear for music, or no eye for
color, or that his nose cannot scent the difference between a rose and
a cabbage--I say, as a general rule, set that man down as a conceited
fellow who swaggers about not caring for dinner."
Three years earlier, in his Memorials of Gormandizing, which he penned
in Paris, he preached another sermon on the subject--a sermon which may
fitly be reprinted here because the state of affairs which distressed
Thackeray has not been quite mended yet--far from it. Speaking of
Parisian opportunities for gastronomic experiments, he says:
"A man in London has not, for the most part, the opportunity to make
these experiments. You are a family man, let us presume, and you live
in that metropolis for half a century. You have on Sunday, say, a leg
of mutton and potatoes for dinner. On Monday you have cold mutton and
potatoes. On Tuesday, hashed mutton and potatoes; the hashed mutton
being flavored with little damp triangular pieces of toast, which
always surround that charming dish. Well, on Wednesday, the mutton
ended, you have beef: the beef undergoes the same alterations of
cookery and disappears. Your life presents a succession of joints,
varied every now and then by a bit of fish and some poultry....
"Some of the most pure and precious enjoyments of life are unknown to
you. You eat and drink, but you do not know the _art_ of eating and
drinking; nay, most probably you despise those who do. 'Give me a slice
of meat,' say you, very likely, 'and a fig for your gourmands.' You
fancy it is very virtuous and manly all this. Nonsense, my good sir;
you are indifferent because you are ignorant, because your life is
passed in a narrow circle of ideas, and because you are bigotedly blind
and pompously callous to the beauties and excellencies beyond you.
"Sir, RESPECT YOUR DINNER; idolize it, enjoy it properly. You
will be by many hours in the week, many weeks in the year, and many
years in your life the happier if you do.
"Don't tell me that it is not worthy of a man. All a man's senses are
worthy of enjoyment, and should be cultivated as a duty. The senses
are the arts.... You like your dinner, man; never be ashamed to say
so. If you don't like your victuals, pass on to the next article; but
remember that every man who has been worth a fig in this world, as
poet, painter, or musician, has had a good appetite and a good taste."