---------- customary treat,
A mixture strange of suet, currants, meat,
Where various tastes combine.
_Oxford Sausage._
_Yule-dough_, or _dow_, a kind of baby, or little image of paste, was
formerly baked at Christmas, and presented by bakers to their customers,
“in the same manner as the chandlers gave Christmas candles.” They are
called _yule cakes_ in the county of Durham. Anciently, “at Rome, on the
vigil of the nativity, _sweetmeats_ were presented to the fathers in the
Vatican, and all kinds of _little images_ (no doubt of _paste_) were to
be found at the confectioners’ shops.” Mr. Brand, who mentions these
usages, thinks, “there is the greatest probability that we have had from
hence both our yule-doughs, plum-porridge, and mince-pies, the latter of
which are still in common use at this season. The _yule-dough_ has
perhaps been intended for an image of the child Jesus, with the Virgin
Mary:” he adds, “it is now, if I mistake not, pretty generally laid
aside, or at most retained only by children.”
It is inquired by a writer in the “Gentleman’s Magazine,” 1783, “may not
the _minced pye_, a compound of the choicest productions of the east,
have in view the offerings made by the wise men, who came from afar to
worship, bringing _spices_,” &c. These were also called _shrid_-pies.
_Christmasse Day._
No matter for plomb-porridge, or _shrid_-pie
Or a whole oxe offered in sacrifice
To Comus, not to Christ, &c.
_Sheppard’s Epigrams_, 1651.
Mr. Brand, from a tract in his library printed about the time of queen
Elizabeth or James I. observes, that they were likewise called
“_minched_ pies.”
According to Selden’s “Table Talk,” the coffin shape of our Christmas
pies, is in imitation of the _cratch_, or manger wherein the infant
Jesus was laid. The ingredients and shape of the Christmas pie is
mentioned in a satire of 1656, against the puritans:--
Christ-mass? give me my beads: the word implies
A plot, by its ingredients, beef and pyes.
The cloyster’d steaks with salt and pepper lye
Like Nunnes with patches in a monastrie.
Prophaneness in a conclave? Nay, much more,
Idolatrie in crust!----------
---------- and bak’d by hanches, then
Serv’d up in _coffins_ to unholy men;
Defil’d, with superstition, like the Gentiles
Of old, that worship’d onions, roots, and lentiles!
_R. Fletcher._
There is a further account in Misson’s “Travels in England.” He says,
“Every family against Christmass makes a famous pye, which they call
Christmas pye. It is a great nostrum; the composition of this pasty is a
most learned mixture of neat’s-tongues, chicken, eggs, sugar, raisins,
lemon and orange peel, various kinds of spicery,” &c. The most notably
familiar poet of our seasonable customs interests himself for its
safety:--
Come guard this night the Christmas-pie
That the thiefe, though ne’r so slie,
With his flesh hooks don’t come nie
To catch it;
From him, who all alone sits there,
Having his eyes still in his eare,
And a deale of nightly feare
To watch it.
_Herrick._
Mr. Brand observes, of his own knowledge, that “in the north of England,
_a goose_ is always the chief ingredient in the composition of a
Christmas pye;” and to illustrate the usage, “further north,” he quotes,
that the Scottish poet Allan Ramsay, in his “Elegy on lucky Wood,” tells
us, that among other baits by which the good ale-wife drew customers to
her house, she never failed to tempt them at _Yule_ (Christmas,) with
“_A bra’ Goose Pye._”
Further, from “Round about our Coal-fire,” we likewise find that “An
English gentleman at the opening of the great day, _i. e._ on Christmass
day in the morning, had all his tenants and neighbours enter his hall by
day-break. The strong beer was broached, and the black jacks went
plentifully about with toast, sugar, nutmegg, and good Cheshire cheese.
The hackin (the great sausage) must be boiled by day-break, or else two
young men must take the maiden (_i. e._) the cook, by the arms and run
her round the market-place till she is ashamed of her laziness.
“In Christmas holidays, the tables were all spread from the first to the
last; the sirloins of beef, the minced pies, the _plumb porridge_, the
capons, turkeys, geese, and plum-puddings, were all brought upon the
board: every one eat heartily, and was welcome, which gave rise to the
proverb, ‘merry in the hall when beards wag all.’”
Misson adds of our predecessors in his time, that besides the “famous
pye” at Christmas, “they also make a sort of soup with plums which is
not at all inferior to the pye, which is in their language called
plum-porridge.”
Lastly, Mr. Brand makes this important note from personal regard.
“Memorandum. I dined at the chaplain’s table at St. James’s on
Christmas-day, 1801, and partook of the first thing served and eaten on
that festival at that table, _i. e._ a tureen full of rich luscious
plum-porridge. I do not know that the custom is any where else
retained.”
* * * * *
Thus has been brought together so much as, for the present, seems
sufficient to describe the ancient and present estimation and mode of
keeping Christmas.
* * * * *