Whether cookery is indebted to the Roman Catholic Church to the full extent that is commonly supposed is questionable. It is certain, however, that the olden monks and friars performed considerable service in preserving ancient recipes and inventing new formulas, many of which have been improved upon as the science has advanced.

Previous to the Renaissance the higher cultivation of cookery was confined largely to the monasteries, which prided themselves upon their excellent cheer and the hospitality they extended to distinguished visitors. Indeed, numbers of food preparations may be traced to the monastic orders, especially forms of cooking fish, eggs, and various soups. The introduction of soup, which is mentioned for the first time in history at the beginning of the fifteenth century, is closely connected with the clergy. Then it was that, during the fÊtes attendant on the marriage of Catherine de Valois to Henry V of England, the Archbishop of Sens, at the head of a procession of his priests, bore the soup and the wine to the royal chamber, accompanied by the blessing of the Papal See.

Around the art of larding is likewise shed the halo of sanctity, its discovery having occurred during the Council of BÂle in 1440, when Amadeus of Savoy, elected pope under the name of FÉlix V, was tendered a larded capon by his cook. Julienne, or a soup somewhat similar, it is more than probable, is an old monastic dish having special reference to days when meat was proscribed, the same observation applying to numerous fish and vegetable soups and ragoÛts.

There is much reason to suppose that not a few treatises on cookery and on wines have appeared whose authors were dignitaries of the church, or at least connected with clericalism, but whose rÔle forbade them attaching their names to works of this nature. Thus, during the year 1671 there was published at Molsheim, in southern Germany, an excellent cook-book which treated of the various branches of the science, by Bernardin Buchinger, Abbot of LÜtzel, having for its title "Koch-Buch so fÜr Geistliche als auch Weltliche Grosse und Geringe Haushaltungen," etc.,—"Cook-Book for large and small Religious as well as Laical Establishments,"—a culinary grammar of much merit which has since passed into several editions. In this work the hierophant's name was omitted, the authorship being announced as "Durch Einen Geistlichen KÜchen-Meister desz Gotteshauses LÜtzel beschrieben und practicirt,"—"described and practised by a religious Master-Cook of the Monastery of LÜtzel." An important volume of three hundred pages by Vittorio Lancellotti, published in Rome, appeared in 1627, in which is presented month by month a description of a large number of feasts given by various prelates in honour of eminent personages at the commencement of the seventeenth century. The volume was dedicated to Cardinal Ippolito Aldobrandino, and is addressed chiefly to the clergy, whose good taste in the matter of good cheer and luxury in entertaining are minutely set forth.[35]

To the ancient ecclesiasts the vineyards producing the finest wines of the world owe their existence and their fame—the Johannisberg, Steinberg, Hochheim, Dom Dechanei, Rauenthal-Pfaffenberg, and numerous other growths of the Rheingau; the Forster KirchenstÜck and Jesuitengarten of the Rheinpfalz; the Stein and Leisten wines of Franconia, the Liebfrauenmilch Enclos Klostergarten of Rhenish Hessia, and the Kloster Neuberg of Austria. No less celebrated in other lands are the rich endowments of the monastery—the RomanÉe, Chambertin, and Clos-Vougeot of the CÔte d'Or; the Hermitage and ChÂteau-neuf-du-Pape of the RhÔne; Saint-Emilion and Sainte-Croix-du-Mont of the Gironde, as well as many of the priceless growths of the Haut-MÉdoc. Like the odour of old arras, around the roseate and golden clusters of the vine clings the incense of prelacy and circles the aureole of the church.

One were more than ungrateful, too, to forget the invaluable services rendered by Dom PÉrignon in contributing to the vinous delights of the table. Fancy, if one can, a world without champagne—not as a daily beverage, but as a talisman to loosen the tongues of the timid and a wand to evoke the joyous sally and brilliant repartee! With what other potable may one so appropriately pledge not only le beau sexe des deux hemisphÈres, mais les deux hemisphÈres du beau sexe?

Almost equally to be commended are the Carthusian friars of DauphinÉ, who evolved the greens and golds of Chartreuse; the cenobites of La GrÂce-Dieu, who produced Trappistine; the Trappists of l'Allier, in whose cloister originated the elixir of long life, de Sept-Fonds; and the holy fathers of Rouen, who invented the delicious balm of Bon-Secours.

The religious orders were early famed for their distillations. In the account of his travels in Italy the observant Seigneur de Montaigne mentions the Jesuits of Vicenza, who had a liqueur-shop in their monastery, as well as the monks of Verona, who were excellent distillers of eau de naffe, a liqueur made with the flower of citron. The famous BÉnÉdictine, however, a rival of Chartreuse, though at present made by the monks of FÉcamp in Normandy, and therefore possessing the stamp of monachism, was not of spiritual inspiration. Like the eau de vie des Carmes, Liqueur des EvÈques, Eau ArchiÉpiscopale, Liqueur des Chartreux, Plaisir des Dames, and Huile des Jeunes MariÉs, it was worldly in its inception. Its history is interesting. In 1803 M. Le Grand, an enterprising wine-merchant of FÉcamp, set about its manufacture, advertising it to the amount of eight hundred thousand francs,—his entire fortune,—the claim being made that the secret of its fabrication was consigned by a Benedictine brother to a manuscript in 1510 and opportunely discovered by the vender. The venture proved successful, as indeed the virtues of the liqueur merited, its annual sale now exceeding a million bottles. At first the clergy protested loudly against the bald appropriation of the name of an abbey, and Cardinal Bonnechose[36] petitioned Napoleon III to put an end to the scandal, the restored order eventually taking up the manufacture of the cordial and signing it with the name of the inventor, whose final Benedicite was recently pronounced. The present Archbishop of Rouen came to bless the most recent constructions of the abbey, among which is a superb Salle des AbbÉs, and, at the banquet following the ceremonial, during the dessert he compared the inventor of the liqueur to several of the heroes of Christianity. Benedictine (ad majorem Dei gloriam) is the only important liqueur thus far which has escaped analysis, although imitations of this and all others that have proved successful are freely placed upon the market.

CuraÇoa, it is said, was discovered by a French chanoine, and the aroma of the wild cherry imprisoned in Maraschino by an Italian frate. A German Pfarrer, it is averred, first dissolved gold in the eau de vie de Dantzig, and through a Spanish sacerdote is said to have come Santa Cruz, the rum of the Holy Cross. In the quest for the elixir of life the monastery became the great alembic of liqueurs, the study of essences, spirits, and distillations varying with the labour of illuminating missals and the routine of religious devotions. During the thirteenth century Arnaud de Villeneuve formulated the question of the elixir of life in these terms, which became a dogma for all his monastic successors: "This is the secret, viz., to find substances so homogeneous to our nature that they can increase it without inflaming it, continue it without diminishing it, ... as our life continually loses somewhat, until at last all is lost." The outcome of the patient labours of these religious alchemists was numerous elixirs and liqueurs, of which the secret composition was transmitted from generation to generation in convents and monasteries. These liqueurs were in their origin simply a pharmaceutic product; it is only within a comparatively short time that they have been converted into after-dinner douceurs.

Every useful art, however, must find perfection of expression sooner or later, notably an art which is a necessity and which likewise appeals to the lawful gratification of the senses. And if cookery was fostered by the cloisters of Europe, and reached its zenith during the early part of the past century in Paris, it is equally true that at no time in the history of the world has it attained such general excellence as at present.

But let the religious orders and the priesthood be credited with their full share in its advancement. They are no exception to the generality of mankind in being blessed with appetites, but they are sufficiently intelligent to recognise that in a well-appointed cuisine there exist both a prophylactic to ennui and the best of pharmacopoeias. Let the spit turn merrily, therefore, and the carp fatten in their ponds; let the flower of the vine and the pressings of the grape distil for them their fragrance; let them repeat their paternosters and chant in concert their penitential psalms:

And so on up to a hundred herrings.

It is most unfortunate that La ReyniÈre omitted to bequeath to posterity a certain monastic recipe of marvellous merit used in connection with wild fowl and all manner of game-birds, which is thus described in the brilliant opening essay of the first year of the "Almanach," the author's reference being to the wild duck, which he advises to be cooked À la broche, as it thus preserves all its fumet without losing any of its other qualities:

"After it has been roasted and carved" [he proceeds to say] "a sort of poignant salmis may be prepared on the table, the recipe for which we have been in possession of for a long time, and which was given to us by the procureur of a Bernardin abbey—the sole riches that the Revolution could not confiscate from him; this formula, however, we must reserve for our most intimate friends. The recipe is not to be found in any nutritive dispensary, and it becomes all the more precious inasmuch as, not being applicable to the duck alone, it may be utilized with all kinds of dark-fleshed feathered game, and especially with partridges and woodcock—which renders it inappreciable."

Far less can be said of the Protestant clergy on the score of cookery or with respect to the improvement of the vine and the invention of beverages. Nearly all clerical roads lead through Rome, it would seem, in so far as relates to gastronomy. Moreover, in Protestant countries—at least among the lesser lights of the church—it is rather the rector who is fÊted than who does the fÊting, and who, even were he inclined to asceticism, would scarcely be allowed to practise it by his parishioners. In one of his essays, "The Country Sunday," Richard Jefferies tells how the chapel pastor is entertained at table in Wiltshire:

"There is no man so feasted as the chapel pastor. He dines every Sunday, and at least once a week besides, at the house of one of his stoutest upholders.... After dinner the cognac bottle is produced, and the pastor fills his tumbler half full of spirit, and but lightly dashes it with water. It is cognac, and not brandy, for your chapel minister thinks it an affront if anything more common than the best French liquor is put before him: he likes it strong, and with it his long clay pipe. Very frequently another minister, sometimes two or three, come in at the same time, and take the same dinner, and afterwards form a genial circle with cognac and tobacco, when the room speedily becomes full of smoke and the bottle of brandy soon disappears. In these family parties there is not the least approach to over-conviviality; it is merely the custom, no one thinks anything of a glass and a pipe; it is perfectly innocent; it is not a local thing, but common and understood. The consumption of brandy and tobacco and the good things of dinner, tea, and supper (for the party generally sit out the three meals) must in a month cost the host a good deal of money, but all things are cheerfully borne for the good of the church. Never were men feasted with such honest good-will as these pastors; and if a budding Paul or Silas happens to come along who has scarce yet passed his ordination, the youthful divine may stay a week if he likes, and lick the platter clean."

One also remembers the curates' dinner as described in "The Professor" by that keen observer, Charlotte BrontË:

"The curates had good appetites, and though the beef was tough, they ate a great deal of it. They swallowed, too, a tolerable allowance of the 'flat beer,' while a dish of Yorkshire pudding and two tureens of vegetables disappeared like leaves before locusts. The cheese, too, received distinguished marks of their attention; and a 'spice-cake,' which followed by way of dessert, vanished like a vision and was no more found."

Anthony Hayward, in "The Art of Dining," tells the story of the phenomenal appetite of a chaplain during the Old Bailey sittings, when it was the custom to serve two dinners (exact duplicates) a day, the first at three o'clock, the second at five:

"The first course was rather miscellaneous, varying with the season, though marrow-puddings always formed a part of it; the second never varied and consisted exclusively of beefsteaks. As the judges relieved each other, it was impracticable for them to partake of both; but a little chaplain whose duty it was to preside at the lower end of the table was never absent from his post. This invaluable public servant persevered from a sheer sense of duty till he had acquired the habit of eating two dinners a day, and practised it for nearly ten years without any perceptible injury to his health. We had the pleasure of witnessing his performance at one of the five o'clock dinners, and can assert with confidence that the vigour of his attack on the beefsteaks was wholly unimpaired by the effective execution a friend assured us he had done on them two hours before."

The last communication from the Rev. Sydney Smith to Canon Barham, better known as Thomas Ingoldsby, related to gastronomy, with the ethics of which he was so conversant, the canon having just sent him a pannier of pheasants.

"Many thanks, my dear sir, for your kind present of game," wrote the appreciative recipient. "If there is a pure and elevated pleasure in this world, it is that of roast pheasant and bread-sauce; barn-door fowls for dissenters, but for the real churchman, the thirty-nine times articled clerk, the pheasant! the pheasant!"

Why the witty rector of Combe-Florey declared that when he found himself seated next to a bishop at a dinner-party he became so nervous that he could do nothing but crumble his bread, and when his place adjoined that of an archbishop he crumbled it with both hands, seems inexplicable, unless it had been his mischance to encounter among his superiors in office more accomplished epularians than himself. Besides his celebrated poetical recipes for a salad, which are presented in a following chapter, his less familiar "Receipt to Roast Mutton" may not be omitted from references to ecclesiastic good cheer:

Canon Barham, no less than Sydney Smith, wielded a valiant spoon, and to the unpunctual at dinner he has delivered one of his most forcible sermons in "The Lay of St. Cuthbert":

Grace before meat is usually well expressed by the reverend clergy, and perhaps the brief introductory thanksgiving of the late Canon Shuttleworth is as happy as any: "For good life and good health; for good company and good cheer, may the Giver of all good things make us thankful." So far as orthodox graces are concerned, it were difficult to improve upon the two fervent thanksgivings of Psalms XXXIV and CXLV:

"The lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they who seek the Lord shall want no manner of thing that is good.

"The eyes of all wait upon thee, O Lord: and thou givest them their meat in due season.

"Thou openest thine hand: and fillest all things living with plenteousness."

So many Protestant denominations exist in America that the manner of entertaining the ministry varies considerably. In no religious sect does fine champagne or any other form of cognac figure, as a general rule, though the use of vinous beverages is less denounced at present than formerly. The most genial hosts and guests among Protestant divines are unquestionably the Episcopalians. But if claret and alcoholic beverages are the exception on the tables of many denominations, the pastor does not lack for substantial aliments when entertained by his parishioners, who here, as in England, fairly dispute for his possession.

That the duck at least, among the toothsome contributions to the table, is appreciated by the Protestant clergy no less than the laity is apparent from the apostrophe to the canvasback of the Rev. Joseph Barber, who has addressed the king of the Anseres in these colourful stanzas:

As regards wine the case is vastly different in Europe, among both the clergy and those who welcome them. When Urban X resolved to remove the Papal See from Avignon to Rome grave discord resulted among his cardinals, several of whom refused to accompany him. Petrarch, in reply to a letter received from the Pope soon afterwards, wherein his Holiness expressed his astonishment at their action, explained the reason thus briefly: "Most holy Father," he wrote, "the princes of the church esteem the wine of Provence, and know that the wines of France are more rare than holy water at Rome."

The anecdote of the curÉ of a village in the Bordelais would indicate, furthermore, that the cloth prefer their wine in a non-diluted state. On the occasion of a wedding dinner at which the officiating pastor was present, he would exclaim after every course, as he raised his glass: "My children, with this you must drink some wine." The turn of dessert arriving, he repeated his injunction for the tenth time, again setting the example himself.

"Pardon, Monsieur le CurÉ," one of the guests interrupted, "but with what do you not drink wine?"

"With water, my son!"

During the episcopate of Bishop Timon of Buffalo, a Roman Catholic prelate of great ability but of small stature, complaint was entered against a certain German priest of the diocese for his over-conviviality and partiality for the foaming glass of Gambrinus, the offender being a man of Falstaffian proportions. The priest was accordingly summoned, and, after being severely reprimanded, was asked by the bishop if he could bring forward any extenuating circumstances with regard to his conduct.

"Your Reverence is a small man, and my detractors are men of small calibre, who require but little beer," was the reply. "I am a large man, as you are aware, with a large appetite, and what might suffice for others were scant pittance for me: the vessel should be filled according to its capacity."

That so distinguished a church dignitary as a bishop should dine well goes without saying. How else might he be so urbane, so stately, and so contented! And without wine how might he dispense such sunshine or pronounce his blessings so sonorously! For a bishop, dean, or archdeacon to be tendered scanty fare or be toasted with ice-water were as incongruous as to deprive the beverage termed "bishop" of its main ingredient. When Bishop Magee of Peterborough, afterwards Archbishop of York, was "entertained" by another church dignitary he was told on his arrival that he would find wine in his room. The dinner which he afterwards sat down to was a wineless one. A few weeks later the positions of host and guest were reversed, whereupon the bishop, shaking hands heartily with his visitor, informed him that he would find water in his room and wine upon the table.

"Scarcely any bishop," says Sydney Smith, "is sufficiently a man of the world to deal with fanatics. The way is not to reason with them, but to ask them to dinner. They are armed against logic and remonstrance, but they are puzzled in a labyrinth of wines, disarmed by facilities and concessions, introduced to a new world, and come away thinking more of hot and cold and dry and sweet than of Newman, Keble, and Pusey."

A number of years ago, when long tables were in vogue at the great hostelries at Saratoga, Bishop Onderdonk of New York was among the guests. The bishop, in accordance with his station, was seated at the head of the table, where the attentive head waiter had just placed his bottle of hotel "Pontet-Canet." Among the other clerical guests was a Connecticut divine and teetotaler who had come to test the restorative virtues of Congress water, so delicious when drunk at the fountainhead in the morning.

"Ah!" said the cynical dominie to a ministerial vis-À-vis, as he frowned over his Oolong and the portly prelate beamed over his Bordeaux, "he wants to prove his apostolic descent by showing that if he drink of any deadly thing it shall not hurt him."

Later, when his Right Reverence was informed of the remark, he observed, quoting Ecclesiasticus as his would-be detractor had quoted St. Mark, "'Wine measurably drunk and in season bringeth gladness of the heart and cheerfulness of the mind,' and as a churchman it were heretical for me to take exception to so orthodox a precept."

The minister whose knowledge of gastronomy is far exceeded by his zeal in "reforming," notably in an attempted extermination of all joyous fluids, is far more prevalent in the United States than abroad. While no one will object to his denunciation of "King Rum" or the "Wine-cup,"—though rum is but little used as a beverage, and wine is supposed to be consumed in glasses at the dinner-table,—one must nevertheless deplore the inconsistency which would annihilate all alcoholic fluids and permit the grossest heterodoxness of diet to pass unscathed. Not undeserved, perchance, are the lines addressed to this class of the clergy by a Western versifier:

On more catholic lines is the gastronomic experience of a distinguished Baptist doctor of divinity of western New York, who, though always temperate, still believes in the sentiment of the grace that was once uttered by an English Episcopal clergyman: "God hath given us all things richly to enjoy; let us enjoy them." The learned divine in his younger days was one of a party of four who were concluding a long sojourn abroad, and ere leaving Paris he was desirous of testing the much-vaunted cuisine of the "Trois FrÈres ProvenÇeaux." His suggestion that the appetising odours which greeted the passer-by from without be verified from within having met with immediate approval, the officier de bouche of the famous restaurant was interviewed and a dinner arranged for the following evening.

"What will be the price of a nice dinner," inquired the ecclesiast,—"a dinner that will leave us no cause for regret? We do not care for the menu in advance, as we prefer a surprise; but we wish a perfect dinner, neither too little nor too much."

The reply was promptly forthcoming, and here we transcribe a leaf from the ecclesiast's note-book:

"'Pour vingt francs un dÎner ordinaire.

"'Pour quarante francs un trÈs joli dÎner!

"'Pour cent francs un grand dÎner!!'—the voice of the restaurateur rising with the advancing prices."

These interesting notes then follow:

"Tuesday, June 3, 1860. Present:——,——,——,——. Dinner at 7 P.M. Dress suits. Voiture de remise. Portier with red waistcoat. Cabinet in entresol hung with pink silk tapestry. Three garÇons, fine china, silver and table appointments. A bouquet of roses. Perfect service.

"Menu. Nine courses:—Melon musquÉ d'Algiers. Potage À la bisque (red soup with little red shrimps in centre of each dish). Vol-au-vent de saumon.... Salade. Checkerboard ice-cream (sixteen different colours and flavours). Great strawberries. Coffee (demi-tasse), cognac, cigars. Four wines: Sauterne, claret, and two champagnes."

Unfortunately, the menu itself has been lost, and the memory of our clerical informant has retained only a portion of the carte, which we have transcribed from the memoranda he has contributed. Was there a chapon À la Toulouse or noix de veau À la Soubise for the relevÉ; did lamb's ears À la TortuË or carbonnades de mouton À la MacÉdoine form the entrÉe; did a caneton de Rouen, a poularde truffÉe, or a coq-viÈrge do the honours of the roast; could des truffes au vin de Champagne or a gelÉe au marasquin have figured as the entremets; and, finally, what might have been the grosse piÈce? Alas! these questions, like many questions of theology, must remain unanswered. It will be observed, notwithstanding, how the wall furnishings, the roses, the red of the bisque, the ripe hues of the melon and the salmon, the erubescence of the strawberries, and the very waistcoat of the avertisseur were happily combined; and also that as far back as 1860 the muskmelon had already been employed as an admirable prologue of the dinner during warm weather. As for the checkerboard crÊme glacÉe, with four flavours and four colours for each person, it is an addition to the dessert that is almost worthy of a sermon.

The following supplementary notes conclude the interesting account of the dinner:

"The solid part of the menu I have no record or memory of. All I know is that we ate pretty much everything that was in sight, and then had just enough and no more. The dinner concluded with four toasts and four speeches, the only one I recall being on the theme, 'The Four Homes'—not one of the four speakers having at the time set up a home of his own.

"A thing of beauty is a joy forever. We went upon the Latin maxim, In medio tutissimus ibis, and so we took the trÈs joli dÎner, which, with vins compris, cost us forty francs or eight dollars apiece. But the recollection of it has been worth at least two dollars a year since then: and as it is forty years ago last summer, and two times forty is eighty, I now count that I then paid only ten per cent. of its value."

It is needless to add that the sermons and addresses of the ecclesiast in question, which join to their fervour and scholarship an originality all their own (were they not inspired by the dinner at the "Trois FrÈres"?), are always listened to with marked attention by his large and appreciative audiences. It also goes without saying that he has distinguished himself in literature, and that his presence is invariably in demand either at a dinner or a debate of theologians.

Of dishes invented by the Roman Catholic priesthood, the omelette À la purÉe de pintade, devised by the Capuchin Chabot, is well known, although "The CurÉ's Omelette" for which Savarin stands sponsor is far more in evidence and is difficult to improve upon either for fat or meagre days. Should the recipe be already familiar, it will well bear repetition—one cannot dine too often with a broad-minded divine; if unknown, the reader should become acquainted with it—it is one of the most sprightly of the VariÉtÉs. The tunny prescribed is not obligatory, and for this and the carp-roes the resources of the American sea-coast will furnish abundant equivalents:

"Every one knows that for twenty years Madame R.[38] has occupied the throne of beauty unchallenged. It is also well known that she is extremely charitable, taking interest in most of those schemes whose object is to console and assist the wretched.

"Wishing to consult M. le CurÉ on something connected with that subject, she called upon him at five o'clock one afternoon, and was astonished to find him already at table. She thought everybody in Paris dined at six, not knowing that the ecclesiastics generally begin early because they take a light collation in the evening.

"Madame R. was about to retire, but the curÉ begged her to stay, either because the matter they were to talk about need not prevent him dining, or because a pretty woman is never a mar-feast for any man; or perhaps because he bethought himself that somebody to talk to was all that was wanted to convert his dining-room into a gastronomic Elysium.

"The table was laid with a neat white cloth, some old wine sparkled in a crystal decanter, the white porcelain was of the choicest quality, the plates had heaters of boiling water under them, and a servant, demure but neat, was in attendance.

"The repast was a happy mean between the frugal and the luxurious. Some crab soup had just been removed, and there was now on the table a salmon-trout, an omelette, and a salad.

"'My dinner shows you what perhaps you did not know,' said the pastor, with a smile, 'that according to the laws of the church meat is forbidden to-day.' The visitor bowed her assent, but at the same time, as a private note informs me, slightly blushed, which, however, by no means prevented the curÉ from eating.

"Operations were already begun upon the trout, its upper side being fully disposed of; the sauce gave proof of a skilful hand, and the pastor's features betokened inward satisfaction. That dish removed, he attacked the omelette, which was round, full-bellied, and cooked to a nicety. At the first stroke of the spoon, there ran out a thick juice, tempting both to sight and smell; the dish seemed full of it, and my dear cousin confessed that her mouth watered.

"Some signs of natural sympathy did not escape the curÉ, accustomed to watch the passions of men; and, as if in answer to a question which Madame R. took great care not to put, 'this is a tunny omelette,' said he. 'My cook has a wonderful knack at them. Nobody ever tastes them without complimenting me.' 'I am not at all astonished,' replied the lady visitor; 'for on our worldly tables there is never seen an omelette half so tempting.'

"This was followed by the salad—a finishing item which I recommend to the use of all who have faith in my teaching, for salad refreshes without fatiguing, and strengthens without irritating. I usually say it renews one's youth.

"The dinner did not interrupt their conversation. Besides the matter in hand, they spoke of the events of the time, the hopes of the church, and other topics. The dessert passed, consisting of some Septmoncel cheese, three apples, and some preserved fruit; and then the servant placed on a small table a cup of hot mocha, clear as amber, and filling the room with its aroma. Having sipped his coffee, the curÉ said grace. 'I never drink spirits,' he said as they rose; 'it is a superfluity I offer to my guests, but personally reserve as a resource for old age should it please God that I live so long.'

"In the meantime six o'clock had arrived, and Madame R., hurrying home, found herself late for dinner, and several friends waiting for her whom she had invited for that day. I was one of the party, and thus came to hear of the curÉ's omelette; for our hostess did nothing but speak of it during dinner, and everybody was certain it must have been excellent.

"Thus it is that as a propagator of truths I feel it my duty to make known the preparation; and I give it the more willingly to all lovers of the art that I have not been able to find it in any cookery book.

"Hash up together the roes of two carp, carefully bleached, a piece of fresh tunny, and a little minced shallot; when well mixed throw the whole into a saucepan with a lump of the best butter, and whip it up till the butter is melted. This constitutes the specialty of the omelette.

"Then in an oval dish mix separately a lump of butter with parsley and chives, and squeezing over it the juice of a lemon, place it over hot embers in readiness. Next complete the omelette by beating up twelve eggs, pouring in the roes and tunny, and stirring till all is well mixed; then, when properly finished, and of the right form and consistence, spread it out skilfully on the oval dish which you have ready to receive it, and serve up to be eaten at once.

"This dish should be reserved for breakfasts of refinement, for connoisseurs in gastronomic art—those who understand eating, and where all eat with judgment; but especially let it be washed down with some good old wine, and you will see wonders."

Among the dignitaries of the Roman Church, Richelieu was preËminent as an entertainer, his table being renowned for its excellence, and no one being more exacting with his cooks. A chartreuse À la Cardinal or a boudin of fowls À la Richelieu at once recalls his Eminence, and the brilliant reign during which he himself virtually wielded the sceptre. "I do not think very highly of that man," said the Comte de M. in speaking of a candidate who had just secured an important position: "he has never eaten boudin À la Richelieu, and is unacquainted with cutlets À la Soubise."

During the war of Hanover, when the surrounding country had been devastated by the French army, MarÉchal Richelieu, grandnephew of the cardinal, wished to give a suitable dinner to a large number of distinguished captives before setting them free. He was informed by his cooks that the larder was empty.

"But it was only yesterday that I saw two horns passing by the window."

"That is true, Monseigneur, there is a beef and some few roots; but what would you do with them?"

"What would I do with them? Pardieu, I would have the best supper in the world!"

"But, Monseigneur, it is impossible."

"Nothing is impossible. RudiÈre, write out the menu that I will dictate. Do you know how to write out a menu properly?"

"I acknowledge, Monseigneur, that—"

"Give me your pen."

And with this the marÉchal, taking the place of his secretary, improvised a classic supper worthy of Vatel. At the end of the bill of fare was added:

"If through any mischance this repast is not an excellent one, I will deduct one hundred pistoles from the wages of Maret and RouquelÈre. Begin, and doubt no more. Richelieu."

There was a certain Bishop of Burgundy who took his share of responsibility in consuming, with a humour all his own, viands which had not been come by legally. Desiring to eat venison when not quite in season, he sent half the body of the deer that tempted him as a present to the prefect, who lived in the same town, accompanying the gift with the following note: "Partageons la responsabilitÉ: chargez-vous du temporel; je me charge du spirituel." (Let us share the responsibility; charge yourself with the temporal part; I will attend to the spiritual.)

Equally felicitous is an incident recounted of Archbishop de Sanzai of Bordeaux, who was especially fond of the fowl which Savarin pronounced one of the finest gifts of the New World to the Old. Having won a truffled turkey on a wager from a grand vicar of his diocese, the archbishop, after waiting a week, became impatient at the delay of the loser in providing the bird. Accordingly, he took him to task and reminded him that delays are dangerous, to which the vicar replied that the truffles were not good that year. "Bah, bah!" was the rejoinder, "we will chance the truffles; depend upon it, it is only a false report that has been circulated by the turkeys."

"There needs to be two to eat a truffled turkey," the AbbÉ Morellet was accustomed to say; "I never do otherwise. I have one to-day; we will be two—the turkey and myself."

It may be of interest to note that the importation of the turkey to Europe has been attributed by various scholiasts to the Jesuits, in proof of which they assert that in many French provinces it was formerly termed a jÉsuite, and that in some of the more remote departments it was the custom to refer to it in the following manner: "Come to dine with me; we will have a fat jÉsuite." "Monsieur, will you pass me some of the jÉsuite?" It is also said to have been referred to as a jÉsuite en capilotade and a jÉsuite au feu d'enfer. Savarin gives the period of its importation by the order in question as the latter part of the seventeenth century; while the Marquis de Cussy states it was imported a century earlier from Paraguay by the Jesuits, and was served for the first time in public at the marriage of Charles IX of France, when, according to Montluc, the young king disposed of the left wing.

The true date of the turkey's flight into history is the early part of the sixteenth century, when the learned confessor and historian to Cortez, Fra Agapida, returned to Spain from his first visit to Mexico, and wrote a brief narrative of the wonders of the New World. In this account he called attention to the abundance of fine fish-food, and the excellence of the venison and a variety of "wild cattle." "There is also a bird," adds the discerning presbyter, "much greater in bigness than a peacock, that is found within the forests and vegas (meadows) all over this country. It surpasses as food any wild bird we have found up to this time. The natives do shoot these birds with arrows and catch them in various kinds of springes and snares. They are sometimes very large, being as much as thirty pounds in weight. They can fly, but prefer to run, which they can do with exceeding swiftness."

No less is the introduction of the potato from South America due to the monks, who first brought it to Europe in the proud galleons of Spain.

In Canon Barham's "A Lay of St. Nicholas," where the temptations of the flesh proved stronger than the spiritual powers of the head of the abbey, turkey and chine figure as the pieces of "resistance," with old sherris sack, hippocras, and malmsey to flank them,—

The capon, however, appears to have been the greatest favourite with the clergy; its frequent companion, the carp, doubtless owing its popularity to the fact that it is so easily raised, rather than that it is more esteemed than numerous other species of fish. Even more than the capon, the carp suggests the cenobites, bringing up a whole train of monastic orders—with the cloister and the abbey as its most congenial home. It is inalienably associated with the cassock and chasuble, the rosary and censer, the peal of the organ and the glory of old stained glass. It is essentially the sacred fish—the true "sole" of piety. It whispers of sanctity and breathes of Benedicites. In fancy one sees the abbot, rotund and rubicund, presiding at table, with one eye upon the fish and the other lifted aloft, uttering his Bonum est confiteri ere the loud "Amen" resounds through the vaulted chamber, and carp and capon are bathed in the red juices of the monastery vineyard. Or it may be a pike, a mullet, or a dish of eels that, cunningly prepared by the master-cook of the brotherhood, steeps the refectory with the perfume of shallots and fine herbs, and justly merits a Benedic, anima mea from the partakers of the repast.

From an anecdote related by the Franciscan Jean Paulli de Thann, it would appear that the olden monks had learned from the Scriptures a particular method of carving fowls when they partook of them in secular company. A gentleman had invited his confessor, who was a monk, to dine in company with his wife, his two sons, and two daughters. There was a fine capon for the roast, which the host requested the guest to carve. The latter excused himself, but the host insisted.

"Inasmuch as you demand it," replied the monk, "I will carve the fowl according to biblical principles."

"Yes," exclaimed the hostess, "act according to the Scriptures."

The theologian therefore began the carving. The baron was tendered the head of the fowl, the baroness the neck, the two daughters a wing apiece, and the two sons a first joint, the monk retaining the remainder.

"According to what interpretation do you make such a division?" inquired the host of his confessor, as he regarded the monk's heaping plate and the scant portions doled out to the family.

"From an interpretation of my own," replied the monk. "As the master of your house, the head belongs to you by right; the baroness, being most near to you, should receive the neck, which is nearest the head; in the wings the young girls will recognize a symbol of their mobile thoughts, that fly from one desire to another; as to the young barons, the drumsticks they have received will remind them that they are responsible for supporting your house, as the legs of the capon support the bird itself."

In England, during Elizabeth's reign, fish was largely consumed on the festival of St. Ulric, a pious custom referred to by Barnaby Googe:

With fish much is possible in the way of a generous dietary during the Lenten penance and on meagre days. To the devout Thomas À Kempis nothing was more delicious to the taste than a salmon, always excepting the Psalms of David. The possibilities of a fish diet, however, have nowhere been more appreciably set forth than by Father Prout on the occasion of the classic "Watergrasshill Carousal," when Sir Walter Scott was among the guests. And though the turkey which was in readiness was forgone on account of the day being Friday and therefore a fast-day, the repast, nevertheless, did not languish. The trout, it will be remembered, the witty priest had caught himself from the neighbouring stream, as well as a large eel from the lake at Blarney. To these were added from the excellent market at Cork a turbot, two lobsters, a salmon, and a hake, with a hundred of Cork-harbour oysters. Besides these figured also a keg of cod-sounds, a great favourite of the bishop of the diocese, which invariably appeared at the table of Father Prout when his lordship was expected. With eggs, potatoes, sauce piquante, lobster-sauce, whiskey and claret in addition, the sacerdotal banquet proved a signal success, fully bearing out the sentiment expressed by the shepherd in the "Noctes" at the end of a Scottish repast,—"We 've just had a perfec' dinner, Mr. Tickler—neither ae dish ower mony, nor ae dish ower few."

Fish naturally demands a white wine; but a carp may be prepared—and doubtless is prepared—so sauced and spiced and aromatised by practised cloistral hands that a red wine, the favoured colour of the cowl, may accord with it perfectly. This is not saying that an abbot who may be as renowned for his gastronomic abilities as for his oratory necessarily confines himself or his followers to red wine with fish. Much will depend, of course, upon the mode of preparation,—it is to be supposed that the cellarer has both red and white wine at command to draw from as occasion demands; to be confined to a single variety must be as onerous to the cloth as to the layman. When the celebrated vineyard of Clos-Vougeot was the property of the Bernardin monks, before it was confiscated and declared national property, Dom Gobelot was the father-cellarer. It was he who, after being forced to retire to private life at Dijon, with a hundred dozen bottles of a famous year of his vineyard as a souvenir, proudly replied to the young Bonaparte, conqueror in Italy and returning from Marengo, when he requested some old Vougeot for his table: "If he wishes some forty-year-old Vougeot, let him come and drink it here; it is not for sale." And does not history record that Pope Gregory XVI, in the year 1371, made the Abbot of Clos-Vougeot a cardinal to express his gratitude for a present of a basket of his best old wine which the abbot had sent him?

The famous wine of "Est, Est, Est" owes its celebrity to a German bishop named Fuger, who, while on a journey to Italy, sent his secretary in advance in order to provide the best accommodations. He was especially charged to test the wine in all the inns en route, and wherever he found it best to write the word "Est" on the wall of the albergo. Arriving at Montefiascone, a small town on the highroad from Florence to Rome, the secretary found the wine so superior that he was at a loss to describe it until he bethought him of the inscription that a sultan of Lahore had engraved on the door of his seraglio,—"If there is a paradise on earth, it is here, it is here, it is here!" Accordingly, he wrote the word "Est" thrice in large characters on the wall of the principal inn—a fatal word for the bishop, who tarried so long and drank so freely that he died ere reaching his destination—Rome. His tomb exists at Montefiascone. On either side of his mitre and his arms his secretary had carved a reversed glass, with this epitaph on the stone: Est, Est, Est, et propter nimium est Johannes de Fuger dominus meus mortuus est. The explanation of the epitaph and emblems is given by the Roman prelate, Valery. It is still further averred that the death of Cardinal Mauri, a distinguished Italian prelate, whose remains were interred near those of the German bishop in the Church of St. Flavien, was also hastened by his fondness for the Montefiascone wine. The story of the bibulous bishop was told in 1825 in German, in a poem of fourteen stanzas, by Wilhelm MÜller, father of Professor Max MÜller.[39] It has also been excellently rendered in English verse by an American poetess whose name the efforts of the writer have been unable to trace:

To judge of the quality of Montefiascone, one must drink it at its home; like other white wines of the former Papal States, it will not bear the shock of distant carriage. As for the German ecclesiast, one should not take him too seriously, but consider him rather from the picturesque point of view, as Rowlandson and Combe have done with the reverend Syntax. "Other times, other manners,"—to-day his reverence would have made the journey by rail and not by post, and thus, doubtless, would have missed the fiasci of Montefiascone. One must also bear in mind that the wine in question, being of the muscat type, is extremely heady and exciting to the nerves, its deleterious effects being masked by its unctuousness and engaging aroma; so that an unsuspecting beer-drinking bishop, accustomed to copious libations of a milder fluid, might readily and unwittingly find himself under the table, and, even though a hierarch, prove an easy subject for a De Profundis. Many years have elapsed since the prelate's demise; and it is to be supposed that, meanwhile, the nectar of Est has been rendered less potent and even more delectable in heavenly vineyards.