Destined by Providence to wander over the globe, and to live in various climes, man is essentially an omnivorous animal. According to the country he inhabits, its productions and the nature of his pursuits, his mode of living differs. The inhabitant of cold and sterile regions on the borders of the ocean becomes ichthyophagous; and fish, fresh, dried, smoked, or salted, is his principal nourishment. The bold huntsman lives upon the game he pursues; while the nomadian shepherd, who tends his herd over boundless steeps, supports himself on the milk of his flock. In warm countries fruits and vegetables constitute the chief support of life; and there the disciples of Pythagoras can luxuriate on the rich produce of a bountiful soil, solely debarring themselves from beans, which, like all flesh, they consider to have been created by putrefaction. What would these good people have done among the Scythians and the GetÆ, who, according to Sidonius Apollinaris, mingled blood and milk for food—

————————Solitosque cruentum
Lac potare Getas, ac pocula tingere venis;

or the stunted natives of the arctic regions, who feed upon whales and seals, drink deep potations of train-oil, and consider the warm blood of the seal an exquisite beverage, dried herrings moistened with blubber a dainty, and the flesh of the seal half frozen in snow during winter, or half corrupted in the earth in summer, the most delicious morsel. The semi-barbarous Russians, who during the late wars enjoyed the abundant bills of fare of France and Italy, accustom themselves easily to this disgusting diet on their return; and their troops, who live amongst the Samoiedes, thrive uncommonly well on raw flesh and rein-deer blood. It is in temperate regions that man displays his omnivorous propensities: there, animal food can be abundantly procured; and every description of grain, roots, and fruit, is easily cultivated. It is as we pass from these middle climes towards the poles, that animal substances are more exclusively consumed; and towards the equator that we enjoy refreshing fruits, and nourishing roots and vegetables. So scarce is food in some desolate tracts of the globe, that we find the wandering Indian satisfying his cravings with earth and clay: and Humboldt informs us that the Ottomaques, on the banks of the Mata and Oronoco, feed on a fat unctuous earth, in the choice of which they display great epicurean skill, and which they knead into balls of four or six inches in diameter, and bake slowly over the fire. When about to be used, these clods are soaked in water, and each individual consumes about a pound of them in the day; the only addition which they occasionally make to this strange fare consists in small fish, lizards, and fern-roots.

The art of cookery has improved, no doubt, with the progressive advance and development of our other institutions; and it seems to prove that the employment of all kinds of food is as natural to man, as a stationary uniformity and restriction of one species of aliment is to animals. A most erroneous idea has prevailed regarding the use of animal food, which has been considered as the best calculated to render mankind robust and courageous. This is disproved by observation. The miserable and timid inhabitants of Northern Europe and Asia are remarkable for their moral and physical debility, although they chiefly live on fish or raw flesh; whereas the athletic Scotch and Irish are certainly not weaker than their English neighbours, though consuming but little meat. The strength and agility of the negroes is well known, and the South Sea islanders can vie in bodily exercises with our stoutest seamen. We have reason to believe, that, at the most glorious periods of Grecian and Roman power, their armies were principally subsisted upon bread, vegetables, and fruits.

Man by his natural structure was created omnivorous, and there is no doubt but that a judicious mixed alimentation is the best calculated to ensure health and vigour, and enable the ambitious or the industrious wanderer to spend his winters near the poles, colonize beneath the equator, or inhabit regions where the hardiest of animals must starve and die. The teeth, the jaws, all the digestive organs fit him for this mode of existence. There is a curious passage in one of Dr. Franklin’s letters in regard to wine: he pleasantly observes, that the only animals created to drink water are those who from their conformation are able to lap it on the surface of the earth, whereas all those who can carry their hands to their mouth were destined to enjoy the juice of the grape.

The diversity of substances which we find in the catalogue of articles of food is as great as the variety with which the art or the science of cookery prepares them: the notions of the ancients on this most important subject are worthy of remark. Their taste regarding meat was various. Beef they considered the most substantial food; hence it constituted the chief nourishment of their athletÆ. Camels’ and dromedaries’ flesh was much esteemed, their heels most especially. Donkey-flesh was in high repute; MÆcenas, according to Pliny, delighted in it; and the wild ass, brought from Africa, was compared to venison. In more modern times we find Chancellor Dupret having asses fattened for his table. The hog and the wild boar appear to have been held in great estimation; and a hog was called “animal propter convivia natum;” but the classical portion of the sow was somewhat singular—“vulv nil dulcius amplÂ.” Their mode of killing swine was as refined in barbarity as in epicurism. Plutarch tells us that the gravid sow was actually trampled to death, to form a delicious mass fit for the gods. At other times, pigs were slaughtered with red-hot spits, that the blood might not be lost; stuffing a pig with asafoetida and various small animals, was a luxury called “porcus Trojanus;” alluding, no doubt, to the warriors who were concealed in the Trojan horse. Young bears, dogs, and foxes, (the latter more esteemed when fed upon grapes,) were also much admired by the Romans; who were also so fond of various birds, that some consular families assumed the names of those they most esteemed. Catius tells us how to drown fowls in Falernian wine, to render them more luscious and tender. Pheasants were brought over from Colchis, and deemed at one time such a rarity, that one of the Ptolemies bitterly lamented his having never tasted any. Peacocks were carefully reared in the island of Samos, and sold at such a high price, that Varro informs us they fetched yearly upwards of 2000l. of our money. The guinea-fowl was considered delicious; but, wretched people! the Romans knew not the turkey, a gift which we moderns owe to the Jesuits. Who could vilify the disciples of Loyola after this information! The ostrich was much relished; Heliogabalus delighted in their brains, and Apicius especially commends them. But, of all birds, the flamingo was not only esteemed as a bonne-bouche, but was most valuable after dinner; for, when the gluttonous sensualists had eaten too much, they introduced one of its long scarlet feathers down their throats, to disgorge their dinner. The modern gastronome is perhaps not aware that it is to the ancients he owes his delicious fattened duck and goose livers,—the inestimable foies gras of France. Thus Horace:

Pinguibus et ficis pastum jecur anseris albi.

The swan was also fattened by the Romans, who first deprived it of sight; and cranes were by no means despised by people of taste. In later days the swan seems to have been in great estimation in our own country. We find in the Northumberland household book that in one year twenty of these birds were consumed at the earl’s table.

While the feathered creation was doomed to form part of ancient delights, the waters yielded their share of enjoyments, and several fishes were immortalized. The murÆna Helena was educated in their ponds, and rendered so tame that he came to be killed at the tinkling of his master’s bell or the sound of his voice.

Natat ad magistrum delicta murÆna,

says Martial. Hirtius ceded six thousand of these fish to CÆsar as a great favour, and Vitellius delighted in their roe. The fame of the lamprey, mustela of Ausonius and Pliny, is generally known; and the sturgeon, the acipenser sturio, was brought to table with triumphant pomp: but the turbot, one of which was brought to Domitian from Ancona, was considered such a present from the gods, that this emperor assembled the senate to admire it. Soles were also so delectable that punning on the word solea, they were called the soles of the gods: the dorad, sparus auratus, was consecrated to Venus; the labrus scarus was called the brain of Jupiter, and Apuleius and Epicharmus maintain that its very entrails would be relished in Olympus.

To these dainties may be added the AlphestÆ, a fish always caught in pairs from their eagerness to be eaten. The Amia so very delicious that the Athenians defied the worst cook to spoil them. The Gnaphius that imparted to the water that had had the honour to boil them, the facility of taking out all stains. The Pompilus which sprang with Venus from the blood of the sky. The fish called fox by the Rhodians, and dog by the Boeotians, was considered such a dainty that Archestratus recommended epicures to steal them if they could not procure them by honest means; adding, that all calamities should be considered immaterial after a man had once feasted on such a luscious morsel, too divine to be gazed upon by vulgar eyes, and which ought to be procured by the wealthy, if they did not wish to incur the wrath of the gods, for not appreciating at its true value the flower of their nectar. Eels were also highly esteemed by the ancients. The preference being given to the Copaic, which the Boeotians offered to the gods crowned with flowers, giving them the same rank among fish that Helen held amongst women.

The garum, or celebrated fish-sauce of the Romans, was principally made out of the sciÆna umbra, and the mackerel; the entrails and blood being macerated in brine until they became putrid.

Expirantis adhuc scombri, de sanguine primo
Accipe fastosum munera cara garum:—

thus says Martial: and Galen affirms that this disgusting preparation was so precious, that a measure of about three or four pints fetched two thousand silver pieces. So delightful was the effluvium of the garum considered, that Martial informs us it was carried about in onyx smelling-bottles. But our luxurious civic chiefs are not aware that the red mullet—for such I believe was the mullus—was held in such a distinguished category among genteel fishes, that three of them, although of small size, were known to fetch upwards of 200l. They were more appreciated when brought alive, and gradually allowed to die, immersed in the delicious garum; when the Romans feasted their eyes in the anticipated delight of eating them, by gazing on the dying creature as he changed colour like an expiring dolphin. Seneca reproaches them with this refinement of cruelty—“Oculis quoque gulosi sunt;” and the most renowned of Apicius’s culinary discoveries was the alec, a compound of their livers.

Snails were also a great dainty. Fulvius Herpinus was immortalized for the discovery of the art of fattening them on bran and other articles; and Horace informs us they were served up, broiled upon silver gridirons, to give a relish to wine. Oysters were brought from our coasts to Rome, and frozen oysters were much extolled. Grasshoppers, locusts, and various insects, were equally acceptable to our first gastronomic legislators. Acorns, similar to those now eaten in Spain, formed part of a Roman dessert; the best were brought from Naples and Tarentum. It does not appear that the ancients had a great variety in their vegetable diet; condiments to stimulate the sluggish appetite seemed to be their principal research: amongst these the asafoetida, which is to this day highly relished in the East, was an indispensable ingredient; this has been doubted by various naturalists, but it appears certain, since Pliny informs us that it was frequently adulterated by sagapenum, which bears the strongest resemblance to it. This substance was called laser, and by many tasteless persons, such as Aristophanes and Apuleius, considered offensive and disgusting; hence the latter, “lasere infectas carnes,” and “laseratum porcellum.” According to Theophrastus, asafoetida was collected and preserved, as it is at present, in skins; and, despite its estimation as a culinary ingredient, it was not unfrequently named stercus diaboli. In addition to this gum, they seasoned their food with various other strong articles, such as coriander and cummin seeds, sumac, saffron, cinnamon, thyme; with divers peppers, salt, and sal-ammoniac.

Instead of bread, which was only introduced in Rome 580, A. D. they used a heavy kind of unleavened paste, similar to the present polenta. This nourishment occasioned frequent indigestion, hence the use of warm water after meals, and the necessity of emetics. Warm water was sold about the streets in their thermopolia, and Seneca observed the paleness and debility that arose from its use and abuse; a practice recorded by Martial:

Et potet calidam, qui mihi livet, aquam.

While water was thus freely drunk, wine was not disregarded; but the various articles with which it was adulterated, must have rendered it any thing but a delectable potation according to our received ideas. Thus we see the Greeks putting salt and sea-water in theirs; at other times dissolving mastic and myrrha, or infusing wormwood, in their choicest Falernian. Like modern tasters, however, they knew the method of developing the bouquet by warmth; and, to appreciate the flavour, they frequently added hot water. That wines of a resinous taste were esteemed, appears from Martial:

Resinata bibis vina, Falerna fugis.

But we may conclude that, according to our modern taste, their boasted wines did not equal ours either in flavour or in delicacy.

The ancients however were very careful in the preparation of their bread, justly called the “staff of life,” as constituting one of the most wholesome and nutritious parts of our food. The Athenian bakers bore the palm in the confection of this article. Archestratus recommended the wheaten bread of Athens and the barley meal of Lesbos, which their poets asserted was supplied to the gods. The Grecian millet bread was also in great repute, while delicious bread was also made with the Zea, the Triticum Spella of LinnÆus and the Far of the Romans. A species of wheat called Tiphe was also much esteemed. Brown bread was made of a grain called Olyra, and it was with loaves of this description that Homer’s heroes fed their horses.

It appears that great attention was paid to the kneeding and the boulting: unboulted meal was called Syncomista, and when finely boulted in a woollen cloth, Semidalis. The most approved method of baking was in the Cribanus or Clibanus, an earthen or iron vessel, which they surrounded with charcoal. Bread according to its superior or inferior quality was consecrated to various divinities. Thus the goddesses used the Homoros, and Hecate was served with the Hemiantium, but we are unacquainted with the preparation of these varieties. The flour of barley was used by the CanephorÆ, or virgins that bore the sacred baskets in the festivals of Ceres, to sprinkle themselves. Bread according to its particular kind was served up in various ways; wheaten bread was brought to table upon fresh leaves; barley bread upon a layer of reeds. At the feasts of Ceres and Proserpine, a large loaf was kneeded and baked by the ladies of Delos, called AchaÏnas which gave the name to the festival, instituted most probably in Achaia, to commemorate the invention of bread, which Ceres taught to Eumelus, a citizen of PatrÆ.

Barley for the preparation of bread was used long before wheat or any other sort of corn, and hence Artemidorus calls it Antiquissimum in cibis. It was also given to the athletÆ who were thence called Hordearii. In latter times it was chiefly given to cattle, although used by the poorer classes. Barley bread was also issued to soldiers as a punishment, the loss of wheaten bread being considered a great privation. Vegetius tells us that soldiers who had been guilty of any offence were thus punished—“hordeum pro frumentuo cogebantur accipere.” In the second Punic war we find Marcellus sentencing the cohorts that had lost their standards to this infliction. Suetonius also informs us that Augustus only allowed barley to the troops that had misbehaved in action. Cohortes, si quÆ cepissent, loco, decimatas hordeo pavit. But there is reason to believe that under the head of bread were included various kinds of cakes, many of which were prepared with honey, some of them were called PlacentÆ omnigenÆ, and were prepared by bakers who bore the name of pistores dulciarii. This honied bread or cake it appears, was frequently resorted to, as in the present day, to quiet troublesome children as well as to please the taste of fastidious patients. Thus Martial:

Leniat ut fauces medicus, quas aspera vexat
AssiduÈ tussis, ParthenopÆ tibi
Mella dari, nucleosque jubet dulcesque placentas.
Est quidquid pueros non sinit esse truces,
At tu non cessas totis tussire diebus
Non est hÆc tussis, ParthenopÆ gula est.

The bread made of spring wheat was called Collabus, and the Athenians considered a toasted Collabus eaten with a slice of a pig’s belly, the very best cure for a surfeit occasioned by an excess in anchovies, especially the Phalerian ones, which were deemed fit for the gods.

Fragments of bread it appears were used instead of napkins to wipe the fingers on. These were called ApomygdaliÆ, with which Aristophanes fed his sausage-makers. These dainty bits were usually thrown to dogs.

The cooks of the ancients appear to have been much more consummate in their art than our modern practitioners. AthenÆus records various descriptions of their incomparable science. A new dish immortalized its inventor, and transmitted his name to posterity. Apicius’s cakes were called Apicians; and Aristoxenes had attained such perfection in curing hams, that the glorious appellation of Aristoxenians was bestowed upon them. Philosophers and poets gloried in their culinary science; the pleasures of the table were the subject of their writings and their conversation. Archestratus tells us with delight, that, although various delicacies can only be enjoyed in their proper season, yet we can talk about them with watering mouths all the year round.

One of these illustrious ministers of luxury attained such a degree of enviable perfection, that he could serve up a pig boiled on one side and roasted on the other, and moreover stuffed with all possible delicacies, without the incision through which these dainties were introduced being perceived. Supplicated to explain this wonderful secret, he swore solemnly by the manes of all the heroes who fell at Marathon, or conquered at Salamis, that he would not reveal this sacred mystery for one year. When the happy day arrived and he was no longer bound by his vows, he condescended to inform his anxious hearers, that the animal had been bled to death by a wound under the shoulder, through which the entrails were extracted; and afterwards hanging up the victim by the legs, the stuffing was crammed down his throat. One half of the pig was then covered with a thick paste, seasoned with wine and oil, put into a brass oven, and gently and tenderly roasted: when the skin was brown and crisp, our hero proceeded to boil the other moiety; the paste was then removed, and the boiled and roasted grunter triumphantly served up.

So refined was the taste of the ancient bons vivans, that Montanus, according to Juvenal, would proclaim, at the first bite, whether an oyster was of English produce or not. Sandwich is believed to have been the favoured spot whence Rome imported her oysters and other shell-fish. Shrimps and prawns must have been in great estimation, since we find Apicius quitting his residence at MinturnÆ, upon hearing that the shrimps of Africa were finer than those he could procure in Campania. He instantly set sail for the happy coast, despite a gale of wind: after encountering a desperate storm, he reached the wished-for land of promise; but alas!—the fishermen displayed the largest prawns they could collect, and to his cruel disappointment, they could not vie, either in delicacy or beauty, with those of MinturnÆ. He immediately ordered his pilot to steer a homeward course, and left Africa’s shore with ineffable contempt.

These ingenious gluttons had recourse to every experiment that could add to their enjoyment. Philoxenus, and many others, used to accustom themselves to swallow hot water, that they might be able to attack scalding dishes before less fireproof guests would dare to taste them.

Sinon maintained that cookery was the basis of all arts and sciences: natural philosophy taught us the seasoning of dishes; architecture directed the construction of stoves and chimneys; the fine arts, the beautiful symmetry of each dish; and the principles of war were applied to the drilling and marshalling of cooks, confectioners, and scullions, posting proper sentries to watch the fires, and videttes to keep off idle intruders. That man is a “cooking animal” is considered one of his proudest attributes, and a proper bill of fare may be considered as the ne plus ultra of human genius!

It may be easily imagined that when good living became a science, sponging upon the wealthy Amphitryons became an art amongst the needy bons vivants, and parasites, as in the present day, were ever seen fawning and cringing for their dinner. These sycophants stuck so close to their patrons, that they were called shadows. Thus Horace:

——Quos Moecenas adduxerat umbras.

They were also called flies, ???a?, by the Greeks, and MuscÆ by the Romans; no doubt from their constant buzzing about the object of their devotion. Plautus calls an entertainment free from these despicable guests, Hospitium sine muscis. Horus Apollo tells us that in Egypt a fly was the symbol of an impudent fellow; because, although driven away, it will constantly return. We have, however, reason to believe that the term parasite was originally applied to the followers of princes, Patroclus was the parasite of Achilles, and Memnon of Idomeneus; it was only in later times that the appellation was given to despicable characters and “trencher friends.”

Our Shakspeare had adopted the term of the ancients, as appears in the following passages:

In such as you,
That creep like shadows by him, and do sigh
At each his needless heavings.

And again—

Feast-won, fast-lost, one cloud of winter showers.
These flies are couched.

While climate points out the most suitable articles of food, it exercises a singular influence over their qualities and properties, more especially in vegetable substances. We find plants which are poisonous in some countries, edible and wholesome in others. Next to climate, culture and soil modify plants to a singular degree: flowers which yield a powerful perfume in some latitudes, are inodorous in others; and, according to climate, their aroma is pleasant or distressing. A striking proof of this fact can be adduced from the well-known effects of perfumes in Rome; where the inhabitants, especially females, cannot support the scent even of the rose, which has been known to produce syncope, illustrating the poet’s line to

Die of a rose in aromatic pain.

This variety in the action of vegetable substances is more particularly observable in such as are considered medicinal. Opium, narcotics, and various drugs, are more powerful in warm climates than in northern regions. The Italian physicians express astonishment at the comparatively large doses prescribed by our practitioners.Cultivation brings forth singular intermediate productions; and by its magic power we have seen the coriaceous and bitter almond transformed into the luscious peach, the sloe converted into the delicious plum, and the common crab transformed into the golden pippin. The same facts are observed in vegetables; the celery sprung from the nauseous and bitter apium graveolens, and the colewort, is metamorphosed into the cabbage and the cauliflower. All cruciform plants degenerate within the tropics, but acquire increased energies in cold countries.

Recent experiments in Germany have demonstrated that in times of scarcity, the wood of several trees may be converted into a nutritious substance. The fibres of the beech, birch, lime, poplar, fir, and various other trees, when dried, ground, and sifted into an impalpable powder, constitute a very palatable article of food. If cold water be poured on this ligneous flour, enclosed in a linen bag, it becomes milky, and considerable pressure and kneading is required to express the amylaceous or starchy part of it. Professor Von Buch, in his travels through Norway and Lapland, has fully described the Norwegian barke brÖd. We find the savages scattered along the coast of the great austral continent mixing up a paste of the bark of the gum-tree with the ants and the other insects, with their larvÆ, which they find in it. Ground dried fish and fish-bones have from time immemorial been converted into bread; Arrianus tells us that Nearchus found several nations on the shores of the Red Sea living upon a bread of this description.

It is thus evident that all substances from the animal and vegetable kingdom appear to afford more or less nutriment, provided that they contain no elements unlike the animal matter of the being they are intended to nourish. All others are either medicinal or poisonous. Food may be considered nourishing in the ratio of its easy digestion or solution. Magendie attributes the nutritious principle to the greater or lesser proportion of nitrogen or azote. According to his view of the subject, the substances that contain little or no nitrogen are the saccharine and acid fruits, oils, fats, butter, mucilaginous vegetables, refined sugar, starch, gum, vegetable mucus, and vegetable gelatin. The different kinds of corn, rice and potatoes, are elements of the same kind. The azotical aliments, on the contrary, are vegetable albumen, gluten, and those principles which are met with in the seeds, stems and leaves of grasses and herbs, the seeds of leguminous plants, such as peas and beans, and most animal substances, with the exception of fat.

To this doctrine, it was objected, that animals who feed upon substances containing little nitrogen, and the field negroes, who consume large quantities of sugar, might be adduced as an exception. Magendie replies, that almost all the vegetables consumed by man and animals contain more or less nitrogen—that this element enters in large quantity in the composition of impure sugar—and lastly, that the nations whose principal food consists in rice, maize, or potatoes, consume at the same time milk and cheese.

To support his theory, this physiologist had recourse to various curious experiments on dogs, whom he fed with substances which contained no nitrogen. During the first seven or eight days, the animals were brisk and active, and took their food and drink as usual. In the course of the second week they began to get thin, although their appetite continued good, and they took daily between six and eight ounces of sugar. The emaciation increased during the third week; they became feeble, lost their appetite and activity, and at the same time ulcers appeared in the cornea of their eyes. The animals still continued to eat three or four ounces of sugar daily, but, nevertheless, became at length so feeble as to be incapable of motion, and died on a day varying from the 31st to the 34th: and it must be recollected that dogs will live the same length of time without any food.

The same were the results where dogs were fed upon gum, and butter; when they were fed with olive oil and water the phenomena were the same, with the exception of ulceration of the cornea.

In Denmark, a diet of bread and water for a month is considered equivalent to the punishment of death. Dr. Stark died in consequence of experiments which he instituted on himself to ascertain the effects of a sugar diet.

Muller has justly observed that these experiments of Magendie have thrown considerable light on the causes and the mode of treatment of the gout and calculous disorders. The subjects of these diseases are generally persons who live well and eat largely of animal food; most urinary calculi, gravelly deposits, the gouty concretions, and the perspiration of gouty persons, contain an abundance of uric acid, a substance in which nitrogen is contained in a large proportion. Thus, by diminishing the proportion of azotical substance in the food, the gout and gravelly deposits may be prevented.

The experiments of Tiedemann and Gmelin have confirmed those of Magendie, whose curious observations on the necessity of varying diet I shall transcribe.

1. A dog fed on white bread, wheat, and water, did not live more than fifty days.

2. Another dog, who was kept on brown soldiers’ bread did not suffer.

3. Rabbits and guineapigs who were fed solely on any one of the following substances—oats, barley, cabbage, and carrots,—died of inanition in fifteen days; but they did not suffer when these substances were given simultaneously or in succession.

4. An ass fed on dry rice, and afterwards on boiled rice, lived only fifteen days; a cock, on the contrary, was fed with boiled rice for several months with no ill consequence.

5. Dogs fed with cheese alone, or hard eggs, lived for a long time; but they became feeble and lost their hair.

6. Rodent animals will live a very long time on muscular substances.

7. After an animal has been fed for a long period on one kind of aliment, which, if continued, will not support life, allowing it the former customary food will not save it: he will eat eagerly, but will die as soon as if he had continued to be restricted to the article of food which was first given him.

Dr. Paris is of opinion that all that these experiments tend to prove is, that animals cannot exist upon highly-concentrated aliment. Horses fed on concentrated aliment are liable to various disorders, originating from diseased action of the stomach and liver, broken wind, staggers, blindness, &c.

Professor Muller has given an excellent definition of indigestion. “It is a state of the digestive organs in which either they do not secrete the fluid destined for the solution of the aliment, or they are in such a condition of irritability or atony, that by the mechanical irritation of the food, painful sensations and irregular motions are exerted.”

But the most curious experiments made on the changes which the food undergoes in the stomach, according to the greater or lesser facility with which it is digested, were those of Dr. Beaumont. This physiologist had the rare opportunity of investigating this subject in a patient of the name of St. Martin, who came under his care in consequence of a gun-shot wound, which left a considerable opening in the stomach, which, when empty, could be explored to the depth of five or six inches by artificial distention. The food and the drink could in this manner be seen to enter it. This enabled him to keep an interesting journal and table, showing the time required for the digestion of different kinds of food, which were taken with bread or vegetables, or both. The following are some of his interesting observations:

Experiment 33. At 1 o’clock St. Martin dined on roast beef, bread, and potatoes—in half an hour examined the contents of the stomach, found what he had eaten reduced to a mass resembling thick porridge. At 2 o’clock, nearly all chymified—a few distinct particles of food still to be seen. At half-past four, chymification complete. At 6 o’clock nothing in the stomach but a little gastric juice tinged with bile.

Ex. 42. At 8 a.m., breakfast of three hard-boiled eggs, pancakes, and coffee. At half-past eight, found a heterogenous mixture of the articles slightly digested. At a quarter-past ten, no part of breakfast could be seen.

Ex. 43. At 2 o’clock same day, dined on roast pig and vegetables. At 3 they were chymified; and at half-past four nothing remained but a little gastric juice.

Ex. 18, in a third series. At half-past eight a.m., two drams of fresh fried sausage, in a fine muslin bag, were suspended in the stomach of St. Martin, who immediately afterwards breakfasted on the same kind of sausage, and a piece of broiled mutton, wheaten bread, and a pint of coffee. At half-past eleven, stomach half empty, contents of bag about half diminished. At 2 o’clock p.m., stomach empty and clean, contents of bag all gone with the exception of fifteen grains, consisting of small pieces of cartilaginous and membranous fibres, and the spices of the sausage, which last weighed six grains.

As I have elsewhere observed, various are the theories that have been entertained in regard to digestion, but the experiments of Dr. Beaumont seem to have proved beyond a doubt, that this operation is due to the action of the gastric juice, with which he was enabled to produce artificial digestion. Having obtained one ounce of this solvent from the stomach of his patient, he put into it a solid piece of recently-boiled beef, weighing three drams, and placed the vessel that contained it in a water bath heated to 100°. In forty minutes digestion had commenced on the surface of the meat; in fifty minutes, the fluid was quite opake and cloudy, the external texture began to separate and become loose; in sixty minutes, chyme began to form. At 1 p.m. (two hours after the commencement of the experiment), the cellular substance was destroyed, the muscular fibres loose and floating about in fine small threads very tender and soft. In six hours they were nearly all digested—a few fibres only remaining. After the lapse of ten hours, every part of the meat was completely digested. The artificial digestion by these experiments appears to be but little slower than the natural process—they also demonstrate the influence of the temperature, and the quantity of the solvent secretion. Having obtained from St. Martin two ounces of gastric juice, he divided this quantity into two equal portions, and laid in each an equal quantity of masticated roast beef. One he placed in a water bath at the temperature of 99° Farh.—and left the other exposed to the open air at the temperature of 34°; a third similar portion of meat he kept in a phial, with an ounce of cold water. An hour after the commencement of the experiment, St. Martin had finished his breakfast, which consisted of the same meat with biscuit, butter, and coffee. Two hours after the meat had been put into the phial, the portion in the warm gastric juice was as far advanced in chymification as the food in the stomach; the meat in the cold gastric juice was less acted on, and that in the cold water only slightly macerated. In two hours and forty-five minutes from the time that the experiment was begun, the food in the stomach was completely digested, the stomach empty, while even at the end of six hours the meat in the gastric juice was only half digested. Dr. Beaumont, therefore, having procured 12 drams of fresh gastric juice, added now a portion to each of the phials containing meat and gastric juice, and to a portion of the half-digested food which he had withdrawn from the stomach two hours after the commencement of the experiment, and which had not advanced towards solution. After eight hours’ maceration, the portions of meat in the cold gastric juice, and in the cold water, were little changed, but, from the time of the addition of the fresh gastric juice, digestion went on rapidly in the other phials, which were kept at the proper heat, and at the end of 24 hours, the meat which had been withdrawn from the stomach after digestion had commenced, were, with the exception of a piece of meat that had not been masticated, converted into a thickish pulpy mass of a reddish-brown colour: the meat in the warm gastric juice was also digested, though less perfectly, while that in the cold gastric juice was scarcely more acted on than the meat in the water, which was merely macerated. Dr. Beaumont now exposed these two phials containing the meat in cold gastric juice, and meat in water, to the heat of the water bath for 24 hours, and the gastric juice, which when cold had no power on the meat, now digested it; while the meat in the water underwent no change, except that towards the end of the experiment, putrefaction had commenced. The antiseptic properties of the gastric juice were fully demonstrated in several other experiments.

Various philosophers, in idle disquisitions, have endeavoured by the most absurd hypotheses to determine what is the natural food of man, and to show that he is not created omnivorous. The comparison between our species and animals confutes these vain theories. The masticatory and digestive organization of man assigns to him an intermediate rank between carnivorous and herbivorous creatures. The teeth may be said by their figure and construction to bear a relation with our natural food. The teeth of flesh-eating animals rise in sharp prominences to seize and lacerate their prey, and those of the lower jaw shut within those of the superior one. The herbivorous animals are not armed with these formidable weapons, but have broad flat surfaces with intermixed plates of enamel, that they should wear less rapidly in the constant labour of grinding and triturating. In the carnivorous, the jaws can only move backward and forward; in the herbivorous their motion is lateral, as observed in the cow when chewing her cud. Beasts of prey tear and swallow their food in masses, while in others it undergoes a careful communition before it is transmitted to the stomach. The teeth of man only resemble those of carnivorous animals by their enamel being confined to their external surface, while in the freedom of the motion of the jaws from side to side they partake of the conformation of the herbivorous. The teeth and jaws of man are in all respects more similar to those of monkeys than any other animals; only in some of the simiÆ the canine teeth are much longer and stronger, and denote a carnivorous propensity.

It is to the abuse of this omnivorous faculty that Providence has bestowed upon mankind, that we owe many of the diseases under which our species labours. “Multos morbos, multa fercula fecerunt,” sayeth Seneca; yet we are far more temperate in the present age than the ancients during the period of their boasted high civilization and prosperity. Their excesses must have been of the most disgusting nature, since, to indulge more easily in their gluttonous propensities, they had recourse to emetics both before and after their meals. “Vomunt ut edant, edunt ut vomunt, et epulas quas toto orbe conquirunt nec concoquere dignantur,” was the reproach of the above-quoted philosopher. Suetonius and Dion Cassius give Vitellius the credit of having introduced this revolting custom into fashion; and splendid vessels for the purpose were introduced in their feasts. Martial alludes to it in the following lines:

Nec coenat priÙs, aut recumbit, antÈ
Quam septem vomuit meri deunces.

And Juvenal tells us that the bath was polluted by this incredible act of bestiality,—

Et crudum pavonem in balne portas.

The sums expended by the ancients on their table exceed all belief. Vitellius expended for that purpose upwards of 3200l. daily, and some of his repasts cost 40,000l. At one of them, according to Suetonius, 7000 birds and 2000 fishes were served up. Ælius Verus laid out 600,000 sestertii on one meal; and some of the dishes of Heliogabalus cost about 4000l. of our money. The excesses of this monster were such, that Herodianus affirms that he wanted to ascertain, not only the flavour of human flesh, but of the most disgusting and nameless substances. The freaks related of this emperor are scarcely credible; but his gastronomic profusion may be easily conceived when we find that his very mats were made with the down of hares or soft feathers found under the wings of partridges! When such ideas of enjoyment prevailed, can we wonder that Philoxenus should have wished that he had the throat of a crane, that he might prolong the delights of eating!

Our early ancestors were remarkable for their frugality, and it is supposed that luxurious, or, at least, full living was introduced by the Danes: it has been even asserted that the verb gormandize was derived from Gormond, a Danish king, who was persuaded by Alfred to be baptized. Erasmus observed that the English were particularly fond of good fare. William the Conqueror, and Rufus, were in the habit of giving most splendid entertainments; and the former monarch was such an irascible epicure, that, upon one occasion, an underdone crane having been served up by the master of the cury, he would have knocked him down but for the timely interference of his dapifer, or purveyor of the mouth. This office of dapifer, with that of lardrenius, magnus coquus, coquorum prepositus, and coquus regius, were high dignitaries in those days. Cardinal Otto, the pope’s legate, being at Oxford in 1238, his brother was his magister coquorum; and the reasons assigned for his holding that office were his brother’s suspicious fears “ne procuraretur aliquid venenosum, quod valdÈ timebat legatus.” These officers were not unfrequently clergymen, who were elevated to the bench for their valuable services.

Whatever barbarity the ancients may have shown in preparing their dainty dishes, none could have surpassed in refinement of cruelty. Their method of roasting and eating a goose alive, is thus directed: “Take a goose or a duck, or some such lively creature, (but the goose is best of all for the purpose,) pull off all her feathers, only the head and neck must be spared; then make a fire round about her, not too close to her, that the smoke do not choke her, and that the fire may not burn her too soon, nor too far off, that she may not escape the fire; within the circle of the fire, let there be small cups and pots full of water, wherein salt and honey are mingled, and let there be set also chargers full of sodden apples, cut into small pieces in the dish. The goose must be all larded and basted over with butter, to make her the more fit to be eaten, and may roast the better. Put the fire about her but do not make too much haste, when as you see her begin to roast; for by walking about, and flying here and there, being cooped in by the fire that stops her way out, the unscared goose is kept in; she will fall to drink the water to quench her thirst and cool her heart, and all her body, and the apple sauce will cleanse and empty her, and when she wasteth, and consumes inwardly, always wet her head and heart with a wet sponge, and when you see her giddy with running and begin to stumble, her heart wants moisture, and she is roasted enough. Take her up and set her before your guest, and she will cry as you cut off any part from her, and will be almost eaten up before she is dead. It is mighty pleasant to behold.”

Our forefathers were most ingenious in these diabolical fancies, we find in Portar’s Magick the way how to persuade a goose to roast herself if you have a lack of cooks.

The heroic conduct of French cooks has been recorded in history, and compared with the noble devotion of the ancients. Vatel, maÎtre d’hÔtel of Louis XIV., put an end to his wretched existence in consequence of fish not having arrived in time for dinner. On this sad event being reported to his sovereign, he both praised and blamed his courage; and, to use the words of Madame de SevignÉ, he perished “À force d’avoir de l’honneur À sa maniÈre; on loua fort et l’on blama son courage.” It is strange that Napoleon should have used the very same expressions when speaking of one of his most distinguished generals. In more modern times we have heard of persons who expected that clerical functions should be combined with various lay duties, as appears by the following curious advertisement in a late paper:

“Wanted, for a family who have bad health, a sober, steady person, in the capacity of doctor, surgeon, apothecary, and man-midwife. He must occasionally act as butler, and dress hair and wigs. He will be required sometimes to read prayers, and to preach a sermon every Sunday. A good salary will be given.” This was certainly an economical speculation for the use of soul and body.

Cooks have sometimes been obliged to resort to pious frauds; and it is related of our Richard Coeur de Lion, that, being very ill during the holy wars, he took a strange fancy for a bit of pork, but, as no pig could be procured, a plump Saracen child was roasted as a substitute; and it was remarked that Richard was ever after partial to pork.

There is little doubt but that our forefathers were harder livers than the present generation: even within the memory of man, drinking to excess is a vice seldom observed, excepting in some individuals belonging to the old school. The hours of refection have been singularly altered; and while our fashionable circles seldom sit down to table before eight o’clock in the evening, we find in olden chronicles that even royalty was used to dine at nine in the morning, more especially upon the Continent. In the HeptÆmeron of the Queen of Navarre we find an account of the manner of spending the day:

“As soon as the morning rose, they went to the chamber of Madame Oysille, whom they found already at her prayers; and when they had heard during a good hour her lecture, and then the mass, they went to dine at ten o’clock, and afterwards each privately retired to his room, but did not fail at noon to meet in the meadow. Vespers heard, they went to supper; and after having played a thousand sports in the meadow they retired to bed.”

During the reign of Charles V. of France, the court dined at ten, supped at seven, and retired to rest at nine. Holinshed gives the following curious description of our early diet: “Our tables are oftentimes more plentifully garnished than those of other nations, and this trade has continued with us since the very beginning; for, before the Romans found out and knew the way into our country, our predecessors fed largely upon flesh and milk, whereof there was great abundance in this isle, because they applied their chief studies unto pasturage and feeding.

“In Scotland, likewise, they have given themselves unto very ample and large diet, wherein as for some respect nature doth make them equal with us, so otherwise they far exceed us in over much and distemperate gormandize, and so engross their bodies, that divers of them do oft become unapt to any other purpose than to spend their time in large tabling and belly cheer. In old times these North Britons did give themselves universally to great abstinence; and in time of war their soldiers would often feed but once, or twice at the most, in two or three days, especially if they held themselves in secret, or could have no issue out of their bogs and morasses, through the presence of an enemy; and in this distress they used to eat a certain kind of confection, whereof so much as a bean would qualify their hunger above common expectation. In those days, also, it was taken for a great offence over all to eat either goose, hare, or hen, because of a certain superstitious opinion which they had conceived of these three creatures. Amongst other things, baked meats, dishes never before this man’s (James I.) days seen in Scotland, were generally so provided for by virtue of this act, that it was not lawful for any to eat of the same under the degree of a gentleman, and those only but on high and festival days. In number of dishes and changes of meat, the nobility of England (whose cooks are for the most part musical-headed Frenchmen and strangers) do most exceed; sith there is no day in manner that passeth over their heads, wherein they have not only beef, mutton, veal, lamb, kid, pork, cony, capon, pig, or so many of these as the season yieldeth, but also some portion of the red and fallow deer, beside great variety of fish and wild fowl, and thereto sundry other delicates, wherein the sweet hand of the seafaring Portingale is not wanting; so that for a man to dine with one of them, and to taste of every dish that standeth before him, is rather to yield unto a conspiracy, with a great deal of meat for the speedy suppression of natural health, than the use of a necessary mean to satisfy himself with a competent repast, to sustain his body withal. The chief part, likewise, of their daily provision is brought in before them commonly in silver vessels, if they be of the degree of barons, bishops, and upwards, and placed upon their tables; whereof when they have taken what it pleaseth them, the rest is reserved, and afterwards sent down to their serving-men and waiters.

“The gentlemen and merchants keep much about one rate, and each of them contenteth himself with four, five, or six dishes, when they have but small resort; or, peradventure, with one or two, or three at the most, when they have no strangers. And yet their servants have their ordinary diet assigned, besides such as is left at their masters’ boards, and not appointed to be brought thither the second time, which, nevertheless, is often seen, generally in venison, lamb, or some especial dish whereon the merchantman himself liketh to feed when it is cold.

“At such times as the merchants do make their ordinary or voluntary feasts, it is a world to see what great provision is made of all manner of delicate meats from every quarter of the country, wherein, beside that they are often comparable herein to the nobility of the land, they will seldom regard any thing that the butcher usually killeth, but reject the same as not worthy to come in place. In such cases, also, geliffes of all colours, mixed with a variety in the representation of sundry flowers, herbs, trees, forms of beasts, fish, fowls, and fruits; and thereunto marchpane wrought with no small curiosity, tarts of divers hues and sundry denominations; conserves of old fruits, foreign and home-bred; suckets, codiniacs, marmalades, sugar-bread, ginger-bread, florentines, wild-fowl, venison of all sorts, and sundry outlandish confections, altogether seasoned with sugar, (which Pliny calls mel ex arundinibus, a device not common nor greatly used in old times at the table, but only in medicine, although it grew in Arabia, India, and Sicilia,) do generally bear the sway, besides infinite devices of our own not possible for me to remember. Of the potato, and such venerous roots as are brought out of Spain, Portingale, and the Indies, to furnish our banquets, I speak not, wherein our Mures, of no less force, and to be had about Crosby Ravenswath, do now begin to have place.

“And as all estates do exceed in strangeness and number of costly dishes, so these forget not to use the like excess in wine, insomuch as there is no kind to be had (neither any where more store of all sorts than in England, although we have none growing with us; but yearly the proportion of twenty or thirty thousand tun and upwards, notwithstanding the daily restraints on the same brought over to us) whereof at great meetings there is not some store to be had. Neither do I mean this of small wines only, such as claret, white, red, French, &c. which amount to about fifty-six sorts, according to the number of regions from whence they come; but also of the thirty kinds of Italian, Grecian, Spanish, Canarian, &c., whereof Vernage, Cate-pument, Raspis, Muscadell, Romnie, Bastard Fire, Osey, Caprike, claret, and malmsey, are not least of all accounted of, because of their strength and value. For as I have said of meat, so, the stronger the wine is, the more it is desired, by means thereof in old times, the best was called Theologicum because it was had from the clergy and religious men, unto whose houses many of the laity would often send for bottles filled with the same, being sure that they would neither drink nor be served of the worst, or such as was any ways mingled or brewed by the vintner; nay, the merchant would have thought that his soul should have gone straightways to the devil, if he should have served him with any other than the best. Furthermore, when they have had their course which nature yieldeth, sundry sorts of artificial stuff, as ypocras and wormwood wine, must in like manner succeed in turns, besides stale ale and strong beer, which nevertheless bears the greatest brunt in drinking, and are of so many sorts and ages as it pleaseth the brewer to make.

“In feasting, the artisans do exceed after their manner, especially at bridals, purifications of women, and such like odd meetings, where it is incredible to tell what meat is consumed and spent; each one bringing such a dish, or so many as his wife and he do consult upon, but always with this consideration, that the leefer (the more liberal) friend shall have the best entertainment. This is also commonly seen at these banquets, that the good man of the house is not charged with any thing, saving bread, drink, house-room, and fire.

“Heretofore there hath been much more time spent in eating and drinking than commonly is in these days; for whereas of old we had breakfasts in the forenoon, beverages or nuntions after dinner, and thereto rere suppers, generally when it was time to go to rest (a toy brought in by Hard Canutus), now these odd repasts, thanked be God! are very well left, and each one in manner (except here and there some young hungry stomach that cannot fast till dinner-time contenteth himself with dinner and supper only). The Normans, disliking the gormandize of Canutus, ordained, after their arrival, that no table should be covered above once in the day; which Huntingdon imputeth to their avarice: but, in the end, either waxing weary of their own frugality, or suffering the cockle of old custom to overgrow the good corn of their new constitution, they fell to such liberty, that in often feeding they surmounted Canutus surnamed the Hardy; for whereas he covered his table but three or four times in the day, they spread their cloths five or six times, and in such wise as I before rehearsed. They brought in also the custom of long and stately sitting at meat, which is not yet left, although it be a great expense of time, and worthy reprehension; for the nobility and gentlemen, and merchantmen, especially at great meetings, do sit commonly till two or three of the clock at afternoon, so that with many it is an hard matter to rise from the table to go to evening prayer, and return from thence to come time enough to supper.”

The early prevalence of drinking in England seems to have been derived from our foreign intercourse. In the reign of Elizabeth and James I. we find various statutes against ebriety.

Tom Nash, in his “Pierce Pennilesse” says, “Superfluity in drink is a sin that ever since we have mixed ourselves with the Low Countries is counted honourable; but, before we knew their lingering wars, was held in that highest degree of hatred that might be. Then, if we had seen a man go wallowing in the streets, or lain sleeping under the board, we should have spit at him, and warned all our friends out of his company.”

According to our laws intoxication is looked upon as an aggravation of any offence. Sir Edward Coke calls a drunkard voluntarius dÆmon. The Romans thought differently: with them intoxication was often deemed an extenuation of guilt, “Per vinum delapsis capitalis poena remittitur.” The Greeks, more severe, had a law of Pittacus that enacted the infliction of a double punishment on those who committed a crime when drunk.

That hard drinking was introduced from Flanders and Holland, and other northern countries, seems probable from the derivation of many of the expressions used in carousing. The phrase of being “half-seas over,” as applied to a state of drunkenness, originated from op zee, which in Dutch meant over sea; and Gifford informs us that it was a name given to a stupifying beer introduced in England from the Low Countries, and called op zea; thus Jonson in the Alchemist:

I do not like the dulness of your eye;
It hath a heavy cast, ’tis up see Dutch.

An inebriating draught was also called an up see freeze, from the strong Friesland beer. The word “carouse,” according to Gifford and Blount, is derived from the name of a large glass, called by the Danes ruuse, or from the German words gar, all, and ausz out: hence drink all out.

Nash, in the work above quoted, says, “Now he is nobody that cannot drink super nagulum, carouse the hunters’ hoope, quaff upsee freze crosse, with healths, gloves, mumpes, frolickes, and a thousand such domineering inventions.” The origin of these slang terms is not quite evident. Drinking super nagulum, or on the nail, was a northern custom which consisted in only leaving one drop in the cup, which was poured upon the thumb-nail, to prove that justice had been done to the potation or toast; and that, to use the language of modern drinkers, the glass was cleared. This custom is alluded to by Bishop Hall in his “Mundus alter et idem,” in which the Duke of Tenderbelly exclaims, “‘Let never this goodly-formed goblet of wine go jovially through me:’ and then he set it to his mouth, stole it off every drop, save a little remainder, which he was by custom to set upon his thumb’s nail and lick it off.” In Fletcher we find the phrase

I am thine ad unguem;

which meant he was ready to drink with him to this extent. The term hoop alludes to the marks of hoops being traced upon drinking-pots to point out certain measures. Jack Cade says, “The three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops, and I will make it felony to drink small beer!” Hence probably the common saying of “drinking deep,” or to the last hoop. The peg tankard was another measured vessel used in the jollifications of our forefathers, and is still to be found in some parts of England, more especially in Derbyshire. Pegge in his “Anonymiana,” thus describes them: “They have in the inside a row of eight pins, one above the other, from top to bottom; the tankard holds two quarts, so that there is a gill of ale between each peg or pin. The first person who drank was to empty to the first peg, the second was to drink to the next, and so on; by which means the pegs were so many measures to the compotators, making them all drink alike or the same quantity.” In Archbishop Anselm’s Canons made in the council at London in 1102, priests are enjoined not to go to drinking-bouts, nor to drink pegs: “Ut presbyteri non eant ad potationes, nec ad pinnas bibant.”

Gloves, also called shoeing-horns, were relishes to encourage drinking, like our modern devils, introduced for a similar purpose. Bishop Hall says in his description of a carousal, “Then comes me up a service of shoeing-horns of all sorts,—salt cakes, red-herrings, anchovies, and gammon of bacon, and abundance of such pullers on.” Massinger thus describes these incentives:

I usher
Such an unexpected dainty bit for breakfast
As never yet I cooked; ’tis not botargo,
Fried frogs, potatoes marrow’d, cavear,
Carps’ tongues, the pith of an English chine of beef,
Nor our Italian delicate oil’d mushrooms,
And yet a drawer on too; and if you show not
An appetite, and a strong one, I’ll not say
To eat it, but devour it, without grace too,
(For it will not stay a preface,) I am shamed,
And all my past provocatives will be jeer’d at.

The botargo was a relish made of mullet’s roes, and highly seasoned, much in use among the Italians.

Amongst many other curious frolics of hard drinkers, we find the use of what they called flap-dragons, or snap-dragon, which consisted in igniting combustible substances, which were swallowed while floating on the glass of liquor. Johnson describes them “a play in which they catch raisins out of burning brandy, and, extinguishing them by closing the mouth, eat them.” This prank is not uncommon to the present day in boarding-schools in certain festive entertainments of the young ladies.

Drunkenness being considered a beastly propensity, its gradations were fixed by animal comparisons. In a curious treatise on drunkards by George Gascoigne, we find the following illustration of these degrees: “The first is ape-drunk, and he leaps and sings and hallos and danceth for the hearers; the second is lion-drunk, and he flings the pots about the house, calls the hostess w——, breaks the glass windows with his dagger, and is apt to quarrel with any man that speaks to him; the third is swine-drunk, heavy, lumpish, and sleepy, and cries for a little more drink and a few more clothes; the fourth is sheep-drunk, wise in his own conceit, when he cannot bring forth a right word; the fifth is maudlin-drunk, when a fellow will weep for kindness in the midst of his drink, and kiss you, saying, ‘By G—! Captain, I love thee! Go thy ways; thou dost not think so often of me as I do of you; I would I could not love thee so well as I do!’ and then he puts his finger in his eye and cries; the sixth is martin-drunk, when a man is drunk, and drinks himself sober ere he stir; the seventh is goat-drunk, when in drunkenness he hath no mind but in lechery; the eighth is fox-drunk, when he is crafty drunk, as many of the Dutchmen be, which will never bargain but when they are drunk. All these species, and more, I have seen practised in one company at one sitting.”

Drunkenness has at various periods been resorted to in religious and political fervour. Daring the usurpation of Cromwell, the Cavaliers were wont to drink their king’s health in bumpers of wine in which some crumbs of bread had been thrown, exclaiming, “God send this crum-well down!” and Whitelocke, in his Memorials, records the following barbarous Catilinian orgies: “Five drunkards agree to drink the king’s health in their blood, and that each of them should cut out a piece of his buttock, and fry it upon the gridiron, which was done by four of them, of whom one did bleed so exceedingly that they were fain to send for a chirurgeon, and so were discovered. The wife of one of them, hearing that her husband was amongst them, came to the room, and, taking up a pair of tongs, laid about her, and so saved the cutting of her husband’s flesh.”

The laws enacted to prevent drunkenness at various periods and by different governments, are curious. Domitian ordered all the vine-plants in the Roman territory to be rooted out. Charles IX. of France issued a similar edict. In 1536, under Francis I, a law was passed sentencing drunkards to imprisonment on bread and water for the first offence; a public whipping punished a second infringement; and, on reiteration, banishment and the loss of ears. The ancients, equally aware of the danger that arose from intoxication, were also anxious to prevent it. Draco inflicted capital punishments. Lycurgus destroyed the vineyards. The Athenians had officers, named ophthalmos, to prevent excesses in liquor drinking. In Rome, patricians were not allowed the use of wine until they had attained their thirty-fifth year. Wine was only drunk pure in the beginning of sober repasts in honour of Deus Sospes, and afterwards mixed with water in honour of Jupiter Servator. Notwithstanding these wise examples in support of prudent precepts, it appears that drunkenness was a common vice amongst the Romans. Tiberius was surnamed Biberius; and it was said of the parasite Bibulus, “dum vixit, aut bibit aut minxit.” Aurelianus had officers of his household whose duty was to intoxicate foreign ambassadors; and Cato’s partiality for the juice of the grape has been recorded by Horace,

Narratur et prisci Catonis
SÆpe mero caluisse virtus.

In the middle ages, drinking was resorted to by the monks as a religious libation; and they also drank to the dead, a custom which was condemned as idolatrous. These excesses were restrained by various regulations, and in 817 the quantity of wine allowed each monk was fixed at five pints. Charlemagne, in his Capitularies, forbids the provocation of drinking healths and hob-nobbing (plÉger et trinquer). Temperance societies are not modern institutions. In 1517, Sigismund de Dietrichstein established one under the auspices of St. Christopher; a similar association was formed in 1600 by Maurice Duke of Hesse, which, however, allowed a knight to drink seven bocaux, or glasses, at each meal, but only twice in the day. The size of these bocaux is not recorded, but no doubt it was an endeavour to obtain a comparative condition of sobriety. Another temperate society, under the name of the Golden Ring, was instituted by Frederic V. Count Palatine.

Whether the influence of temperate societies or their advocates will tend to diminish the consumption of wine and spirituous liquors in the British empire, it is difficult to say. Hitherto every act of interference, either from individuals or on the part of the legislature, has proved not only abortive, but has increased the evil it was intended to remedy. The imposition of heavy duties only threw the distillation of spirits into the hands of illicit speculators instead of respectable capitalists; and, as M’Culloch justly remarks, “superadded the atrocities of the smuggler to the idleness and dissipation of the drunkard.” During the latter part of the reign of George I. and the earlier period of George II. gin-drinking was so prevalent, that it was denounced from the pulpit and the press. At length ministers determined to make a vigorous effort to put a stop to the further use of spirituous liquors except as a cordial or medicine. To accomplish this end, a duty of twenty shillings was laid on spirits, exclusive of a heavy licence duty to retailers, while a fine of 100l. was levied on all defaulters. But instead of the anticipated effects, this act produced results directly opposite: the respectable dealers withdrew from a trade proscribed by the legislature; and the sale of spirits fell into the hands of the lowest and most profligate characters. The officers of the revenue were hunted down by the populace, and did not dare to enforce the law; and Tindal, in his Continuation of Rapin, says, “within two years of the passing of this act, it had become so odious and contemptible, that policy as well as humanity forced the commissioners of excise to mitigate its penalties.” During these two years twelve thousand persons were convicted of offences connected with the sale of spirits, while no exertion could check the torrent of smuggling, and seven millions of gallons illicitly distilled were annually consumed in London and its environs. Our present consumption of British, Colonial and Foreign spirits is immense, but not equal to what it was at the period alluded to. The following is the account of this consumption in 1832:

In that year, 1832, the total amount of spirits that paid duty in the United Kingdom was 2,646,258 gallons, yielding a revenue of 8,483,247l. In the same year the appearance and dread of the cholera produced a singular increase in the consumption of brandy. In the preceding year, 1831, the entries for home use in England had amounted to 1,194,717 gallons; but during this state of alarm, it increased to 1,508,924; in 1833, the danger having subsided, the consumption declined to its former level, and did not exceed 1,356,620 gallons.

From the above observations it may be inferred, that no penal enactments, no denunciations of canting senators or fanatic preachers, will ever succeed in checking the evils which must arise from excesses in the use of spirituous liquors. Gluttony and drunkenness can only be combated by the salutary effects of good example held out by the superior classes of society; by a gradual improvement in the moral education of the lower grades, for whom salutary amusements should be procured when a cheerful repose from their weekly labour will no longer be considered a breach of the sabbath. Diffusion of knowledge and habits of industry will do more than sanctimonious admonitions, and the Penny Magazines may be considered more hostile to gin-drinking than the ranting of pseudo-saints.

In regard to the quantity that we should eat, no rules can be established, as individuals differ widely from each other, both as to their capacity and their inclination. Mr. Abernethy maintained, that it would be well if the public would follow the advice of Mr. Addison, given in the Spectator, of reading the writings of L. Cornaro, who, having a weak constitution, which he seemed to have ruined by intemperance, so that he was expected to die at the age of 32, did at that period adopt a strict regimen, allowing himself only 12 ounces daily. To this remark Dr. Paris very properly observes, “When I see the habits of Cornaro so incessantly introduced as an example for imitation, and as the standard of dietetic perfection, I am really inclined to ask with Feggio, ‘Did God create Lewis Cornaro to be a rule for all mankind in what they were to eat and drink?’”

In regard to the dyspeptic, Dr. Philips has given the very best advice in the following paragraph:

“The dyspeptic should carefully attend to the first feeling of satiety. There is a moment when the relish given by the appetite ceases; a single mouthful taken after this oppresses a weak stomach. If he eats slowly and carefully attends to this feeling, he will never overload the stomach.” To this Dr. Paris adds, “Let him remember to eat slowly.” “This is an important condition—for when we eat too fast we introduce a greater quantity of food into the stomach than the gastric juice can at once combat with; the consequence of which is, that hunger may continue for some time after the stomach has received more than would be sufficient, under the circumstances, to induce satiety.”

The introduction of French cookery in every part of England amongst the wealthy will render attention to dietetic rules still more important than in former days; although Dean Swift, in his time, observed, “That modern epicurism had become so prevalent, that the world must be encompassed, before a washerwoman can sit down to breakfast.”