Formerly, sworn examiners of the clouds, skilful in discovering the storms they concealed, announced to the inhabitants of the country the hail by which their crops were threatened, and every one immediately offered a sacrifice to the inimical cloud, in order that it might carry ruin and desolation elsewhere. The most devout sacrificed a lamb; the lukewarm worshippers a fowl; some even contented themselves with pricking their finger with a pin, and throwing towards heaven the drops of blood which came out. The cloud, it is said, satisfied with these pious offerings, soon disappeared never to return.[XVI_110]
The lamb, an oblation pure and agreeable in the sight of the gods, reconciled the earth with Olympus. In Egypt, the inhabitants of Sais and Thebes offered it to their divinities.[XVI_111] Minerva and Juno also were pleased to see its flesh smoking on the altars which Greece and Italy raised to them.[XVI_112]
These practices, no doubt, were an obscure imitation of the religious rites which Moses prescribed to his people,[XVI_113] and which heathen nations adopted in their turn, one from the other.[XVI_114]
The Hebrew law forbad the killing of the Paschal lamb before it was weaned, and also the cooking of it in its mother’s milk. It was to be eaten roasted, with unleavened bread, lettuces, mustard, or bitter herbs: whatever might remain was to be burnt with fire. It was not to be boiled, nor a bone of it broken. It must be chosen of that year, a male, and without fault or blemish.[XVI_115]
Many passages of the sacred writings allow us to appreciate the pastoral riches of the first nations of the East; and an idea may be formed of the number of their flocks, when we are told that Jacob gave the children of Hamor a hundred sheep for the price of a field;[XVI_116] and that the King of Israel received a hundred thousand every year from the King of Moab, his tributary, and a like number of rams, covered with their fleece.[XVI_117]
The delicate flesh of the lamb was the ornament of the tables of the voluptuous inhabitants of Sion and Samaria. The prophet Amos reproaches them with this luxury, and threatens them with the Divine anger[XVI_118] on that account. The Greeks carried their love for this meat to such a height, that the magistrates of Athens were obliged to forbid the eating of lamb which had not been shorn.[XVI_119] This restriction did not prevent the epicures of Attica from buying one of these animals every day, which cost them ten drachmas[XVI_120] (6s. 5d.), and the head of which, prepared with art, heightened the beauty of the first course.[XVI_121] Rome and Italy imitated Greece,[XVI_122] and the flocks of the fertile Campania hardly sufficed for the exigencies of the capital of the world, especially towards the end of autumn, a period at which lambs afforded, according to the Romans, a more highly flavoured and wholesome meat than in the spring.[XVI_123]
Lamb’s Head à la Quirinale.—The head is boiled with pepper, garum, and beans, and served with a sauce consisting of garum, pepper, benzoin, and cummin, to which is added a little oil, and small pieces of bread, soaked in sweet wine.[XVI_124]
Quarter of Lamb à l’Esquilin.—Place a quarter of lamb in a saucepan with onions and coriander, chopped very small. Then pound pepper, alisander, and cummin; put to it some oil, wine, and garum. Pour the whole on the lamb; cook well, and thicken with fine flour.[XVI_125]
Palatine Broil.—Leave a piece of lamb during some time in a mixture of pepper, benzoin, garum, and oil. After having cooked it in oil and garum, put it a little while on the gridiron, sprinkle with pepper, and serve.[XVI_126]
Roast Lamb à la Phrygienne.—Bake a lamb and serve it with the following sauce:—Mix well half an ounce of pepper, six scruples of cinnamon, a little ginger, half a pint of excellent garum, and the quarter of that quantity of oil.[XVI_127]
Lamb à la Trimalcion.—Draw a lamb at the neck; preserve the intestines entire, and wash them with the greatest care; fill them with force meat and garum; put them back again by the same way; sew up the opening, and place the lamb in the oven. Then mix gravy and milk; add pounded pepper, garum, wine, sweet wine, and oil; let it boil only an instant; thicken with fine floor, and serve it with the lamb.[XVI_128]
Blount informs us of a very ancient and rather strange custom. He says:—
“At Kidlington, in Oxfordshire, the custom is, that on Monday after Whitson week, there is a fat, live lamb provided, and the maids of the town, having their thumbs tied behind them, run after it, and she that with her mouth takes and holds the lamb is declared Lady of the Lamb, which, being dressed, with the skin hanging on, is carried on a long pole before the Lady and her companions to the Green, attended with music, and a morisco dance of men and another of women, when the rest of the day is spent in dancing, mirth, and merry glee. The next day the lamb is part baked, boiled, and roast, for the Lady’s feast, where she sits majestically at the upper end of the table, and her companions with her, with music and other attendants, which ends the solemnity.”[XVI_129]
The kid was one of the most delicate dishes of the Hebrews: Rebecca prepared some for Isaac, in order to dispose him to give his blessing to Jacob.[XVI_130] Moses ordered that, for the Feast of Passover, a lamb or a kid should be slain.[XVI_131] Samson carried a kid to his young wife when he wished to be reconciled to her.[XVI_132] The brother of the prodigal son complains to his father that he has never given him a kid to make merry with his friends.[XVI_133]
The Egyptians, who represented their god Pan with the face and legs of a goat, abstained religiously from killing a kid or eating its flesh.[XVI_134] Their veneration for this animal went so far, in some countries, that goat-keepers appeared in their eyes invested with an august and sacred character.[XVI_135] The Greeks did not judge it convenient to adopt these strange ideas, although on other points their theology was sufficiently ridiculous. The kid was considered one of the most dainty dishes in state banquets; it was served whole, on a silver basin, to each of the guests at the wedding of the Macedonian, Caranus.[XVI_136]
The kids of Attica were especially praised, and a considerable trade was made of them in Athens.[XVI_137] Certain connoisseurs, whose authority had weight, preferred, however, those produced in the Island of Mælos.[XVI_138] A great many also came from Sicily: they were in less repute, and sold at a low price.[XVI_139]
At Rome, the kid of Italy was much thought of; the most delicate were fattened at Tivoli,[XVI_140] and in different localities of the Roman Campagna.[XVI_141]
Kid à la Trans-Tibérienne.—The kid is to be cooked slowly, with a little milk, four ounces of honey, an ounce of pepper, a little salt and benzoin. After some time, add eight dates crushed in a mortar, a little gravy, garum, a small quantity of excellent wine; the whole is thickened with fine flour.[XVI_142]
Roast Kid à la Janiculum.—Empty and carefully clean a kid; rub it well with oil and pepper; sprinkle with salt and a large quantity of coriander seed; place it in the oven, and bake slowly.[XVI_143]
Kid à la Tarpéienne.—Empty the kid; stuff it, and sew it up; then entirely cover it with a thick mixture of pepper, rue, winter savory, onions, a small quantity of thyme, and some garum; then place it in an oven, or on a dish, covered with oil. When the kid is cooked, you surround it with a sauce of winter savory, onions, rue, dates, mixed with wine, oil, and cooked wine; sprinkle with pepper, and serve.[XVI_144]
Kid à la Tivoli.—Bake the kid; then pound some pepper, rue, onions, winter savory, and Damascus plums (without their stones), a little benzoin, which you must dilute in wine, garum, and oil; throw this sauce on the kid as you withdraw it from the oven, and, at the moment of serving, cover it with boiling wine.[XVI_145]
Kid à la Mélissienne.—Draw the kid at the neck, and clean the intestines; then pound some pepper, alisander, benzoin root, two bay leaves, and a little Spanish camomile; add two or three brains; mix them well together; then add some garum and a little salt; afterwards, a small quantity of milk and honey. Fill the intestines with this stuffing, and place them round the kid, which you then put into a large basin on the fire. When half-cooked, you must add a mixture of garum, oil, and wine. Then bruise some pepper and alisander seed, which moisten with the gravy of the kid, and a little cooked wine; pour it into the basin, and the moment before serving thicken with fine flour.[XVI_146]
The ass was an impure animal, according to the law of Moses, whose flesh was forbidden because it did not ruminate.[XVI_147] However, at the siege of Samaria, the Jews were compelled to eat it for want of other food. The famine was such, that the head of an ass was sold for eighty pieces of silver.[XVI_148]
The Roman peasants thought the flesh of the young ass had a very agreeable taste,[XVI_149] and regaled themselves with it at their rustic festivals. The celebrated Mecænas one day tasted of this dish at the house of one of his free slaves; he spoke of it with much praise, caused it to be served on his own table, and even succeeded in introducing it on those of the great and rich, who gave up the onager, or wild ass, which they had hitherto preferred, to humour this illustrious favourite. But this new gastronomic conquest had only a short vogue; and was forgotten after the death of Mecænas.[XVI_150] Galen tells us that the cooks of Alexandria thought much of the ass,[XVI_151] whose flesh, he says, much resembles that of the stag.[XVI_152] Still, this great physician disapproves of the use of this food, which he considers unsuited to mankind.[XVI_153]
It is asserted, even at the present day, that the flesh of the young ass is a pretty good dish; we have heard, but we hardly can repeat it, that much is consumed in the guinguettes round Paris, where the artless customers are far from thinking that anything else but veal can be served to them.
The modern restaurateurs of the Barrières of Paris, have, perhaps, read the biography of Mecænas, and endeavour to render popular the dish so honoured by the celebrated favourite. Who can blame them?
We must beg pardon of the reader for informing him that the dog presented a very relishing dish to many nations advanced in culinary science. To them, one of these animals, young, plump, and delicately prepared, appeared excellent food.[XVI_154]
The Greeks, that people so charming by their seductive folly, their love of the arts, their poetic civilization, and the intelligent spirit of research presiding over their dishes—the Greeks (we grieve to say it) ate dogs, and even dared to think them good: the grave Hippocrates himself—the most wise, the least gluttonous, and therefore the most impartial of their physicians—was convinced that this quadruped furnished a wholesome and, at the same time, a light food.[XVI_155]
As to the Romans, they also liked it,[XVI_156] and no doubt prepared it in the same manner as the hare, which they thought it resembled in taste.[XVI_157]
However, it is but right to add, that this dish, which we will not even hear mentioned, was never favourably received by the fashionable portion of Roman society, and that the legislators of ancient gastrophagy even repulsed it with disdain.
There is every reason to believe that the people regaled themselves with a roast or boiled dog, especially once a year, at the period when they celebrated the deliverance of the Capitol from the siege of the Gauls. It is known that, at this solemnity, a goose, laid on a soft cushion, was carried in triumph, followed by an unhappy dog nailed to a cross,[XVI_158] whose loud cries greatly amused the populace. In this manner they commemorated the signal service rendered by one animal, and the fatal negligence of the other. The Gauls scaled the Capitol while the dogs slept, and Rome had been lost if the deafening cries of the geese had not given an alarm to the garrison, who, it must be allowed, should have kept better watch.
The quadrupeds last mentioned are the only domestic animals of the kind used as food by the ancients. The chase afforded them several others, which we shall mention, after having just glanced at the poultry—one of the most interesting divisions in natural history for the serious and reflective appreciator of gastronomic productions.
The air is less dense than the earth, said Aristotle; poultry ought, then, to stand higher in estimation than quadrupeds.[XVII_1] It is, adds Galen, the lightest and best of all aliments.[XVII_2] After this, would any one dare to accuse of sensuality those who, wisely following the diet recommended by these great men, prefer a fat capon or delicate fowl, to heavy, common butcher’s meat?
Our masters, the ancients, have left us fine examples on this head. In vain did impertinent sumptuary laws, enemies of progress, strive to repress the luxury of the farm-yards. These precautions on behalf of abstinence against the magiric genius were unceasingly met by a resistance, as energetic as it was truly Roman. Fannius, Archius, Cornelius, could make martyrs; but let us say, with pride, good cheer never had cause to envy them deserters and apostates. One of these tyrannical decrees was just published; a tribune of the people, a man of heart and taste, undertook to have it repealed. He courageously mounted the rostrum, and cried, with an inspired voice: “Romans! you are treated like slaves. By the gods! what can be more strange than the new law? They would force you to sobriety, whether you will or no! They would impose temperance on you! Ah! renounce this pretended liberty, of which you are so jealous, since you are no longer allowed to ruin yourselves, each one according to his fancy, or die of indigestion if you please.”
This discourse was received as it deserved to be, and unanimous applause proved to the orator that he was addressing men capable of understanding him. But, alas! this excellent tribune had a dangerous enemy: the censor, Lucius Flaccus, a sort of fanatic teetotaller and carniphobis of that time, had sufficient credit to cause this worthy citizen to be driven from the senate. But Rome revenged him by devouring more poultry than ever.[XVII_3]
In the early ages of the Church, poultry in general was regarded as a food for fast days; and this opinion was founded on the text in Genesis, where it is said that birds and fishes were created on the fifth day, whereas quadrupeds were created on the sixth.[XVII_4]
St. Benedict, in his rule, does not formally forbid the monks any other flesh than that of quadrupeds; and St. Columbanus, in his, permits the monks the flesh of poultry, in default of fish. The Greek monks ate it down to the 10th century.
An object of divine worship in Syria,[XVII_5] the cock was considered by almost every nation as the emblem of vigilance and courage.[XVII_6] Thus, heathen antiquity consecrated it to the god of battles.[XVII_7] Themistocles, marching with his army against Xerxes, King of Persia, met with some cocks fighting furiously; he made his troops halt, that they might observe them, and he then addressed a spirited discourse to them on the subject. He conquered, and on his return to Athens, desired that every year a cock-fight should commemorate his victory.[XVII_8] These cruel games soon spread throughout Greece, and feathered champions were reared with great care, and obtained at a high price from Rhodes, Bœotia, Mela, and Chalcis.[XVII_9]
Italy also wished to enjoy this barbarous pastime. At Pergamus, any spectator might throw a cock into the arena, and a prize was awarded to the lucky possessor of the bird who remained master of the field of battle.[XVII_10]
This warlike bird has never enjoyed a high culinary reputation; nevertheless, it was eaten when old, that is to say, at that period of its life when its flesh, hard, fibrous, and tough, possesses neither juice nor flavour—then this wretched food was left to those among the common people who joyously feasted in the drinking-shops of Rome. They, however, always avoided making fricassees of white cocks, because they were consecrated to the month, and proclaimed the hours.[XVII_11]
The cock being banished from the table of all respectable people, the necessity of dressing hens became evident, for it was necessary to live. Now, you are aware that there are two sorts of hens; one sort consumptive looking and tough, the other tender, plump, and before which an epicure banishes every other thought, and sighs with pleasure. These last were preferred, and, in order to render them more worthy of the voluptuous epicures for whom they were intended, they learned from the inhabitants of the island of Cos the art of fattening them in dark and closed places, with certain wonderful pastes, which increased their delicacy and tempting whiteness.[XVII_12]
This ingenious invention belonged to Greece and Asia. Rome possessed herself of it, and even improved it; but soon the constant tyrant of the kitchen, the Consul, C. Fannius, who thought bad what others thought good, and who pretended that in consequence of the immense consumption made of them, the result would be that not a living hen would be left in the empire, ordered that for the future the Romans should dispense with fattening and eating this delicious winged animal.[XVII_13]
Fortunately, the law said nothing about young cocks; this silence saved Roman gastronomy, and the capon was invented.[XVII_14] It is not necessary to relate with what transports of delight this new creation was greeted; it will be easily understood. Rome was moved; the famous Greek cooks, who consecrated their science to her, were on tip-toe. Everywhere, from mouth to mouth, spread the name of the skilful enchanter, who could in such a manner metamorphose the clarion of the farm yard. Fannius, himself, it is said, wished to be assured of the truth of the prodigy: he was served with a roast capon, and the praises he bestowed on it were assuredly the triumph of the bird, of epicures, and of art.[XVII_15] From this remarkable epoch, nearly all chickens underwent the ingenious transformation which rendered them so welcome to all Lucullian tables;[XVII_16] and it caused such a destruction of birds, that the consul repented, but too late, that he had only named hens in his sumptuary law.
Capon à la Déliaque.—Draw completely a fat capon; then bruise pepper, alisander, and ginger, which you must mix with sausage-meat and fine flour, and a pig’s brains cooked; add some eggs, then some garum, a little oil, whole pepper, and several pine nuts. Make a stuffing of this mixture, and put it into the capon, which afterwards roast before a slow fire.[XVII_17]
The cackling of hens infallibly announced, among the ancients, some dreadful calamity to the person who had the misfortune to hear it.[XVII_18] This fatal omen must have rendered a great number of people unfortunate; for whether she lays eggs, or conducts her young family, a hen generally cackles.
They therefore sought to diminish the number of these birds of ill-omen; they fattened them for eating, and they did right, since, according to learned physicians, the flesh of these birds is good for weakly persons, as well as those who are convalescent.[XVII_19] Healthy individuals also find this food suit them perfectly. In Greece there would have been something wanting at a feast, if fat hens had not been served. They embellished the celebrated wedding repast of Caranus; and Athenæus often speaks of them when describing a grand banquet.[XVII_20]
At Rome, the art of fattening them became a serious occupation, which was long studied, and had its precepts and rules. Marcus Lœlius Strabo, belonging to the order of knights, invented aviaries in which hens were confined;[XVII_21] others sought and discovered the means of giving to their flesh that particular flavour unperceived by uncultivated palates, but which the experienced gastrophilist always appreciates. They patiently gave themselves up to laborious experiments: a warm, narrow, dark spot received these interesting volatiles; the feathers of their wings and tails were plucked, and they were gorged twice a day during three weeks with balls of barley flour mixed with soft water. Great cleanliness was combined with this diet: their heads were well cleansed, and care taken that no insect should enter the aviary.[XVII_22]
Afterwards barley flour, kneaded with milk, was preferred; then, instead of milk, water, and honey were employed. Excellent wheaten bread, soaked in good wine and hydromel, was also used with success.[XVII_23]
Skilful breeders by these means obtained magnificent hens of an incredibly exquisite flavour, and which weighed no less than sixteen pounds.[XVII_24]
The Fannian law unfortunately came, and, as we have before observed, brought impediments to these beautiful results by interdicting aviaries and skilfully prepared pastes. It is true that this law allowed a farm-yard hen to be served at every repast[XVII_25]—mais une poule par jour est-ce contentement? It became necessary, then, to have recourse to a mezzo-termine, which was discovered in the capon. But the favourite dish forbidden by the consular authority was not altogether abandoned: some faithful epicureans always possessed in the shade well-furnished aviaries; and it was even then, we are assured, that Rome and the universe were enriched with the poularde.[XVII_26]
Poularde à la Viminale.—Cook a fine hen in its gravy; pound and mix benzoin, pepper, oil, and garum, a little thyme, fennel seed, cummin, mint, and rue; stir for a long time; add some vinegar; pound some dates, and mix them with honey and a little vinegar. Of all this make a homogeneous seasoning, and pour it on the hen when it is cold.[XVII_27]
It is certainly surprising that a people so serious as the Romans generally were, should make the success of the greatest enterprise depend on the appetite of their famous sacred chickens. They were brought from the Island of Negropont, and were kept shut up in cages; their guardian was designated by the name of Pullarius.[XVII_28]
Publius Claudius, constrained to consult these strange prophets before engaging in a naval combat, ordered them to be fed; they refused to open their beaks. The incredulous general ordered them at once to be thrown into the sea, and laughingly exclaimed to the dismayed Pullarius: “Since they will not eat—well! then let us make them drink.”[XVII_29]
Diodorus of Sicily, and some ancient writers, tell us that the Egyptians, from a remote period, hatched chickens in ovens. This process is decidedly of the highest antiquity, and was applied to the eggs of all kinds of poultry.[XVII_30] In the last century, Réaumur tried various experiments, and recovered this art, which was thought to have been lost; others again have followed the steps of this skilful observer, and, at the present day, obtain the most satisfactory results.
Chickens have ever been considered an estimable food, and hardly yielded to the two glories of their family—the fattened hen and the capon.[XVII_31] The Greeks served them at all their feasts of ceremony, and the Romans granted them a distinguished place among the dishes of the second course.
Apician Macedonia of Chicken.—Chop small the meat of a chicken, which mix with a kid’s breast, and put it into a saucepan with parsley seed, dried pennyroyal, dried mint, ginger, green coriander, and raisins; then add three pieces of the finest oaten bread, some honey, vinegar, oil, and wine; some time after, add some excellent cheese, pine nuts, cucumbers, and dried onions, well chopped. Pour some gravy over the whole, and when it is cooked, surround the dish on all sides with snow, and serve.[XVII_32]
Parthian Chicken.—Open the croup dexterously, and put it in the saucepan; then mix some pepper, alisander, a little carrot, garum, and wine; fill the chicken with this seasoning; cook well, and sprinkle with pepper before serving.[XVII_33]
Numidian Chicken.—Begin by boiling a chicken for some time; then place it in a stew-pan, after having sprinkled it with benzoin and pepper. Afterwards bruise some pepper, cummin, coriander seed, benzoin root, pine nuts, rue, and dates; add honey, vinegar, garum, and oil; boil, thicken with fine flour, sprinkle with pepper, and serve.[XVII_34]
Chicken à la Frontonienne.—Half cook a chicken, and then put into the saucepan garum, oil, a bunch of dill, some leeks, winter savory, and green coriander. You then sprinkle with pepper, and serve.[XVII_35]
Chicken à la Cœlienne.—Cook a chicken with garum, oil, wine, coriander seed, and onion. Then put some milk and a little salt into another saucepan, with honey and a little water, and cook this mixture over a very slow fire. Throw in by degrees some raspings of sweet biscuits, and take care to stir continually. Put the chicken into this sauce, and then serve with a seasoning of pepper, alisander, and wild marjoram, mixed with honey and cooked vine, which must be boiled and thickened with fine flour.[XVII_36]
The duck swims so well it was thought to be paying a compliment to Neptune by sacrificing it to him.[XVII_37] The god of the seas never found fault with this offering.
Attica and the whole of Greece sought the beautiful ducks of Bœotia,[XVII_38] and that province was always found to have supplied a larger number than it reared. It is true the poulterers of Athens, banishing all scruples of conscience, rarely failed to satisfy their customers as to the doubtful origin of a white nêssa (duck), by taking Neptune to witness that it was a pure Bœotian, a real duck, as they said emphatically, of that species so much appreciated by connoisseurs. Future quidnuncs will examine whether the friendly duck of the English and the political and literary canard of the French have, or have not, found their way from Greece, after wandering a little on the road.
There were ducks at that prodigious dinner of the opulent Caranus, of whom we have already spoken several times. They were always served at the tables of the rich Greeks;[XVII_39] and Archigenes reckons them among the viands which agree best with the stomach.[XVII_40] Cato was of the same opinion; and, if we are to believe Plutarch, he made them the food of those of his family who were ill, and boasted of maintaining his children, servants, and himself in perfect health, by the aid of this diet alone.[XVII_41] It was the same idea that made Mithridates mix the flesh of ducks with all he ate, as an antidote against poison, which he feared.[XVII_42]
Hippocrates evinces a contrary opinion. The flesh of this bird seemed to him hard, heavy, and indigestible.[XVII_43] Avicenna goes still further: he threatens all who eat it with fever.[XVII_44] The Romans were no more frightened than the Greeks at the decision of the father of medicine. Lentulus, one of the high magiric authorities of Rome, ordered that the duck should figure in the most honourable manner at the brilliant feast of which Macrobius has preserved us an account.[XVII_45] It must, however, be remembered that polite people, who observed the forms and usages of society, only offered to their guests the breast and head of this biped; the remainder returned to the kitchen.[XVII_46]
Ducks’ Brains à l’Epicurienne.—Cook some ducks’ brains, and mince them very small; then place in a saucepan, with pepper, cummin, benzoin root, garum, sweet wine, and oil; add milk and eggs, and submit the whole to the action of a slow fire, or rather, cook them in a bain-marie.[XVII_47]
Apicius’s Seasoning for a Roast Duck.—Make a mixture of pepper, cummin, alisander, mint, stoned raisins, or Damascus plums; add a little honey and myrtle wine; place it in a saucepan; cook, and then add to these substances vinegar, garum, and oil; afterwards some parsley and savory; serve with the roast duck.[XVII_48]
When a flock of geese are obliged to pass Mount Taurus—the dreaded abode of their enemies, the eagles—each of them takes the precaution to hold a stone in its beak, in order that he may keep a profound silence, which, otherwise, his natural loquacity would render impossible.[XVII_49] This, if true, would justify Aristotle in attributing foresight to the goose;[XVII_50] a quality which Scaliger also claims for this bird.[XVII_51]
The ancients highly esteemed its flesh. Homer[XVII_52] and Athenæus[XVII_53] speak with praise of the fat geese and goslings which the Greeks ate.
The Egyptians served them at their meals every day; it was, with veal, the favourite dish of their monarchs,[XVII_54] and they did not forget to offer some to King Agesilaus, when he was travelling through the country.[XVII_55]
Some eastern nations were impressed with such deep veneration for this bird that they swore by nothing else.[XVII_56] The Britons honoured it, and forbad all persons to do it the least harm.[XVII_57] It remained for Queen Elizabeth to prove, at her joyous dinners of the 29th September, that tastes and usages are modified by time.[XVII_58] And moreover, many centuries before, her ancestors had been greatly wanting in respect towards a particular kind of goose, which they roasted without any ceremony.[XVII_59] A well-deserved sentiment of gratitude rendered them dear to the Romans: their noisy clamour had formerly saved the Capitol.[XVII_60] They became for them, as for the Egyptians,[XVII_61] a symbol of safety, and were reared, both in town and country, to guard the houses.[XVII_62]
Those which were kept, out of gratitude, in the Capitol, were consecrated to Juno, Isis, Mars, and Priapus,[XVII_63] and every year one of them was chosen for the brilliant and solemn ceremony we have already mentioned.[XVII_64]
But, alas! time obscures and effaces all the glories of this world; and that of the Roman geese, no doubt, had to submit to this sad fate,[XVII_65] for they were eaten at least a century before the time of Pliny. Unfortunate bird! Yes, a perfidious art fed them delicately in the shade, in convenient aviaries, where nothing was wanting for their comfort, and at the end of a few days the poor victims made but one step from this dangerous retreat to the place of execution.[XVII_66] The Emperor Alexander Severus became so fond of this dish, that on his great festival days they served him with a goose and a pheasant.[XVII_67] Nothing, in his estimation, could equal the exquisite flavour of these two birds.
The luxurious Romans, however, neglected the entire animal, and thought only of the liver. They invented the art of fattening this viscera, and of increasing its size to such an extent that it often weighed two pounds. To obtain this result, they simply fed their victims of sensuality, during twenty days, with a paste of dried figs and water.[XVII_68] As soon as the goose was killed, the liver was put to soak in milk and honey.
It is not known exactly to whom we are to attribute this gastronomic discovery. Scipio, Metellus, and Marcus Sejus disputed the glory of the invention.[XVII_69] At all events, it is certain that the same method was used in Greece as in Italy; that white geese were chosen in preference,[XVII_70] and that the fat livers were served roasted, or fried in the frying-pan, and enveloped in the omentum, a membrane which we term the caul.[XVII_71] Pliny assures us that Apicius found means to increase livers to a monstrous size,[XVII_72] which almost equalled in weight the whole body of the animal.[XVII_73]
The wings and neck of the goose also acquired some favour; the feet were added, when Messalinus had taught how to peel them by passing them rapidly over the fire, and then preparing them with cocks’ combs. The remainder was only good for the common people.[XVII_74]
Stuffed goslings also enjoyed a reputation among the Greeks,[XVII_75] who fattened them by giving them, three times a day, during a month, a mixture of bran and flour, moistened with hot water (two parts of flour and four parts of bran); but, if Palladius is to be believed, it is much better to feed them solely with millet, and as much water as they may require.[XVII_76]
Sejus Seasoning.—Bruise pepper, alisander, coriander, mint, and rue; mix with it garum and a little oil; pour it over the roast goose, and serve.[XVII_77]
Apician Seasoning for a Roast Goose’s Liver.—Crush in a mortar, and then well mix, pepper, carrots, cummin, parsley-seed, thyme, onions, benzoin root, and fried pine nuts; add honey, vinegar, garum, and oil, and serve with the roast liver in the omentum.[XVII_78]
Boiled Goose à la Gauloise.—Boil a goose with garum, oil, wine, a bunch of leeks, coriander, and savory; then crush pepper and pine nuts, to which put a little water. Then take the leeks, coriander, and savory out of the saucepan; put in their place the mixture mentioned, add some milk, boil it, thicken with whites of eggs, and serve.[XVII_79]
In the sixteenth century they had dark cages, in which they fattened poultry with ground tares, wheaten flour, and barley meal. Capons fattened in hutches, where they could not turn, nor even stir, were esteemed delicious. They fed pigeons on the crumb of bread, steeped in wine; peacocks on the sediment from cider.
On Michaelmas Day, the 29th of September, many persons in England eat roast goose for their dinner. It is said that this custom dates from the time of Queen Elizabeth, who was being served with a piece of goose on Michaelmas Day, at the very moment when news was brought of the defeat of the famous Armada. Some persons affirm that the Queen expressed a desire that this dish might, each year, serve to perpetuate the remembrance of so signal a victory. Would it not be more simple to suppose that Elizabeth herself already conformed to a custom which had existed before her time?[XVII_80]
At Mans, instead of letting the poultry eat freely, they are shut up in a dark place, and made to swallow pellets of about two inches long and one thick, composed of two parts of barley flour, and one of maize, made with sufficient quantity of milk.
“In the time when the French had a decided taste for spices and aromatics, they imagined to vary at will the flavour and perfume of the flesh of fowls. With the paste used to fatten them was mixed musk, anise-seed, and comfits, with other aromatic drugs. A Queen was known to spend 1,500 francs (£60) in fattening three geese, whose livers she wished to render more delicate.”—Parmentier.
The dove, a bird so dear to Venus,[XVII_81] served ambrosia to Jupiter,[XVII_82] and became the interpreter of Dodona’s oracles.[XVII_83] Several nations consecrated it to their gods.[XVII_84] The Jews discovered in it the image of the sweetest virtues,[XVII_85] of beauty, innocence, and purity;[XVII_86] and they sacrificed it to the Almighty, as a burnt offering agreeable to His unspeakable holiness.[XVII_87]
This was because the dove or pigeon (begging pardon, here, for mixing varieties) is to the hawk, according to an expression of a father of the Church, what the lamb is to the wolf,[XVII_88]—a symbol of good by the side of evil, or of a calm and peaceful conscience, as opposed to the sad and agitated criminal. But, alas! the ancient prerogatives of this tender bird, its candour and innocence, could not even preserve it from the fate common to almost everything which breathes. Its delicate flesh—fatal gift of Heaven!—recommended it to the epicure; not for its poetical qualities, but for its delicate flavour; and, after many songs of praise, it was condemned to be roasted.
From the beginning of the heroic ages, pigeons were caught with snares and nets,[XVII_89] in order to feed them, and be able to procure some at once, if required to be served at a repast; for they formed a dainty dish upon the tables of the most fastidious.[XVII_90] Of course they figured in the joyous wedding feast of that opulent Caranus who entertained his guests so sumptuously.[XVII_91]
The Greeks, therefore, used to bring up an immense number of pigeons, and built for them, in the most open situations, charming pigeon-houses, in the form of small towers, models of elegance and cleanliness, where those timid birds found at night a retreat, always fatal to some one amongst them.[XVII_92]
The Romans introduced in these sorts of edifices the most unusual luxury.[XVII_93] Each kind of pigeon had a particular home[XVII_94]—a foolish and expensive taste, which they continually attempted to embellish. It was, however, a profitable speculation for those who knew how to be satisfied with pigeon-houses of more simple appearance. A brace of rather ordinary pigeons did not cost less than 16s.: the finest were sold at £4 a pair. It is even known that L. Axius, a Roman knight, demanded and obtained £6 8s. for two young pigeons intended for a patrician’s table.[XVII_95]
Physicians of that period greatly praised the flesh of these birds; they recommended it to the sick and convalescent.[XVII_96]
Roast Pigeon, with Servilian Seasoning.—Bruise some dill seeds, dried mint, and the root of benzoin; add some vinegar, dates, garum, a little mustard, and oil; stir well; then mix with it some wine reduced to half, and pour the whole on the roasted pigeon.[XVII_97]
This bird, called by the ancients the “Hen of Numidia,” comes originally from many burning regions of Africa. In Greece, and especially in Rome, vanity alone gave it a price which was willingly granted, more on account of its scarcity than for its taste.[XVII_98] The Guinea hen appeared at great banquets, when the Amphytrion was more anxious to show his opulence than to demonstrate the delicacy of his dishes. Martial,[XVII_99] and Pliny,[XVII_100] the naturalist, raised great objections against this ostentatious and useless rarity.
Guinea Hen à la Numide.—Cook it; then put it in a saucepan with some honey and garum; make several incisions in the bird; baste it with its own gravy, and sprinkle with pepper previously to its being served.[XVII_101]
“There must be two to eat a truffled turkey,” said a gastronomist of the 18th century, to one of his friends—a noted gourmand—who had just come to pay him a visit. “Two!” replied the visitor, with a smile of sensuality. “Yes, two,” answered the first; “I never do otherwise: for instance, I have a turkey to-day, and of course we must be two.” The friend, looking earnestly at the other, said: “You, and who else?” “Why,” answered the gastronomist, “I and the turkey.”
In Greece, more than one stomach would have been capable of challenging nobly the voracity of this modern polyphagus: witness the insatiable greediness of the well-known glutton who complained that nature ought to have given him a neck as long as the stork, that he might enjoy for a longer period his eating and drinking.[XVII_102]
But for a long time the Greeks were quite ignorant of the culinary value of the turkey; it was looked upon as an uncommon curiosity, and not condemned to the spit. Sophocles, the first who spoke of it, pretended that those marvellous birds came purposely from some distant climate beyond the Indies, to bewail the death of Meleager, who took possession of the throne of Macedonia (279 years B.C.), and who was soon driven from it.[XVII_103] This Prince, it is reported, carried them away from barbarous regions, that they might enjoy the charms of Greek civilization; and hence could there be anything more natural than to find those compassionate volatiles shedding tears for their benefactor, in one of Sophocles’ tragedies? They have been called since, Meleagrides, and this name perpetuated “misfortune, favour, and gratitude.”
Aristotle hardly supplies us with any details upon turkey hens: he merely says that their eggs are distinguished by little specks from those of the common hens, which are white;[XVII_104] but Clytus of Miletus, his disciple, gives an exact description of them, by which no mistake can be made.[XVII_105]
Egypt also possessed some of these birds; but there they were still more rare than in Greece, and formed one of the principal ornaments in the triumphal pomp of Ptolemy Philadelphus, when he entered Alexandria. Large cages, containing meleagrides, were carried before the monarch, and on that day the people knew not which to admire most—the prince or the turkey.[XVII_106]
They were introduced into Rome about the year 115 before our era; but, for a long time, they were objects of uncommon curiosity: and Varro, the first of the Latins who speaks of them, confounds these birds with the guinea hens, or hens of Numidia.[XVII_107]
A century later, turkeys greatly multiplied, and vast numbers were reared in the Roman farms. Caligula, who had the good sense to make his own apotheosis during his life-time, through fear lest it might be refused after his death, ordered a sacrifice of peacocks, guinea hens, and turkeys to be made daily before his statue.[XVII_108]
It appears, however, that the breed of turkeys soon began to diminish in Europe; very few were reared, and that only as a curiosity: in the citadel of Athens, towards the year 540 of the Christian era;[XVII_109] and in 1510, two were exhibited in Rome, which belonged to the Cardinal of Saint Clement.[XVII_110] Jacques Cœur brought some meleagrides from India, in 1450; they were the first ever seen in France, and it was not till fifty-four years afterwards that Americus Vespucius made them known to the Portuguese. In our days these ancient inhabitants of Asia or America[XVII_111] have become naturalized among us, and let us hope that the day is yet distant when they will be absentees from our farm-yards and our tables. We admire them less perhaps than Charles IX. did when a turkey was served to him for the first time,[XVII_112] but we shall always receive with cheerfulness the majestic dish upon which appears a well-fed turkey, truffled, and smoking hot.
Turkey à l’Africaine.—Roast a turkey; bruise some pepper, alisander, and benzoin; mix it with wine and garum. Pour this seasoning on the turkey, sprinkle with pepper, and serve.[XVII_113]
The historian of Provence, Bouche, will have it that the French are indebted for the turkey to King René, who died in 1480. Other writers assure us that this volatile was introduced during the reign of Francis I. by Admiral Chabert. La-Bruyère-Champier speaks of it as a recent acquisition, and Beckmann refutes those who date its existence in France previous to the 16th century. He says that this bird, which was wild in the forests of America, became domesticated in Europe.
It is also said that we owe the importation of it to the Jesuits. According to Hurtaut, it was not until about the time of Charles IX. that turkeys appeared in France.[XVII_114] It is asserted, adds this author, that at the wedding-dinner of that Prince the first turkey was served, and that it was admired as a very extraordinary thing. The English tasted this new dish in 1525, the fifteenth year of the reign of Henry VIII.
To fatten turkeys—every morning, for a month, give them mashed potatoes, mixed with buck-wheat flour, Indian corn, barley, or beans; a paste is made of it which they are left to eat as they please. Every evening what remains must be taken away. One month after, you add to this food, when they go to roost, half a dozen balls composed of barley floor, which they are made to swallow for eight days successively; at the end of that time turkeys, thus fed, become excessively fat, delicious, and weigh from twenty to twenty-five pounds.
In Provence, walnuts are given to them whole, which they are compelled to swallow by slipping them one by one with the hand along the neck until they have all past the œsophagus; they begin with one walnut, and increase by degrees to forty. This kind of food gives an oily taste to the flesh.
Turkey eggs are good boiled, and are preferred to those of hens for pastry; mixing them with the common eggs makes an omelette more delicate.
“To obtain all the advantages possible from turkeys, they must be killed at the same time as pigs; then cut the turkeys in quarters, and put them in earthen pots covered over with the fat of the pork, and by this means they may be eaten all the year round.”—Parmentier.