Eating, Drinking, and Sleeping, 239 



case, the bile effused into the stomach seems to have kept up 

 a constant irritation, by which the ingesta were expelled before 

 digestion took place. 



We have before paid our respects to voracious eaters : those 

 whom we are now to introduce are inordinate swallowers, who 

 may be said to devour, rather than to eat. 



The first, and most notable of these, is the famed Nicholas 

 Wood, whose excessive manner of eating, without manners, is 

 described, in strange and true manner, about the year 1630, 

 by no less a person than the celebrated water-poet, John Tay- 

 lor, in a book entitled ^' Nicholas Wood, the great eater ; or 

 the admirable teeth and stomach exploits of Nicholas Wood, of 

 Harrison, in the county of Kent.^' It is a very singular spe- 

 cies of composition ; and lest his prose should be taken for the 

 flights of poetic fancy, he gives very cogent reasons why, in 

 writing the memorable actions of Nicholas Wood, he tells 

 nothing but plain truth, bare and threadbare, "almost stark- 

 naked truth." 



** First," he says, " I were to blame to write more than truth, 

 because that which is known to be true is enough." 



*' Secondly, that which is only true is too much." 



'^ Thirdly, the truth will hardly be believed, being so much 

 beyond men's reason to convince." 



*' Fourthly, I shall runne the hazard to be accounted a great 

 lyar, in writing the truth." 



** Lastly, I will not lye, on purpose to make all those lyars 

 that esteeme me so." 



Our author then enters upon his history, and after pleasaptly 

 paraphrasing his name, and telling us, ''that his mouth was a 

 mill of perpetual motion, for let the wind or the water rise or 

 fall, yet his teeth would ever be a-grinding ;" and that his breed- 

 ing would have been most mighty, if his education had been as 

 his feeding, he proceeds to enumerate some of his exploits. 

 *• Two loynes of mutton, and one loyne of veal, were but as 

 three sprats for him." Milo, the Crotonian, could hardly be 

 his equal ; and Woolner, of Windsor, was not worthy to be his 

 footman. 



" A quarter of fat lambe, and three-score eggs, has been au 

 easy collation — three well-larded pudding pyes he hath at one 



S2 



