Eating, Drinking, and Sleeping, 245 



Wine has not only been considered good for the body, but 

 has, from the earliest period, been thought invigorating to the 

 mind. Thus we find it a constant theme of praise with poets. 

 Martial says — 



Regnat nocte calix, volvuntur biblia mane. 

 Cum Phoebo Bacchus dividit imperium. 



All night I drink, and study hard all day : 

 Bacchus and Phoebus hold divided sway. 



Horace has done ample justice to it ; and even Homer 



says — 



The weary find new strength in generous wine. 



Upon the principle, no doubt, of expanding the imagination, 

 we find, so early as 1374, old Geoffrey Chaucer had a pitcher of 

 wine a day allowed him. Ben Jonson, in after times, had the 

 third of a pipe annually; and a certain share of this invigo- 

 rating aliment has been the portion of Laureates down to the 

 present day. 



At Dulwich College are preserved some of Ben Jonson's 

 Memoranda, which prove that he owed much of his inspiration 

 to good wine, and the convivial hours he passed at the Devil, 

 a tavern then situated in Fleet street, near Temple Bar, on 

 the site where ChiWs Place now stands. " Mem, J. laid the 

 plot of my ^ Volpone,' and wrote most of it, after a present of 



ten dozen of Palm Sack from my very good Lord T : 



that play, I am positive, will live to posterity, and be acted, 

 when I and Envy be friends, with applause.'* — " Mem. The 

 first speech in my * Catalina,' spoken by Sylla^s Ghost, was 

 writ after I parted with my friend at the Devil tavern. I had 

 drank well that night, and had brave notions. There is one 

 scene in that play which I think is flat. I resolve to drink no 

 more water with my wine." — *' Mem. Upon the 20th of May, 

 the King (Heaven reward him !) sent me a hundred pounds. 

 At that time I went often to the Devil ; and, before I had 

 spent forty of it, wrote my ' Alchymist.' " — '* Mem. *■ The 

 Devil an Ass,' the * Tale of a Tub,' and some other comedies, 

 which did not succeed, written by me in the winter honest 

 Ralph died, when I and my boys drank bad wine at the 

 Devil." iEschylus wrote some of his tragedies under the 

 influence of wine. 



Nor are the poets the only eulogists of wine. Some of the 



