140 A Dissertation upon Dinners. [FEB. 



*lucnces were obvious : when we called for beer, we were helped to brandy 

 presented with a quartern -loaf, instead of a clean plate and nearly 

 suffocated with half-a-pint of castor oil, which we had swallowed in mis- 

 take for noyeau. How opposite to all this is a dinner given by a parson ! 

 By a parson, wo mean one who loves church and state, and never fails in 

 a certain steady not voracious appetite, becoming a Christian and a 

 preacher. Dissenters we abhor ; and until we find from experience that 

 they pay more attention to gastronomy, shall always look upon them 

 shuddeiingly, yet pityingly, as men without the pale of redemption. 



Among the ancients, Vitellius was perhaps the most gentlemanly epi- 

 cure that ever existed : Heliogabulus, too, knew how to give a good dinner ; 

 so, indeed, did Lucullus : but there was a scientific propriety about the 

 first, which modern times have never equalled. Even Sardanapalus 

 was not without talents as a gastronomist ; and, had the darkness of his 

 times permitted, might have endeared himself to the palates of posterity. 

 At the present day, O'Doherty and Kitchiner are almost the only living 

 authors who have studied the philosophy of the stomach with the atten- 

 tion due to its importance. Of the former we have already made honourable 

 mention ; it remains to say, that the latter has published " Directions for 

 Diners out," characterized by a calm and enlarged spirit, feelingly alive 

 to the epicurean prejudices of mankind. Nothing, indeed, is so difficult 

 as to know how to give a good dinner ; one, we mean, that shall please 

 the most fastidious palate, and tickle the amateur of mutton, while it 

 shocks not the sensibilities of the connoisseur of beef. Our late friend, 

 the lamented Robert Edkins, was a genius of this stamp ; for we have 

 actually known him invite half-a-dozen bigotted epicureans to his table ; 

 the first of whom professed an hereditary aversion to rump-steak the 

 second to pork the third to venison the fourth to veal the fifth to roast 

 goose while the sixth was a staunch seceder from that orthodox sect who 

 believe in the infallibility of a sirloin. But, alas ! how transitory is hu- 

 man glory ! This interesting young man was cut off in the flower of his 

 youth, at the early age of thirty-two, in consequence of apoplexy, occa- 

 sioned, like the consumption of Kirk White, by too zealous a devotion to 

 his art. Ill-fated friend! it has been our painful lot for years to dine with- 

 out thee for years to sit beside a table unenlightened by thine expressive 

 features; but, nevertheless, the soothing reflection remains, that it is here 

 permitted us to close a Dissertation upon Dinners with an appropriate 

 apostrophe to thy shade : Si quis Epicitrorum Manibus locus (we quote 

 from memory), si, ut sapientibus placet, non cum corpore extinguuntur 

 magnae animae, placide quiescas, nosque domum tuam, a muliebri lamenta- 

 tione, ad contemplationem virtutem tnarum, voces, quas neque lugeri 

 neque plangi fas est. Nam multos veterum velut inglorios et ignobiles 

 oblivlo obruet, EDKINS posteritati narratus et traditus, superstes erit.* 



D. 



* Tucitus, de Vit& Agricolae. 



