On Cookery in general. 147 



in these refined times, which are on a par with roasting and 

 braizing live swallows, whipping live pigs, and scarifying live 

 fish ; we mean the oleaginous dropsy, or unnatural obesity 

 which 



" makes modern meat 



Too dear to buy, too fat to eat ;" 



and particularly the liver complaints, produced in that stupid 

 yet amiable bird, the goose. To render him worthy of being 

 placed in a pate, " il faut sacrifier la personne de la bete /" 

 which is nailing him by the foot close to a large fire, where it 

 is confessed that he passes " une vie assez malheureuse" — 

 which he could not support but from the consolation of the 

 great honour that awaits him — " cette perspective lui fait sup- 

 porter sex maux avec courage ; et lorsque son foie, plus gros 

 qu'elle meme, et larde de truffes, revetu d'une pate savante, ira 

 par l'entremise de M. Corcellet porter dans toute 1' Europe la 

 gloire de son nom, elle se resigne a la destinee, et ne laisse pas 

 meme couler une larme !" Nor do the more respected galli- 

 nagenous tribe escape these horrible practices, who suffer by 

 mutilation and cramming, for the same exalted purposes, 

 giving them an embonpoint which nature never intended. 



We must also express our regret that a man of so much 

 erudition and refinement did not extend his system a little 

 further, and give a code of " Rules for the Decorums of the 

 Table." The great Dilvvorth, at the end of his Spelling-book, 

 condescended to instruct, " a la Chesterfield," little boys and 

 girls in their general behaviour. 



How well might our ingenious author have enlarged, after 

 this mode, on the best and most graceful style of handling a 

 silver fork, shewing the national peculiarities in the use of this 

 modern appurtenance of the table: — how an Englishman 

 places it by the left side of his plate, and uses it in conjunc- 

 tion with the knife : — how the Frenchman takes his fork in one 

 hand, and apiece of bread in the other; — how the German, 

 being bothered with it, holds it perpendicularly to his plate; 

 — while the Russian contents himself with using it as a tooth- 

 pick 1 Then what a theme for a Greek cook would have been 

 that unceremonious and uncourteous proceeding called bolt- 

 ing ! in all its different varieties. 



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