27 



and of two dishes of which their dinner is composed, as for instance a 

 pudding and a piece of roast beef Sometimes they will have a piece boiled, 

 and then it has always lain in salt some days, and is flanked all round with five 

 or six mounds of cabbage, carrots, turnips, or some other herbs or roots, 

 seasoned with salt and pepper, with melted butter poured over them. At other 

 times they will have a leg of mutton, roasted or boiled, and accompanied by 

 the same delicacies ; poultry, sucking pigs, tripe, and beef tongue, rabbits, 

 pigeons — all well soaked with butter without bacon. Two of these dishes 

 — always .served one after the other — make the ordinary dinner of a good 

 gentleman or of a good burgher."* 



The traveller describes their broth as consisting of the water 

 in which the meat had been boiled, mixed with oatmeal and 

 with some leaves of thyme, or sage, or such small herbs. Flour, 

 tnilk, eggs, butter, fat, sugar, marrow, raisins, etc., he describes 

 as the ingredients of an English pudding, and cheese as their only 

 dessert.t 



* From Wright's Homes qfoihtr Days, p. 470. 



+ A distinguished amateur in gastronomy has directed my attention to a 

 remarkable ISth century dinner described iu the fourth chapter of Lord 

 Beacousfield's deliglitful romance, "Veuetia," and is anxious to know 

 whether the dishes enumerated are really "historical " in a culinary sense, 

 or whether the accomplished novelist allowed his fancy to ruu riut in 

 picturing a Sunday diiaier at an English cuuutry house about 176S. 



"Before him (the Eev. Dr. Masham) still scrawled in death the counte- 

 nance of a huge roast pike, flanked on one side by a leg of mutton « la daube, 

 and on the other by the tempting delicacies of bombarded veal. To these 

 succeeded that masterpiece of the culinary art, a grand battalia pie, in 

 which the bodies of chickens, pigeons, and rabbits, were embalmed iu spices, 

 cock's combs, and savoury balls, and well bedewed with one of those rich 

 sauces of claret, anchovy, and sweet herbs, in which our great grandfathers 

 delighted, and which was technically termed a Lear. But the grand essay 

 of skill was the cover of this pastry, whereon the curious cook had contrived 

 to represent all the once-living form.s that were now entombed in that 

 gorgeous sepulchre." 



There is no case of fancy running riot here. Chapter and verse could be 

 given from old cookery books fur all the dainty dishes described in 

 " Venetia." • But of the " historical " accuracy of the " grand battalia pie," 

 a curious proof occurs in that delightful book, "The Life of William Hutton, 

 and the History of the Hutton Family. " In his biography of his maternal 

 grandmother \V. H. relates : — 



" She was a careful yet libera) housekeeper, and well skilled in cookery, 

 pastry, and confectionery. I have heard of a pie she raised in the form of 

 a goose trussed for the spit ; the real goose was booed ; a duck was boned 



