JAN. 5. 1850.] 
of the other Tuscan provinces, widely spread their 
idiom by means of commerce. . . . And to this pur- 
pose I remember to have read (but, from the treachery 
of my memory, for the moment I know not where) 
that, for the propagation of Florentine writings, the 
cheese-merchants of Lucardo kept in their pay many 
writers to copy the best authors of the best age, and 
with these enveloped their buttery bantlings*, in order 
that in the ports of the east and of the north, wherever 
such merchandize was marketable, the milk of the 
Florentine cows and that of the Florentine Muses 
might gain credit together. And this is so true, that 
at Oxford, in the celebrated Bodleian Library, is still 
preserved a Dante, correctly copied from the first MS. 
text, which had been used carefully to envelope a 
consignment of cheese at the time when the Bardi 
were merchants in England. It was known as the 
Lucardian Dante. The keepers of the great library, 
kept always beside it two mousetraps, on account of 
the persecution of this Cheesy Codex by the mice, so 
that at length it was called, in English, the Book of 
the Mousetrap.” 
Now quere? is there any tradition in the Bod- 
leian respecting this Mousetrap Dante? and does 
it still retain its cheesy flavour, so as to require 
the protection of a trap if still there? I know, to 
my cost, that hungry mice find unctuous hogskin 
binding very attractive, and, when hardly pressed 
for subsistence, wiil feed upon parchment or vel- 
lum, whether cheesy or not. Aretino’s profane 
exclamation, — 
“ Guardatemi da’ topi or che son unto,” 
might have been the invocation of many a well- 
thumbed greasy volume. 
Prriereus Breriopuiwvs. 
WAS THE LACEDAEMONIAN BLACK BROTH BLACK ? 
With reference, rather than in reply to, your 
correspondent “ R. O.’s” speculations upon coffee, 
permit me to put a Query, which may, perhaps, 
surprise both him and you—whether the Lace- 
dzmonian black broth was black? because, if this 
can be shown to be questionable, the notion of its 
being mixed with coffee falls to the ground of 
course, 
The phrase is Zwpode pé\ac; Zwpoe being the liquid 
produced from any meat or edible substance cut in 
ome and boiled or stewed with water over the 
re, so that it may signify gravy, as well as broth. 
We find also that called white, Zwp0c¢ evedc, sup- 
posed to be made from or for eels, a favourite dish 
with the Athenians. 
What the Lacedemonian diet was, we gather 
from the amusing gossip of Athenzeus, and therein 
something, en passant, of the composition of their 
Zwubc. Whether any better cookery book exists, 
I know not. ‘The passage is to be found in book 
iy. chapter xix., and the following translation 
* Bambolini Burrati. 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
155 
is offered with much diffidence, from some diffi- 
culties in the original not affecting the question of 
the Zopoc : — 
“ With regard to the meal called pheiditia (spare- 
meals), Diceearchus gives the following account, in the 
work called Tripoliticus : — ‘In the first place, the meal 
is laid for each person separately, without reference to 
the others; he has a cake as large as he will, and a 
full cup is placed by him, to repeat his draught as 
often as he pleases; on all occasions the meat given to 
all is the same —swine’s flesh, boiled; and sometimes 
nothing at all but a little bit of meat, weighing as nearly 
as possible a quarter of a pound ; and nothing more at 
all except the liquor (or gravy) from these rations (6 
amd totrwy Cwuds), which is sufficient in quantity to 
supply all the company through the whole meal. If 
there is any thing more than this, it is an olive, a bit 
of cheese, or a fig, or any thing that may happen to be 
given to them, as a fish, a hare, a pigeon, or any thing 
of this sort.’” 
From this passage it would appear that the 
Zwpoc is the liquor in which the meat had been 
boiled ; and this being generally the flesh of swine 
(a phrase I use advisedly, as there is no hint of its 
having been salted), the produce must have been 
more than sufficiently disagreeable to those not 
accustomed to it. Monsieur Soyer himself could 
hardly have used such stock either for soupe maigre, 
or in his cookery for the poor, though it may have 
been strong, and therefore dark in colour, whence 
the epithet. ButI am sure your correspondent 
“R. O.” will agree with me, that, if to such a de- 
coction coffee were added, it would form a compo- 
sition de diable, against which, in an equal degree, 
ancient and modern stomachs would rebel, which 
would resemble nothing ever heard of before but 
Don Quixote’s balsam of Fierabrass. There is 
said to be something on the “black broth” in 
Pollux, lib. vi.; but that book I have not at hand 
at present. Mave 
REHETING — REHETOURS — WHAT DO THESE WORDS 
MEAN ? 
Dear Sir, —In the Glossary at the end of Tyr- 
whitt’s edit. of the Canterbury Tales of Chaucer, 
there are the following remarks under the words 
Rehete as a verb, and Reheting as a noun sub- 
stantive : — 
“ Renere v. Fr. Rehaiter. To revive, to cheer: 
R.” [i. e. Romaunt of the Rose] “6509. Renerina. 
n. T.” [i e. Troilus and Creseide] “iii. 350. according 
to several MSS., And all the reheting of his sikes sore. 
Some MSS, and most of the printed editions read 
Richesse instead of Reheting. Gloss. Ur. Richesse, 
though almost as awkward an expression as the other, 
is more agreeable to the corresponding passage in the 
Filostrato : — 
‘ E sospir che gli avea a gran dovicia, ’ 
and one can hardly conceive that it could come from 
any hand but that of the author. I can make no sense 
