2 So COOKERY OF THE GROUSE 



as with most roasted birds, and salad almost as good 

 as with any ; though perhaps the brown-fleshed birds 

 do not so imperatively call for this adjunct as the 

 white. I seem to have heard that there were times 

 and places where grouse were eaten with melted 

 butter ; but it is well known that there were times 

 and seasons when there was hardly anything to which 

 Britons did not add that unlovely trimming. It must 

 be confessed that the thing is still done (the trimming 

 being actually poured over the birds) in Scotland, 

 where they certainly understand cooker} 7 , and where- 

 they ought to understand that of grouse in particular. 

 But it seems to me an abomination, and it must be 

 remembered that if Scottish cookery, admirable as it 

 is, has a tendency to sin, that tendency is in the 

 direction of what is delicately called ' richness/ and 

 that this may be an instance. No doubt the counter 

 tendency of the grouse to the other original sin of 

 dryness has also to be considered. 



There is a good deal more dispute as to the time, 

 or in other words the degree, to which grouse ought to 

 be roasted than in regard to most other gam,' birds. 

 Nobody not, I should suppose, even an ogre or a 

 cannibal likes underdone pheasant ; and I never heard 

 of anybody who liked underdone partridge. On the 

 other hand, only very unfortunately constituted persons 



