Part 10

But Carême was capricious. It was not that he was unfaithful, but he was _volage_; and he passed from kitchen to kitchen, as the bee wings from flower to flower. The Emperor Alexander dined with Talleyrand, and forthwith he seduced Carême: the seduction-money was only £100 sterling per month, and the culinary expenses. Carême did not yield without much coyness. He urged his love for study, his desire to refine the race of which he made himself the model, his love for his country; and he even accompanied, for a brief moment, “Lord Stewart” to Vienna; but it was more in the way of policy than pastry: for Count Orloff was sent after him on a mission, and Carême, after flying, with the full intention of being followed, to London and Paris, yielded to the golden solicitation, and did the Emperor Alexander the honour of becoming the head of the imperial kitchen in whatever palace His Majesty presided. But the delicate susceptibility of Carême was wounded by discovering that his book of expenses was subjected to supervision. He flung up his appointment in disgust, and hastened across Europe to England. The jealous winds wished to detain him for France, and they blew him back on the coast between Calais and Boulogne, exactly as they did another gentleman, who may not be so widely known as Carême, but who has been heard of in England under the name of William Wordsworth. Carême accepted the omen, repaired to Paris, entered the service of the Princess Bagration, and served the table of that capricious lady, _en maître d’hôtel_. As the guests uttered ecstatic praises of the fare, the Princess would smile upon him as he stood before her, and exclaim, “He is the pearl of cooks!” Is it a matter of surprise that he was vain? Fancy being called a “pearl” by a Princess! On reading it we think of the days when Lady Mary Wortley Montague put nasty footmen into eclogues, and deified the dirty passions of Mrs. Mahony’s lacquey.

The Princess, however, ate herself into a permanent indigestion, and Carême transferred his services to the English Ambassador at the Court of Vienna. There, every morning, seated in his magnificent kitchen, Carême received the visit of “Milor Stewart,” who seldom left him without presents and encouragements. Indeed, these rained upon the immortal artist. The Emperor Alexander had consented to have Carême’s projects in culinary architecture dedicated to him, and, with notice of consent, sent him a diamond ring. When Prince Walkouski placed it on his finger, the cook forgot his dignity, and burst into tears. So did all the other cooks in the Austrian capital,--out of sheer jealousy.

Carême, two years before George IV. was King, had been for a short period a member of the Regent’s household. He left Vienna to be present at the Coronation; but he arrived too late; and he does not scruple to say, very ungenerously, that the banquet was spoiled for want of his presence, nor to insinuate that the colleagues with whom he would have been associated were unworthy of such association,--an insinuation at once base and baseless. After being the object of a species of semi-worship, and yielding to every new offer, yet affecting to despise them all, Carême ultimately tabernacled with Baron Rothschild in Paris; and the super-human excellency of his dinners, is it not written in the “Book without a Name” of Lady Morgan? And was not his residence there the object of envy, and cause of much melancholy, and opportunity for much eulogy, on the part of George IV.? Well, Anthony Carême would have us believe as much with respect to himself and the King; but we do not believe a word of it; for the royal table was never better cared for by the royal officers, whose duty lay in such care, than at this very period. George IV. is said to have tempted him by offering triple salaries; but all in vain; for London was too _triste_ an abiding place for a man whose whole soul, out of kitchen hours, was given to study. And so Carême remained with his Jewish patron until infirmity overtook his noble nature, and he retired to dictate his immortal works (like Milton, very!) to his accomplished daughter. _Les beaux restes_ of Carême were eagerly sought after; but he would not heed what was no longer a temptation; for he was realizing twenty thousand francs a year from the booksellers, besides the interest of the money he had saved. Think of it, shade of Milton! Eight hundred pounds sterling _yearly_, for writing on kitchen-stuff! Who would compose epics after that? But Carême’s books were epics after their sort, and they are highly creditable to the scribe who wrote them from his notes. Finally, even Antony Carême died, like cooks of less degree; but he had been the imperial despot of European kitchens, had been “beringed” by Monarchs, and been smiled on by Princesses; he had received Lords in his kitchen, and had encountered ladies who gave him a great deal for a very little knowledge in return; and finally, as Fulke Greville had inscribed on his tomb that he had been the friend of Sir Philip Sidney, so the crowning joy of Carême’s life might have been chiselled on his monument, indicating that he had been the friend of one whom he would have accounted a greater man than the knightly hero in question,--namely, _il Maestro Rossini_! Carême’s cup was thereat full; and he died, perfectly convinced that paradise itself would be glad at his coming.

The celebrated Damvers was _chef_ to the as celebrated financier Grimaud de la Reynière, in the last century. Grimaud died a martyr to his epicurean tastes. He was dining on a _pâté de foies gras_, when he allowed his appetite to overpower his digestion, and he died of the excess. Barthe, the author of “_Les Fausses Infidélités_,” also fell on the field of the dining-room. He was extremely short-sighted, and ate of every thing on the table. He did not consult his appetite, but his servant, asking him, “Have I eaten of that?” “Have I had any of this?” It was after partaking too freely, both of “this” _and_ “that,” that poor M. Barthe let his temper get the better of him in an argument, and a stroke of apoplexy sent him under the table. His cook deplored in him the loss of a man of taste.

The cook of the Count de Tessé, Master of the Horse to Marie Antoinette, was famous for dressing artichokes. The great Morillian surpassed him, however; but this feat did not save the artist from ending his days in poverty. The elder Robert was, perhaps, equal to either of them, in this or in any other respect connected with his art. The great Carême, ignorant of every thing else, was at least an accomplished cook. There is, as I have said, a tradition that his _petits pâtés_, when they left the Regent’s table, were sold, like the second-hand pies from the royal table at Versailles, for fabulous prices. As I have before intimated, it was for Leo X. that Carême the First invented those succulent, but orthodox, dishes, which pleased the pontifical palate at a season when gratification by gravy would have been scandalous! It was in the Baron Rothschild’s household that Carême the Second invented his famous _sauce piquante_, the result of his studies under Richaut, Asne, and the elder Robert. It was in and for France that Carême published the learned and curious work of which he is the reputed author, and which he may have dictated, but which he could not have written. It is marked by philosophical inquiry, instruction, and pleasant trifling; and neither book nor reputed author has been excelled by any artist, or any sample of kitchen literature, that has appeared since that period.

Before the age of Carême, the popular kitchen in France was not very superior to our own; and the patrons of _tavernes_ and _traiteurs_ were as coarsely fed as our frequenters of ordinaries. But as royalty fell, the _restaurateurs_ rose; and when, in 1786, the cooks of Louis XVI. began to augur badly of their prospects, three provincial brothers, Barthélemy, Mannielles, and Simon, opened their famous _restaurant_, “_Les Trois Frères Provençaux_,” in the Palais Royal, and constituted themselves the cooks of another King,--the sovereign people. The new establishment created an era in the history of cookery, and men of all shades of politics, and Generals of all grades of reputation, resorted to the tables of the Brothers. General Bonaparte and Barras were to be seen there daily, before they took their cheap pleasure at the theatre of Mlle. Montansier. During the wars of the Empire it was the chosen stage for the farewell banquets of brethren in arms, and at this period the receipts amounted to not less than £500 sterling daily. The triumvirate of proprietors endured longer than any such union in the political world; and it was not till the reign of Louis Philippe that the establishment of “_Les Trois Frères_” descended, under a new proprietary, into a more unpretending position than that which it had proudly sustained during half a century. The _casseroles_ of the savoury Brothers had remained unshaken, while Kings and constitutions had fallen around them.

The fortune of the Provincial Brothers tempted another country cook from his obscurity; and some four years after the former had set up their tables in the Palais Royal, the immortal Véry thrust his feet into wooden clogs, and trudged from a village on the Meuse up to the capital, to give it a taste of his quality. He enchanted Marshal Duroc with some of his _plats_, and henceforth his fortune was secure. He married a beautiful woman, whose pen kept his books, whose face attracted customers, and whose heart was devoted to her husband. A quarter of a century sufficed to enable Véry to die immensely rich, after working excessively hard, and to be magnificently entombed in the _Cimetière Montmartre_, under a marble column, which bore the engraved assurance that “his whole life was devoted to the useful arts.”

Beauvilliers appeared in Paris about the same time as “the Three Brothers;” he made and unmade his fortune three or four times, and died poor, three years after Véry died so rich. Beauvilliers was the author of “_L’Art du Cuisinier_,” a book almost as interesting as “The Art of Dining;” and one cannot name either without standing mentally _chapeau bas!_ before the author.

Beauvilliers was famous for his splendid wines and heavy bill. The _Veau qui tette_ was renowned for its sheep-trotters. The reputation of others was built upon kidneys; that of Véry, on his _entrées truffées_. The “Three Provincial Brothers” enjoyed a wide esteem for the way in which they dressed cod with garlic. Baleine kept a house that was crowded by the admirers of fish; while that of Robert was distinguished for the graceful attention with which previously ordered dinners were served; and that of Henneveu for the splendid _boudoirs_ in which shy couples, too modest to encounter the public gaze, could dine in private, and cease to find their modesty oppressive. Beauvilliers’, as I have intimated, was a costly house; but it was not _therefore_ the most excellent in Paris. The excellence of a dinner is not to be determined by its price. Four years ago an illustrious party dined at Philippe’s, in the Rue Montorgueil, at a far lower cost, and after a far more exquisite fashion, than if they had joined the Epicureans of the Clarendon, at £5 per head. The party consisted of Lords Brougham and Dufferin, the Honourable W. Stuart, two other “Britishers,” and Count D’Orsay and M. Alexandre Dumas. The dinner on this occasion was a _recherchée_ affair. It had been as anxiously meditated upon as an epic poem; and it was a far pleasanter thing. “The most successful dishes,” says the author of “The Art of Dining,” “were the _bisques_, the _fritures à l’Italienne_, and the _gigot à la Bretanne_. Out of compliment to the world-wide fame of Lord Brougham and Alexandre Dumas, M. Philippe produced some _Clos de Vougeot_, which, (like his namesake in ‘High Life Below Stairs,’) he vowed, should never go down the throat of a man whom he did not esteem and admire; and it was voted first-rate by acclamation.”

The French repasts are not always good, even when they are rather costly. In 1807, a party of twenty-two sat down to a repast at the younger “Robert’s,” in Paris. The Amphitryon of the feast was M. Daolouis; and the bill, exclusive of wine, amounted to thirty louis. There were but three or four great dishes, and two or three sauces. The discontent of the guests was general, and the giver of the feast allowed that the dinner was not near so good as that of the “_Société des Mercredis_,” at _Le Gacque’s_, which cost only seven francs per head, ordinary wine, liqueurs, and coffee included. “_Mais, à dîner, Messieurs, à dîner!_”

DINNER TRAITS.

“For these and all His mercies”----once began Dr. Johnson, whose good custom it was always to thank Heaven for the good things set before him; but he almost as invariably found fault with the food given. And of this see-saw process Mrs. Johnson grew tired; and on the occasion alluded to, she stopped her husband by remarking that it was a farce to pretend to be grateful for dishes which, in two minutes, he would pronounce to be as worthless as the worst of Jeremiah’s figs! And so there was no blessing. Mrs. Johnson might have supplied the one employed by merry old Lady Hobart at a dinner where she looked inquiringly, but vainly, for a grace-sayer. “Well,” remarked the good ancient dame, “I think I must say as one did in the like case, ‘God be thanked!--nobody will say grace!’” It is seldom that “grace” is properly said or sung. The last is a terribly melodious mockery at public dinners; but then every man should silently and fervently make thanksgiving in his own heart. He is an ungracious knave who sits down to a meal without at least a silent acknowledgment of gratitude to Him, without whom there could have been no spreading of the banquet. Such a defaulter deserves to be the bound slave of dyspepsia, until he learn better manners. “Come, gentlemen,” Beau Nash used to say, “eat, and welcome!” It was all his grace; and had he said, “Come, gentlemen, be thankful and eat,” it would have been more like the Christian gentleman, and less like the “beau.”

It was a good old rule that prescribed as a law of numbers at the dinner-table, that the company should not be more than the Muses nor less than the Graces. There was not always unlimited freedom of action in the matter; for, by the _Lex Faunia_, a man was forbidden to invite more than three strangers (not of his family) to dinner, except on market days, (three times a month,) when he might invite five. The host was restricted to spending only two and a half _drachmas_; but he might consume annually one hundred and twenty Roman pounds of meat for each person in his house, and eat at discretion of all plants and herbs that grew wild; and, indeed, little restriction was put upon vegetables at all. One consequence was, that this law against luxury begot a great deal of it, and ruined men’s stomachs in consequence. When the French Mayor ordered all good citizens in his dark district to carry lanterns at night, he forgot to say a word about candles, and the wits walked about with the lanterns unfurnished. The official rectified the mistake by ordering the candles; but as he omitted to say that these were to be lighted, the public did not profit by the decree. So the _Lex Faunia_, when it allowed unrestrained liberty in thistles, forgot to limit sauces; and vegetables generally were eaten with such luscious aids to which the name of “sauce” was given, that even the grave Cicero yielded to the temptation, spoiled his digestion, and got a liver complaint! After all, it is said that only three Romans could be found who rigorously observed the _Faunia_ Law, according to their oaths. These were men more easily satisfied than Apicius, who cried like a child, when, of all his vast fortune, he had only about £250,000 sterling that he could devote to gluttony; or than Lucullus, who never supped in the “Apollo” without its costing him at least ten thousand pounds.

Notwithstanding this, the _Faunia_ Law was an absurd impertinence. It was like the folly of Antigonus, who one day, seeing the poet Antagoras in the camp, cooking a dish of congers for his dinner, asked, “O Antagoras, dost thou think that Homer sang the deeds of heroes while he boiled fish?” “And you, O King,” returned the poet, “thinkest thou that Agamemnon gained renown for his exploits, by trying to find out who had boiled fish for dinner in his camp?” The moral is, that it is best to leave men at liberty to eat as they like. Society is strong enough to make laws on these matters for itself; and no one now could commit the crime of the greedy Demylos, who, to secure a superb dish of fish for himself, ἐνέπτυσεν εἰς αὐτήν, “spat in it;” and if my readers refer to the chapter illustrating “Their Majesties at Meat,” they will find that so dirty a trick was not the reserved privilege of Heathenism.

The Pythagoreans were clean eaters, and dined daily on bread and honey. On the smell of the latter Democritus did not indeed dine, but died. He had determined to commit suicide, and had cut down his allowance to such small rations, that his death was expected daily. But the fun and the festival of Ceres was at hand; and the ladies of his house begged him to be good enough not to spoil the frolic by dying at such a mirthful moment. He consented, asked for a pot of honey, and kept himself alive by smelling at it, till the festival was over, when his family hoped that he would die whenever he found it convenient. He took one sniff more at the pot, and in the effort his breath passed away for ever. There was nothing reprehensible in the conduct of those ladies. They did not outrage the spirit of their times. I think worse of Madam du Deffand, who went out to dine on the day her old lover died, remarking, as she entered the room, how lucky it was that he had expired before six o’clock, as otherwise she would have been too late for the gay party expecting her. The brilliant society who played cards by the side of the bed of the dying Mlle. de l’Espinasse, and counted their tricks while they commented upon her “rattles,” may be pronounced as being twice as Pagan as the ladies of the household of Democritus.

A small portion of soup is a good preparative to excite the digestive powers generally for what is to follow. Oysters form a far less commonly safe introduction to the more solid repast, their chill, which even Chablis cannot always rectify, paralysing rather than arousing the stomach. The French _bouilli_ after soup is a dangerous vulgarity; for it is simply, as a distinguished professor has styled it, “meat, all but its nourishing juice.”

“Poultry,” says M. Brillat, “is to the sick man who has been floating over an uncertain and uneasy sea, like the first odour or sight of land to the storm-beaten mariner.” But a skilful cook can render almost any dish attractive to any and every quality of appetite. In this respect, the French and Chinese cooks are really professional brethren; much more so than a general practitioner and a veterinary surgeon!

The Chinese are exceedingly skilful cooks, and exhibit taste and judgment in the selection of their food. With a few beans, and the meal of rice and corn, they will make a palatable and nutritious dish. They eat horse-flesh, rats, mice, and young dogs. Why not? All these are far cleaner feeders than pigs and lobsters. A thorough-bred horse is so nice in his appetite, that he will refuse the corn which has been breathed upon by another horse. The Tonquin birds’ nests eaten in China may be described as young Mr. Fudge describes the Paris _grisettes_: “Rather eatable things, those _grisettes_, by the bye!” So are the birds’ nests, composed as they are of small shell-fish and a glutinous matter, supplied by the plumed inhabitant of the edible houses. Bears’ paws, rolled in pepper and nutmeg, dried in the sun, and subsequently soaked in rice-water, and boiled in the gravy of a kid, form a dish that would make ecstatic the grave Confucius himself.

There are some men for whom cooks toil in vain. The Duke of Wellington’s cook had serious doubts as to his master being a great man,--he so loved simple fare. Suwarrow was another General who was the despair of cooks. His biographer says of him, that he was at dinner when Col. Hamilton appeared before him to announce an Austrian victory over the French. The General had one huge plate before him, a sort of Irish stew, with every thing for sauce, from which he ate greedily, spitting out the bones, “as was his custom.” He was so delighted with the message and the messenger, that he received him as Galba did Icelus, the announcer of Nero’s death: with his unwiped mouth, he began kissing the latter, (as the half-shaven Duke of Newcastle once did the bearer of some welcome intelligence,) and insisted on his sitting down and eating from the General’s plate, “without ceremony.” The great Coligny was, like Suwarrow, a rapid eater; but he was more nice in his diet. The characteristic of Coligny was, that he always used to eat his tooth-picks!

According to ancient rule, an invitation not replied to within four-and-twenty hours was deemed accepted; and from an invitation given and accepted, nothing releases the contracting parties but illness, imprisonment, or death! Nothing suffers so much by delay as dinner; and if punctuality be the politeness of Kings, it should also be the policy both of guests and cooks. Lack of punctuality on the part of the former has been illustrated in the cases of men, of whom it is said that they never saw soup and fish but at their own tables. The late Lord Dudley Ward used to cite two brothers as startling examples of want of punctuality: “If you asked Robert for Wednesday, at seven, you got Charles on Thursday, at eight!” On the other hand, an unpunctual cook is scarcely to be accounted a cook; and an unpunctual master is not worthy of a cook whose dinner is ready to be served at the moment it has been ordered. The great “_artiste_” who dismissed his patron because he never sat down to dinner until after he had kept it waiting for an hour, was thoroughly acquainted with the dignity of his profession.

At the beginning of the present century, it was the custom in France to serve the soup immediately before the company entered the dining-room. The resulting advantage was a simultaneous operation on the part of the guests. The innovation was introduced by Mlle. Emilie Contat, the actress; but it was tolerated only for a season. It was, at the same period, of rigorous necessity, when eggs were eaten at dinner, to crush the empty shell. To allow the latter to leave the table whole was a breach in good manners; but the reason of this prandial law I have never been able to discover. Mlle. Contat was almost as famous for her love of good cheer as our own Foote, and both were, equally often, “on hospitable thoughts intent.”