Part 14

_Lucanian Sausages._--Pound in a mortar some pepper, cummin, and winter savory with bay leaves, and moisten with gravy and garum; then add to this mixture some pork, chopped small, more garum and pepper, and a good quantity of bacon, with a few pine nuts. When these various ingredients are well incorporated one with another, you stuff the prepared intestines, and hang up the sausages.[XVI-69]

_Imperial Sausages._--Cut some pork into very small pieces, which most be pounded with the finest bread, well-soaked in wine; then pound some pepper and decorticated myrtle leaves, and add some gravy. Make some small sausages, and put inside some fir-nuts. When these sausages are finished, you must cook them over a slow fire, with sweet wine, previously reduced to a-third.[XVI-70]

The following is the seasoning you must add to it:--

Bone some small chickens, and put them into a saucepan, with leeks, dill, and salt. When this is cooked, add pepper and smallage seed; then crumble some sesame bread, on which pour some very thick gravy, mix the whole well, and serve with the sausages.[XVI-71]

The Gauls had very considerable herds of swine, which they fed exclusively upon acorns. The inhabitants of the towns reared them in their houses. As these animals went frequently out, they caused some obstruction, and we know that Philip, grandson of Louis-le-Gros, lost his life in Paris, in consequence of a furious pig having run between the legs of his horse, and caused him to fall. This accident took place on the 1st October, 1181. The 3rd of the same month a proclamation was issued, forbidding all persons to let their swine ramble through the streets of Paris. A short time after, those which belonged to the Abbaye Saint-Antoine were privileged; the abbess and the nuns having represented that it would be a want of courtesy to their patron saint not to exempt his hogs from the general rule.[XVI-72]

A new proclamation of the 20th January, 1850, interdicted with still greater severity the rearing of swine in the town of Paris, under penalty of a fine of 60 sous (two shillings and four-pence); and the police were authorized to kill them wheresoever they might be found, to take the head as a perquisite for themselves, and to deposit the carcase at the Hôtel-Dieu (the name of an hospital), charging that establishment with the cost incurred for its conveyance.[XVI-73]

There was nothing more delicate in the 16th century, nothing more odoriferous, than the flesh of young pigs fed on parsnips,[XVI-73A] and roasted, with a stuffing of fine herbs.[XVI-73B]

THE OX.

A profound sentiment of gratitude has been often the cause of rendering to the ox extraordinary honours, which no animal, perhaps, ever shared with him. The Egyptians considered this quadruped as the emblem of agriculture, and of all that serves to support existence;[XVI-74] and incense smoked on its altars at Memphis and Heliopolis.[XVI-75]

The Phœnicians religiously abstained from its flesh, and the Phrygians punished with death whosoever dared to slay the labouring ox.[XVI-76]

In Greece, during the heroic ages, an ox was the reward adjudged to the conquering wrestlers and pugilists; a horse was the prize of racing or the quoits.[XVI-77]

At a later period the Athenians decreed that their coins should bear the image of this useful quadruped;[XVI-78] and though they then offered it to their gods, the ceremonies even of the sacrifice testified the repugnance felt at shedding its blood.

The sacrificer fled with the greatest speed after he had struck it; he was followed, and, to avoid being arrested, he threw away the axe he had used, and accused it of causing the death of the innocent ox. The axe was then seized and tried; some one defended it, and alleged that it was less guilty than the grinder who had sharpened the blade. The latter cast the odium of the crime on the grinding stone, so that the trial was never ended, and the pretended offence remained unpunished.[XVI-79]

For a long time the greater part of the ancients considered it a sin to eat the flesh of the ox, the companion of the agriculturist, whose patient vigour hollows the furrow which is to be the means of his support.[XVI-80] But the bad example of Proserpine, who prepared one for Hercules,[XVI-81] caused these scruples, one by one, to be hushed, the solemn prohibition of the legislator of Athens forgotten;[XVI-82] and, in spite of the obstinate resistance of the Pythagorians and the disciples of Empedocles, every one declared in favour of the doctrines of Zeno and Epicurus.

Moreover, it is certain that the heroes of Homer were not so scrupulous: Menelaus offered roast-beef to Telemachus; Agamemnon also presented some to the wise Nestor; and an ox, roasted whole, frequently appeased the robust appetite of the illustrious chiefs of Greece.[XVI-83]

If we go back to centuries still more remote, and of which a venerable historian has preserved us an account, we find herds of oxen were possessed by the great patriarchal families.[X][XVI-84] Abraham cooked a calf and served it to the three angels, in the valley of Mamre;[XVI-85] and the flesh of this animal, whether ox or heifer, was evidently much in use in the primitive ages, since no particular proscription exempts them from those beings having “life and motion,”[XVI-86] and which are to serve us as food.[XVI-87] As to Moses, far from interdicting it to the Israelites, he places the ox in the first rank of pure animals,[XVI-88] whose flesh was allowed them.

The oracle of ancient medicine, Hippocrates, praises the flesh of the ox, in which he recognises the most nutritious qualities, but nevertheless he believes it to be heavy and indigestible.[XVI-89]

Of what material, then, must have been the stomach of Theagenes, of Thasos--he, who devoured a whole bull in one day.[XVI-90]

To be sure, the same exploit is attributed to Milo of Crotona, whose ordinary meal consisted of eighteen pounds of meat, as much bread, and fifteen pints of wine.[XVI-91] These formidable polyphagists could, without much expense, indulge their fabulous appetites; for, in the time of Demosthenes, 354 B.C., an ox of the first quality cost only eighty drachmas, or about two pounds, eleven shillings, and eightpence.[XVI-92]

Magiric writers have left us very few details on the different methods of cooking the flesh of the ox or calf. It appears to have been generally roasted,[XVI-93] in which case it was eaten alone; but sometimes it was eaten boiled, with one of the sauces to be hereafter mentioned.

These animals were fed with particular care, in order to render them more worthy of the luxurious tables for which certain choice pieces were destined. The manner of fattening oxen has already been described: it is only necessary to add, that calves, which were to be slaughtered, received no other food than their mothers’ milk; and that, frequently, they were not killed before the expiration of a twelvemonth.[XVI-94]

Double tripe was reputed as an excellent food. The Asiatics, Greeks, and Romans were particularly fond of it. It was served at a sumptuous repast prepared for Achilles; and Homer observes, that this dish was always honourably received at the banquets of heroes.[XVI-95]

Athenæus, describing a feast of the most exquisite elegance, names double tripe among a host of dishes he enumerates;[XVI-96] he also says, speaking of a state dinner at which Philoxenus, one of the generals of Alexander the Great, was a guest, that first of all there appeared large basins containing the intestines of animals, disposed with art around their heads:[XVI-97] and it is thus, he adds, that even the gods gave themselves up, in the society of their friends, to the pleasures of good cheer.[XVI-98] To be brief, this artless chronicler of antique gastrophagy, tells us that after the sacrilegious undertaking of the Titans, the human race enjoyed such perfect happiness, that men caused to be served at every one of their repasts delicious double tripe and savoury intestines.[XVI-99]

This touching example of felicity and innocent gluttony found few imitators at Rome among that class of voluptuous men who entertained, at enormous expense, tasters whose discriminating palates could tell whether a fish had been caught at the mouth of the Tiber, or further off; whether a goose’s liver had been fattened with fresh figs, or only on dried ones.[XVI-100] For them tripe could have very little attraction, but this rather plebeian dish appeared with honour on modest tables, and proletarian epicures sought for it with eagerness.[XVI-101]

_Beef à l’Ibérienne._--Well boil an excellent piece of beef, and serve it with the following sauce. Grind and mix pepper, alisander, parsley seed, wild marjoram, and dried onions; moisten with sun-made raisin wine; stir, and add honey, vinegar, wine, garum, oil, and sweet wine.[XVI-102]

_Stewed Beef à la Sarmate._--Carefully choose a piece of beef, which stew slowly for a long time with leeks, cut small, onions, or beans. When it is well cooked, pour over a mixture of pepper, benzoin, and a little oil.[XVI-103]

_Dish of Veal à la Syracusaine._--Cook a piece of veal, on a slow fire, with pepper, alisander, carrots, and parsley seed, bruised together in a mortar; then add honey, vinegar, garum, and oil; thicken the whole with fine flour, and serve.[XVI-104]

_Noix de Veau à la Tarantaise._--Take a _noix de veau_, cook it in a saucepan with pepper, alisander, and fenugreek seed; add, later, some wild marjoram, pine nuts, and dates; then moisten with a mixture of honey, vinegar, garum, mustard, and oil. When the cookery of these various substances shall have made an homogeneous whole, serve.[XVI-105]

_Cisalpine Preserve._--Mince some beef in very small pieces; do the same with a little bacon; add pine nuts, pounded with dates; pour on the whole a mixture of vinegar, garum, mustard, and oil; stir well, and throw on this pulp a powder of strong odoriferous herbs. Stir it a long time, let it rest, compress it strongly in a prepared intestine, close the opening, and put a string round to tighten it still more. This preserve cannot turn bad.[XVI-106]

The ox was so precious among the Romans, that mention is made of a certain citizen accused before the people and condemned, because he had killed one of his oxen to satisfy the fancy of a young libertine, who told him he bad never eaten any tripe. He was banished, as if he had killed his farmer.[XVI-107]

The Brahmin women think to obtain abundance of milk and butter by invoking one particular cow,--the darling cow of the king of heaven; the type, mother, and patroness of all cows. The entire species are treated with the greatest deference; they have lavished upon them every expression of gratitude, and one day of each year is set apart as a solemn festival consecrated to their worship.[XVI-108]

Some centuries ago the large pieces of meat were boiled first, and then roasted. Roasted meat was always served with sauce. Animals roasted whole were generally filled with an aromatic stuffing. Sage was the common seasoning for geese, and sucking-pigs were stuffed with chesnuts. Some minutes before these were taken from the spit, they were covered with bread crumbs; and appeared on the table enveloped in a crust composed of bread, sugar, orange juice, and rose water.[XVI-109]

_Bœuf Gras._--There is a very old custom in the whole of France, and which consists in leading throughout the streets, in the provincial towns, on Shrove Tuesday, a fatted ox, ornamented with flowers and ribbons. This ceremony is considered as a commemorative emblem of the fecundity of the earth. In Paris, the ox chosen for the same purpose has generally obtained beforehand the prize awarded by the Agricultural Society. The horns of the animal are gilded; he is afterwards decorated in a sumptuous manner, and led through the principal thoroughfares of that city, on Shrove Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, to the Palace of the Tuileries, the ministerial residences, the Hôtel-de-Ville, and the foreign embassies. Troops of butchers, dressed in appropriate fancy costumes, both on horseback and on foot, are preceded by bands of music; and the heathen divinities, drawn by eight horses in a richly gilt triumphal car, form one of the most splendid and grotesque pageants of modern times.

THE LAMB.

Formerly, sworn examiners of the clouds, skilful in discovering the storms they concealed, announced to the inhabitants of the country the hail by which their crops were threatened, and every one immediately offered a sacrifice to the inimical cloud, in order that it might carry ruin and desolation elsewhere. The most devout sacrificed a lamb; the lukewarm worshippers a fowl; some even contented themselves with pricking their finger with a pin, and throwing towards heaven the drops of blood which came out. The cloud, it is said, satisfied with these pious offerings, soon disappeared never to return.[XVI-110]

The lamb, an oblation pure and agreeable in the sight of the gods, reconciled the earth with Olympus. In Egypt, the inhabitants of Sais and Thebes offered it to their divinities.[XVI-111] Minerva and Juno also were pleased to see its flesh smoking on the altars which Greece and Italy raised to them.[XVI-112]

These practices, no doubt, were an obscure imitation of the religious rites which Moses prescribed to his people,[XVI-113] and which heathen nations adopted in their turn, one from the other.[XVI-114]

The Hebrew law forbad the killing of the Paschal lamb before it was weaned, and also the cooking of it in its mother’s milk. It was to be eaten roasted, with unleavened bread, lettuces, mustard, or bitter herbs: whatever might remain was to be burnt with fire. It was not to be boiled, nor a bone of it broken. It must be chosen of that year, a male, and without fault or blemish.[XVI-115]

Many passages of the sacred writings allow us to appreciate the pastoral riches of the first nations of the East; and an idea may be formed of the number of their flocks, when we are told that Jacob gave the children of Hamor a hundred sheep for the price of a field;[XVI-116] and that the King of Israel received a hundred thousand every year from the King of Moab, his tributary, and a like number of rams, covered with their fleece.[XVI-117]

The delicate flesh of the lamb was the ornament of the tables of the voluptuous inhabitants of Sion and Samaria. The prophet Amos reproaches them with this luxury, and threatens them with the Divine anger[XVI-118] on that account. The Greeks carried their love for this meat to such a height, that the magistrates of Athens were obliged to forbid the eating of lamb which had not been shorn.[XVI-119] This restriction did not prevent the epicures of Attica from buying one of these animals every day, which cost them ten drachmas[XVI-120] (6_s._ 5_d._), and the head of which, prepared with art, heightened the beauty of the first course.[XVI-121] Rome and Italy imitated Greece,[XVI-122] and the flocks of the fertile Campania hardly sufficed for the exigencies of the capital of the world, especially towards the end of autumn, a period at which lambs afforded, according to the Romans, a more highly flavoured and wholesome meat than in the spring.[XVI-123]

_Lamb’s Head à la Quirinale._--The head is boiled with pepper, garum, and beans, and served with a sauce consisting of garum, pepper, benzoin, and cummin, to which is added a little oil, and small pieces of bread, soaked in sweet wine.[XVI-124]

_Quarter of Lamb à l’Esquilin._--Place a quarter of lamb in a saucepan with onions and coriander, chopped very small. Then pound pepper, alisander, and cummin; put to it some oil, wine, and garum. Pour the whole on the lamb; cook well, and thicken with fine flour.[XVI-125]

_Palatine Broil._--Leave a piece of lamb during some time in a mixture of pepper, benzoin, garum, and oil. After having cooked it in oil and garum, put it a little while on the gridiron, sprinkle with pepper, and serve.[XVI-126]

_Roast Lamb à la Phrygienne._--Bake a lamb and serve it with the following sauce:--Mix well half an ounce of pepper, six scruples of cinnamon, a little ginger, half a pint of excellent garum, and the quarter of that quantity of oil.[XVI-127]

_Lamb à la Trimalcion._--Draw a lamb at the neck; preserve the intestines entire, and wash them with the greatest care; fill them with force meat and garum; put them back again by the same way; sew up the opening, and place the lamb in the oven. Then mix gravy and milk; add pounded pepper, garum, wine, sweet wine, and oil; let it boil only an instant; thicken with fine floor, and serve it with the lamb.[XVI-128]

Blount informs us of a very ancient and rather strange custom. He says:--

“At Kidlington, in Oxfordshire, the custom is, that on Monday after Whitson week, there is a fat, live lamb provided, and the maids of the town, having their thumbs tied behind them, run after it, and she that with her mouth takes and holds the lamb is declared _Lady of the Lamb_, which, being dressed, with the skin hanging on, is carried on a long pole before the Lady and her companions to the Green, attended with music, and a morisco dance of men and another of women, when the rest of the day is spent in dancing, mirth, and merry glee. The next day the lamb is part baked, boiled, and roast, for the Lady’s feast, where she sits majestically at the upper end of the table, and her companions with her, with music and other attendants, which ends the solemnity.”[XVI-129]

THE KID.

The kid was one of the most delicate dishes of the Hebrews: Rebecca prepared some for Isaac, in order to dispose him to give his blessing to Jacob.[XVI-130] Moses ordered that, for the Feast of Passover, a lamb or a kid should be slain.[XVI-131] Samson carried a kid to his young wife when he wished to be reconciled to her.[XVI-132] The brother of the prodigal son complains to his father that he has never given him a kid to make merry with his friends.[XVI-133]

The Egyptians, who represented their god Pan with the face and legs of a goat, abstained religiously from killing a kid or eating its flesh.[XVI-134] Their veneration for this animal went so far, in some countries, that goat-keepers appeared in their eyes invested with an august and sacred character.[XVI-135] The Greeks did not judge it convenient to adopt these strange ideas, although on other points their theology was sufficiently ridiculous. The kid was considered one of the most dainty dishes in state banquets; it was served whole, on a silver basin, to each of the guests at the wedding of the Macedonian, Caranus.[XVI-136]

The kids of Attica were especially praised, and a considerable trade was made of them in Athens.[XVI-137] Certain connoisseurs, whose authority had weight, preferred, however, those produced in the Island of Mælos.[XVI-138] A great many also came from Sicily: they were in less repute, and sold at a low price.[XVI-139]

At Rome, the kid of Italy was much thought of; the most delicate were fattened at Tivoli,[XVI-140] and in different localities of the Roman Campagna.[XVI-141]

_Kid à la Trans-Tibérienne._--The kid is to be cooked slowly, with a little milk, four ounces of honey, an ounce of pepper, a little salt and benzoin. After some time, add eight dates crushed in a mortar, a little gravy, garum, a small quantity of excellent wine; the whole is thickened with fine flour.[XVI-142]

_Roast Kid à la Janiculum._--Empty and carefully clean a kid; rub it well with oil and pepper; sprinkle with salt and a large quantity of coriander seed; place it in the oven, and bake slowly.[XVI-143]

_Kid à la Tarpéienne._--Empty the kid; stuff it, and sew it up; then entirely cover it with a thick mixture of pepper, rue, winter savory, onions, a small quantity of thyme, and some garum; then place it in an oven, or on a dish, covered with oil. When the kid is cooked, you surround it with a sauce of winter savory, onions, rue, dates, mixed with wine, oil, and cooked wine; sprinkle with pepper, and serve.[XVI-144]

_Kid à la Tivoli._--Bake the kid; then pound some pepper, rue, onions, winter savory, and Damascus plums (without their stones), a little benzoin, which you must dilute in wine, garum, and oil; throw this sauce on the kid as you withdraw it from the oven, and, at the moment of serving, cover it with boiling wine.[XVI-145]

_Kid à la Mélissienne._--Draw the kid at the neck, and clean the intestines; then pound some pepper, alisander, benzoin root, two bay leaves, and a little Spanish camomile; add two or three brains; mix them well together; then add some garum and a little salt; afterwards, a small quantity of milk and honey. Fill the intestines with this stuffing, and place them round the kid, which you then put into a large basin on the fire. When half-cooked, you must add a mixture of garum, oil, and wine. Then bruise some pepper and alisander seed, which moisten with the gravy of the kid, and a little cooked wine; pour it into the basin, and the moment before serving thicken with fine flour.[XVI-146]

THE ASS.

The ass was an impure animal, according to the law of Moses, whose flesh was forbidden because it did not ruminate.[XVI-147] However, at the siege of Samaria, the Jews were compelled to eat it for want of other food. The famine was such, that the head of an ass was sold for eighty pieces of silver.[XVI-148]

The Roman peasants thought the flesh of the young ass had a very agreeable taste,[XVI-149] and regaled themselves with it at their rustic festivals. The celebrated Mecænas one day tasted of this dish at the house of one of his free slaves; he spoke of it with much praise, caused it to be served on his own table, and even succeeded in introducing it on those of the great and rich, who gave up the onager, or wild ass, which they had hitherto preferred, to humour this illustrious favourite. But this new gastronomic conquest had only a short vogue; and was forgotten after the death of Mecænas.[XVI-150] Galen tells us that the cooks of Alexandria thought much of the ass,[XVI-151] whose flesh, he says, much resembles that of the stag.[XVI-152] Still, this great physician disapproves of the use of this food, which he considers unsuited to mankind.[XVI-153]

It is asserted, even at the present day, that the flesh of the young ass is a pretty good dish; we have heard, but we hardly can repeat it, that much is consumed in the _guinguettes_ round Paris, where the artless customers are far from thinking that anything else but veal can be served to them.

The modern restaurateurs of the Barrières of Paris, have, perhaps, read the biography of Mecænas, and endeavour to render popular the dish so honoured by the celebrated favourite. Who can blame them?

THE DOG.

We must beg pardon of the reader for informing him that the dog presented a very relishing dish to many nations advanced in culinary science. To them, one of these animals, young, plump, and delicately prepared, appeared excellent food.[XVI-154]

The Greeks, that people so charming by their seductive folly, their love of the arts, their poetic civilization, and the intelligent spirit of research presiding over their dishes--the Greeks (we grieve to say it) ate dogs, and even dared to think them good: the grave Hippocrates himself--the most wise, the least gluttonous, and therefore the most impartial of their physicians--was convinced that this quadruped furnished a wholesome and, at the same time, a light food.[XVI-155]

As to the Romans, they also liked it,[XVI-156] and no doubt prepared it in the same manner as the hare, which they thought it resembled in taste.[XVI-157]

However, it is but right to add, that this dish, which we will not even hear mentioned, was never favourably received by the fashionable portion of Roman society, and that the legislators of ancient gastrophagy even repulsed it with disdain.