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Article ENGLISH DIET IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. ← Page 4 of 5 →
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
English Diet In The Seventeenth Century.
and well fatted with wholesome meat , aud eaten with sorrel sauce to correct their malignity , ( if any malignity can remain after such dieting ) , no doubt their flesh is as nourishing as it is pleasant and sweet . " The Doctor then talks of " smoke of borax and spices , " and other heathenish condiments ; but Muffett lived in the clays oi" darkness , for he speaks no word of sage and onions ! For the effect of goose-flesh upon the Hebrew character , there can be little doubt that to his inordinate love of
such food in the days of his youth , is to be attributed all the " crooked conditions" of Shylock . A true commentator of the good old school having stumbled on the text of Jason Pratensis , would have furnished a hundred illustrations of the fact . However , we leave it to future Zachary Jacksons , if futurity have in her womb such wits , to make the most of it . On quitting the subject , we may be allowed to state that the goose that laid the golden eggs was originally the property of a writer of the Talmud .
SWANS . — " Swans , " says the Doctor , " were forbidden the Jews , because by them the hieroglyphical sages did describe hypocrisy ; swans having the whitest features and the blackest flesh of all birds . A goose and swan-fed Jew , according to the olden prejudice , must have been a monster unparalleled—a very Barubbas of Malta . Swans , however , for Gentile stomachs , are not , according to Muffett , ' ¦ ' the worst of meats , if kept in a little pound , and well fed with corn . Being thus used , they
are appointed to be the first dish on the Emperor of Muscovite ' s table . " CRANES . —The Doctor recommends that the cook hang the crane hot two or three days by the heels , and after that , it be eaten with galentine , drowned in sack . He also applauds the mode of treating them in Plutarch ' s time , when " they stitched up their eyes , and fed them in the dark with wholesome mixtures of corn ancl milk . " PHEASANTS . —For hectick feversMuffett recommends
pheasant-, pouts ; and to those recovering from long or violent sickness , no meat so ¦ wholesome . But—ancl we readily publish the opinion for the benefit of vulgar poachers—" to strong stomachs itis inconvenientest : especially to ploughmen and labourers , who eating of pheasants fall suddenly into sickness , and—shortness of breath . " Such effects have been known ; especially about the time of assizes . OYSTERS . —Doctor Muffett declares that" oysters do justly deserve a
full treatise , being so common and withal so wholesome a meat . " He prefers those which are " in a manner all belly and no fins ; or at the most having very short fins , of a green colour , and listed about as ivith a purple hair which will make them indeed to be justly called calliblephara , that is to say ' the fair eye-lidded oysters . '" The doctor prescribes as a certain cure for '' the cholic and dropsy ; " and if stewed , recommends them " with wineonions , pepperand butteror roasted
, , , with vinegar , pepper , and butter , or pickled with bays , mints , ancl hot spices . " PORPOISES . ; —This fish was long a favourite at the English tables ; we find it in the bill of fair at Coronation dinners . " It is an unsavory meat , " says the Doctor , " engendering many supurfluous humours , augmenting phlegm , and troubling no less an indifferent stomach than it troubles the sea ; yet many ladies and gentlemen love it exceedingly ,
baked like venison . Yea , I knew a great gentleman in Warwick Lane once send for a pasty of it given from a courtier , when the prisoners of Newgate had refused the fellow of it out of the beggar ' s basket . " FROGS . —Their hinder parts and livers ( which be two in each ) are
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
English Diet In The Seventeenth Century.
and well fatted with wholesome meat , aud eaten with sorrel sauce to correct their malignity , ( if any malignity can remain after such dieting ) , no doubt their flesh is as nourishing as it is pleasant and sweet . " The Doctor then talks of " smoke of borax and spices , " and other heathenish condiments ; but Muffett lived in the clays oi" darkness , for he speaks no word of sage and onions ! For the effect of goose-flesh upon the Hebrew character , there can be little doubt that to his inordinate love of
such food in the days of his youth , is to be attributed all the " crooked conditions" of Shylock . A true commentator of the good old school having stumbled on the text of Jason Pratensis , would have furnished a hundred illustrations of the fact . However , we leave it to future Zachary Jacksons , if futurity have in her womb such wits , to make the most of it . On quitting the subject , we may be allowed to state that the goose that laid the golden eggs was originally the property of a writer of the Talmud .
SWANS . — " Swans , " says the Doctor , " were forbidden the Jews , because by them the hieroglyphical sages did describe hypocrisy ; swans having the whitest features and the blackest flesh of all birds . A goose and swan-fed Jew , according to the olden prejudice , must have been a monster unparalleled—a very Barubbas of Malta . Swans , however , for Gentile stomachs , are not , according to Muffett , ' ¦ ' the worst of meats , if kept in a little pound , and well fed with corn . Being thus used , they
are appointed to be the first dish on the Emperor of Muscovite ' s table . " CRANES . —The Doctor recommends that the cook hang the crane hot two or three days by the heels , and after that , it be eaten with galentine , drowned in sack . He also applauds the mode of treating them in Plutarch ' s time , when " they stitched up their eyes , and fed them in the dark with wholesome mixtures of corn ancl milk . " PHEASANTS . —For hectick feversMuffett recommends
pheasant-, pouts ; and to those recovering from long or violent sickness , no meat so ¦ wholesome . But—ancl we readily publish the opinion for the benefit of vulgar poachers—" to strong stomachs itis inconvenientest : especially to ploughmen and labourers , who eating of pheasants fall suddenly into sickness , and—shortness of breath . " Such effects have been known ; especially about the time of assizes . OYSTERS . —Doctor Muffett declares that" oysters do justly deserve a
full treatise , being so common and withal so wholesome a meat . " He prefers those which are " in a manner all belly and no fins ; or at the most having very short fins , of a green colour , and listed about as ivith a purple hair which will make them indeed to be justly called calliblephara , that is to say ' the fair eye-lidded oysters . '" The doctor prescribes as a certain cure for '' the cholic and dropsy ; " and if stewed , recommends them " with wineonions , pepperand butteror roasted
, , , with vinegar , pepper , and butter , or pickled with bays , mints , ancl hot spices . " PORPOISES . ; —This fish was long a favourite at the English tables ; we find it in the bill of fair at Coronation dinners . " It is an unsavory meat , " says the Doctor , " engendering many supurfluous humours , augmenting phlegm , and troubling no less an indifferent stomach than it troubles the sea ; yet many ladies and gentlemen love it exceedingly ,
baked like venison . Yea , I knew a great gentleman in Warwick Lane once send for a pasty of it given from a courtier , when the prisoners of Newgate had refused the fellow of it out of the beggar ' s basket . " FROGS . —Their hinder parts and livers ( which be two in each ) are