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THE FLOWING BOWL,
by EDWARD SPENCER

By the Same Author

CAKES AND ALE

A Memory of many Meals; the whole inter­spersed with var­i­ous Rec­i­pes, more or less orig­i­nal, and An­ec­dotes, main­ly ver­a­cious.

THIRD EDITION

Small Crown 8vo, Cloth, 2s.

Cover designed by Phil May

THE GREAT GAME
AND HOW IT IS PLAYED

A Treatise on the Turf,
full of Tales

Small Crown 8vo, cloth, 2s.

LONDON: GRANT RICHARDS

THE

FLOWING BOWL

A TREATISE ON DRINKS OF ALL KINDS AND OF ALL PERIODS, INTERSPERSED WITH SUNDRY ANECDOTES AND REMINISCENCES

BY

EDWARD SPENCER

(‘NATHANIEL GUBBINS’)

AUTHOR OF ‘CAKES AND ALE,’ ETC.

London

GRANT RICHARDS

1903

PREFACE

I claim no merit for the following pages, other than may attach to in­dus­try, appli­ca­tion, the gift of copying accurately, and the acqui­si­tion of writer’s cramp. The mechan­i­cal writ­ing is—to the great joy of the com­pos­i­tors who have dealt with it—every let­ter mine own; but the best part of the book has been conveyed from other sources. In fact the book is, as the old lady said of the divine tragedy of Hamlet, “full of quotations.” The hand is the hand of Gubbins, but the voice is, for the most part, the voice of the great ones of the past, including Pliny and Gervase Markham. The matter, or most of it—I am endeavouring to drive the fact home—is culled from other sources; and if this is the most useful and inter­est­ing work ever pub­lished it is more my for­tune than my fault.

The genial reception of my earlier effort, Cakes and Ale—which was condemned only by worshippers of Ala, who were not expected to applaud—together with the hope of earning something towards the purchase of a Bath Chair—have induced me to issue this little treatise on liquids, as a companion to my first cloth-bound book. And innate modesty—I stick to “innate,” despite the critics—compels me to add that I think the last is the better work. I will, however, leave a generous and discriminating public to decide that question for itself.

LONDON, CHRISTMAS EVE, 1898.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
THE OLD ADAM
[1]–10

Introductory — Awful habits of the ancients — A bold, bad book — Seneca on the Drink Habit — The bow must not be always strung — Ebrietatis Encomium — The noble Romans — “Dum vivimus vivamus” — The skeleton at the banquet — Skull-cups — “Life and wine are the same thing” — Virgil and his contemporaries — Goats for Bacchus — The days of Pliny — Rewards for drunkenness — Novellius Torquatus — Three gallons at a draught — A swallow which did not save Rome — The antiquity of getting for’ard — Noah as a grape-grower — Father Frassen’s ideas — Procopius of Gaza — New Testament wine — Fermented or not? — Bad old Early Christians — Drunkenness common in Africa — Religion a cloak for alcohol — Tertullian on cider — Paulinus excuses intemperance — Excellence of Early Christians’ intentions

CHAPTER II
MORE FRIGHTFUL EXAMPLES
[11]–21

Eating and drinking the only work of the monks — Nunc est bibendum — An apology for Herodotus — A jovial pope — Good quarters in Provence — Intemperance of holy men — A tippling bishop — Alexander the Great — “Lovely Thais sits beside thee” — A big flare-up — Awful end of Alec — Cambyses always shot straight — Darius the strong-of-head — Philip drunk and Philip sober — Dionysius gets blind — Tiberius loved the bowl — So did Flavius Vobiscus, the diplomatist — Bluff King Hal — The Merry Monarch and the Lord Mayor — Dear Old Pepys — A Mansion House wine-list — Minimum allowance of sack — A slump in brandy — A church-tavern — Dean Aldrich — The Romans at supper — “The tippling philosophers”

CHAPTER IV
SOME OLD RECIPES
[36]–47

Indifference of the Chineses — A nasty potion — A nastier — White Bastard — Helping it to be eager — Improving Malmsey — Death of the Duke of Clarence — Mum is not the word — English champagne — Life without Ebulum a blank — Cock ale — How to dispose of surplus poultry — Painful fate of a pauper — Potage pauvre — Duties of the old English housewife — Election of wines, not golf — Muskadine — Lemon wine — Familiar recipe — King William’s posset — Pope’s ditto

CHAPTER V
GLORIOUS BEER
[48]–60

Nectar on Olympus — Beer and the Bible — “Ninepenny” at Eton — “Number One” Bass — “The wicked weed called hops” — All is not beer that’s bitter — Pathetic story of “Poor Richard” — Secrets of brewing — Gervase Markham — An “espen” full of hops — Eggs in ale — Beer soup — The wassail bowl — Sir Watkin Wynne — Brown Betty — Rumfustian — Mother-in-law — A delightful summer drink — Brasenose ale

CHAPTER VI
ALL ALE
[61]–71

Waste not, want not — The right hand for the froth — Arthur Roberts and Phyllis Broughton — A landlord’s perquisites — Marc Antony and hot coppers — Introduction of ale into Britain — Burton-on-Trent — Formerly a cotton-spinning centre — A few statistics — Michael Thomas Bass — A grand old man — Malting barleys — Porter and stout — Lager beer — Origin of bottled ale — An ancient recipe — Lead-poisoning — The poor man’s beer

CHAPTER VII
A SPIRITUOUS DISCOURSE
[72]–82

What is brandy? — See that you get it — Potato-spirit from the Fatherland — The phylloxera and her ravages — Cognac oil — Natural history of the vine-louse — “Spoofing” the Yanks — Properties of Argol — Brandy from sawdust — Desiccated window-sills — Enormous boom in whisky — Dewar and the trade — Water famine — The serpent Alcohol — Some figures — France the drunken nation, not Britain — Taxing of distilleries — Uisge beatha — Fusel oil — Rye whisky — Palm wine — John Exshaw knocked out by John Barleycorn

CHAPTER VIII
OTHER SPIRITS
[83]–90

Old Jamaica pine-apple — “Tots” for Tommy Atkins — The grog tub aboard ship — Omelette au rhum — Rum-and-milk — Ditto-and-ale — A maddening mixture — Rectifying gin — “The seasoning as does it” — Oil of turpentine and table-salt — A long thirst — A farthing’s worth of Old Tom — Roach-alum — Dirty gin — Gin and bitters — “Kosher” rum — An active and intelligent officer — Gambling propensities of the Israelites — The dice in the tumbler — Nomenclature at “The Olde Cheshyre Cheese” — “Rack” — “Cork”

CHAPTER IX
CUPS WHICH CHEER
[91]–100

Claret combinations — Not too much noyeau — A treat for schoolboys — The properties of borage — “Away with mel­an­choly” — Salmon’s Household Companion — Balm for vapours — Crimean cup — An elaborate and far-reaching compound — Orgeat — A race-day cup — “Should auld acquaintance be forgot?” — Sparkling Isabella — Rochester’s delight — Freemason’s relish — Porter cup — Dainty drink for a tennis-party

CHAPTER X
PUNCH
[101]–114

Derivation of the word questioned — Not an Asiatic drink — “Pale-punts” — No relation to pale punters — Properties of rum — Toddy as a tonic — Irish punch — Glasgie ditto — O’er muckle cauld watter — One to seven — Hech sirs! — Classical sherbet — Virtues of the feet of calves — West India dry gripes — Make your own punch — No deputy allowed — Attraction of capillaire — Gin punch — Eight recipes for milk-punch — University heart-cheerers

CHAPTER XI
STRANGE SWALLOWS
[115]–125

“Wormwood!”—The little green fairy — All right when you know it, but

— The hour of absinthe — Awful effects — Marie Corelli — St. John the Divine — Arrack and bhang not to be encouraged — Plain water — The original intoxicant — Sacred beverage of the mild Hindu — Chi Chi — Kafta, an Arabian delight — Friends as whisky agents — Effervescent Glenlivet — The peat-reek — American bar-keeper and his best customer — “Like swallerin’ a circ’lar saw and pullin’ it up again” — Castor-oil anecdote — “Haste to the wedding!”

CHAPTER XII
“THE BOY”
[126]–136

Definition of the youth — The valley of the Marne — An Archbishop in sparkling company — All is not cham. that fizzes — Beneficial effects of Pommery — Dire memories of the Haymarket — The bad boy at York — A hair of the canine — The good boy — Gout defied — Old Roman cellars — A chronic bombardment — Magnums to right of ’em — Duties of the disgorger — Simon the cellarer — Fifteen millions of full bottles — Pro-dig-i-ous! — Gooseberry champagne a myth — About Médoc — The ancients spelt claret with two “r’s” — Hints on adulteration — “Château Gubbins” — New wine — Gladstone claret — “Pricked!”

CHAPTER XIII
THE OLD WINES AND THE NEW
[137]–148

Decline and fall of port — Old topers — A youthful wine-bibber — The whisky age succeeds the port age — “Jeropiga” — Landladies’ port — A monopoly — Port v. gout — A quaint breakfast in Reading — About nightcaps — Sherry an absolutely pure wine — Except when made within the four miles’ radius — Treading the grapes — “Yeso” — Pliny pops up again — “Lime in the sack” — What the Lancet says — “Old Sherry” — Faux pas of a General — About vintages

CHAPTER XIV
THE LONG AND THE SHORT OF IT
[149]–161

The Long Drink — Cremorne Gardens — Hatfield — Assorted cocktails — Brandy-and-Soda — Otherwise Stone Fence — Bull’s milk — A burglar’s brew — More cocktails — A “swizzle” — L’Amour Poussée — A corpse reviver — A golden slipper — A heap of comfort

CHAPTER XV
STILL HARPING ON THE DRINK
[162]–173

Sangaree — Slings — John Collins — Smashes — Sour beverages — Home Ruler — Burning brandy — A prairie oyster — A turkey ditto — About negus, for white-frock and black-mitten parties — Egg nogg — A doctor — A surgeon-major — A new locomotive — Rumfustian — Pope — Bull’s milk — A bosom caresser — The Colleen Bawn — Possets — Sir Fleetwood Fletcher

CHAPTER XVI
“APPLE SASS”
[174]–184

Ancient British seider — Conducive to longevity — The best made in Normandy — Which develops into champagne — And other popular and salubrious wines — Non-alcoholic cider — A loathsome brew — German man­u­fac­turers — Medical properties of apple juice — Away with mel­an­choly — The mill and the press — Pure wine — Norfolk cider — Gaymer’s gout-fuge — Revival of the industry — Old process of cider-making — Improving the flavour — Boiled cider — Hippocras — Juniper cider — An ancient cider-cup

CHAPTER XVII
CORDIALS AND LIQUEURS
[185]–197

A chat about cherry brandy — Cherry gin — And cherry whisky — Sloe gin — Highland cordial — What King Charles II. swallowed — Poor Charles! — Ginger brandy — Orange-flower brandy — Employment of carraway seeds — The school treat — Use and abuse of aniseed — Do not drink quince whisky — Try orange brandy instead — A hell-broth — Curaçoa — Cassis — Chartreuse — The monks as benefactors — Some quaint tavern “refreshers” — Kirschenwasser — Noyeau — Parfait amour — Maraschino — A valuable ginger cordial

CHAPTER XVIII
THE AFTERMATH OF REVELRY
[198]–210

Revelry means remorse — And “Katzenjammer” — And other things — Why will ye do it? — The devil in solution — Alcoholism a disease — An accountant on wires — A jumpy journalist — A lot of jolly dogs — What is “Langdebeefe”? — To cure spleen or vapours — Directly opposite effects of alcohol — The best pick-me-up in the world — An anchovy toast — Baltimore egg nogg — Orange quinine — About brandy and soda-water — A Scorcher — Brazil relish — St. Mark’s pick-me-up — A champion bitters — A devilled biscuit — Restorative sandwiches — Fresh air and exercise best of all — Stick to your nerve!

CHAPTER XIX
THE DRINKS OF DICKENS
[211]–226

The lesson taught by “Boz” — Clothing Christmas — Dickens’s drunkards — Fantastic names for ales — Robbing a boy of his beer — A school supper — Poor Traddles — Micawber and punch — Revelry at Pecksniff’s — Todgers’s “doing it” — Delights of the “Dragon” — Sairey Gamp’s requirements — What was in the teapot — The “Maypole” — Sydney Carton’s hopeless case — Stryver’s model — “Little D. is Deed nonsense” — Dear old Crummles — A magnum of the Double Diamond — Newman Noggs — Brandy before breakfast — Mr. Fagin’s pupils — Orange-peel and water — Quilp on fire — “Pass the rosy” — Harold Skimpole — Joey Bagstock — Brandy-and-tar-water — That ass Pumblechook — An inexhaustible bottle — Jaggers’s luncheon — Pickwick v. total abstinence — Everything an excuse for a dram — Brandy and oysters — “The inwariable” — Milk-punch — Charm of the Pickwick Papers

CHAPTER XX
SWORN OFF!
[227]–237

Introduction of temperance into England — America struck it first — Doctor Johnson an abstainer — Collapse of the Permissive Bill — Human nature and forbidden fruit — Effects of repressive legislation — Sunday closing in Wales — Paraffin for miners — Toasting her Majesty — A good win — A shout and a drink — Jesuitical logic of the prohibitioners — The end justifies the means — A few non-alcoholic recipes — Abstainers and alcohol — Pure spring-water v. milk-punch — “Tried baith!”

INDEX OF RECIPES
[239]–243

CHAPTER I THE OLD ADAM

Introductory — Awful habits of the ancients — A bold, bad book — Seneca on the Drink Habit — The bow must not be always strung — Ebrietatis Encomium — The noble Romans — “Dum vivimus vivamus” — The skeleton at the banquet — Skull-cups — “Life and wine are the same thing” — Virgil and his contemporaries — Goats for Bacchus — The days of Pliny — Rewards for drunkenness — Novellius Torquatus — Three gallons at a draught — A swallow which did not save Rome — The antiquity of getting for’ard — Noah as a grape-grower — Father Frassen’s ideas — Procopius of Gaza — New Testament wine — Fermented or not? — Bad old Early Christians — Drunkenness common in Africa — Religion a cloak for alcohol — Tertullian on cider — Paulinus excuses intemperance — Excellence of Early Christians’ intentions.

I wish to state at the outset that this little work is not compiled in the interests of the sot, the toper, and the habitual over-estimator of his swallowing capacity. That the gifts of the gods, and the concoctions of more or less vile man, should be used with moderation, if we wish to really and thoroughly enjoy them, is a truism which needs no repetition; and although at the commencement of this work many “frightful {2} examples” of the evils of over-indulgence will be found mentioned, nothing but moderation will be found counselled in my book, from cover to cover.

In the past, drunkenness was not always regarded as a vice, and this is evident from much of the literature of former generations. In the course of my researches into the alcohol question I have come across a little book which bears the shameful and abandoned title of Ebrietatis Encomium, or the Praise of Drunkenness. And this book, which conveys such questionably moral aphorisms as “It is good for one’s health to be drunk occasionally,” and “The truly happy are the truly intoxicated,” claims to prove, “most authentically and most evidently, the necessity of frequently getting drunk, and that the practice is most ancient, primitive, and catholic.”

The author commences with what he calls “a beautiful passage out of Seneca:—

“The soul must not be always bent: one must sometimes allow it a little pleasure. Socrates was not ashamed to pass the time with children. Cato enjoyed himself in drinking plentifully, when his mind had been too much wearied out in public affairs. Scipio knew very well how to move that body, so much inured to wars and triumphs, without breaking it, as some nowadays do . . . ; but as people did in past times, who would make themselves merry on their festivals, by leading a dance really worthy men of those days, whence could ensue no reproach, when even their very enemies had seen them dance. One must allow the mind {3} some recreation: it makes it more gay and peaceful. . . . Assiduity of labour begets a languor and bluntness of the mind: for sleep is very necessary to refresh us, and yet he that would do nothing else but sleep night and day would be a dead man, and no more. There is a great deal of difference between loosening a thing, and quite unravelling it. Those who made laws have instituted holidays, to oblige people to appear at public rejoicings, in order to mingle with their cares a necessary temperament. . . . You must sometimes walk in the open air, that the mind may exalt itself by seeing the heavens, and breathing the air at your ease; sometimes take the air in your chariot, the roads and the change of the country will re-establish you in your vigour; or you may eat and drink a little more plentifully than usual. Sometimes one must even go as far as to get drunk; not indeed with an intention to drown ourselves in wine, but to drown our care. For wine drives away sorrow and care, and goes and fetches them up from the bottom of the soul. And as drunkenness cures some distempers, so, in like manner, it is a sovereign remedy for our sorrows” (Seneca de Tranquillitate).

Such sentiments were doubtless popular enough in Great Britain at the commencement of the present century—when Ebrietatis Encomium was published—when three and four bottle-men slept where they fell, “repugnant to command”; and malt liquor, small or strong, was the only known matutinal restorative of manly vigour. But my own experience is that {4} the sorrow and care which may be temporarily driven away by drowning them in the bowl are apt to return within a very few hours, reinforced an hundredfold, with their weapons re-sharpened, their instruments of torture put in thorough working-order, and with many other devils worse than themselves. A man, sound in body and mind, may really enjoy a certain amount of good liquor without feeling any ill effects next morning; but woe to him who seeks to drown that which cannot sink; to crush the worm which knows not death! The individual has yet to be born who can flourish, either in body or soul, on his own immoderation; and but for a chronic state of thirst in early youth I should not now be reduced to the compilation of drink statistics for a living.

But the ancients, in their heathen philosophy—which, by the way, was once rec­om­mend­ed to Christians to follow—took no thought for the morrow. “Carpe diem!” was the head and front of the programme of the Roman patricians, who used to cry aloud at their feasts, by way of grace before meat:—

AMICI,
DUM VIVIMUS
VIVAMUS!

This was probably the original version of “We won’t go home till morning,” and was sung, or shouted, at all bean-feasts and smart supper-parties. The ancient Egyptians made use of a very extraordinary, and a very nasty, custom in their festivals. They shewed to every guest a {5} skeleton, before the soup was served. This, according to some historians, was to make the feasters think on their latter end. But others assert that this strange figure was brought into use for a directly opposite reason; that the image of death was shewn for no other intent than to excite the guests to pass their lives merrily, and to employ the few days of its small duration to the best advantage; as having no other condition to expect after death than that of this frightful skeleton.

This was the idea of one Trimalchion, who, Petronius tells us, thus expressed himself on the subject: “Alas! alas! wretched that we are! What a nothing is poor man! We shall be like this, when Fate shall have snatched us hence. Let us therefore rejoice, and be merry while we are here.” The original Latin of this translation is much stronger, and had better not be given here. And the same Trimalchion on another occasion remarked: “Alas! Wine therefore lives longer than man, let us then sit down and drink bumpers; life and wine are the same thing.”

The Scythians undoubtedly used to drink out of vessels fashioned from human skulls, and probably had the same design in doing so as the Egyptians had in looking on their nasty skeletons.

In Virgil’s time, his contemporaries—and very probably the old man himself—drank deep; but instead of fighting, and breaking things, and jumping on their wives, and getting locked up, they brought their own heathen religion into their debaucheries. In more civilized circles, at this end of the most civilized century, the reveller {6} goes out “to see a man,” and sub­se­quent­ly “shouts for the crowd”; but in Virgil’s time a man who had a drink was said to be “pouring forth libations to the gods,” “making sacrifices”—more especially to Bacchus, the wine deity, whom nothing under the slaughter of a he-goat was supposed to propitiate. And the “Billy” was chosen for the sacrifice, because the tender shoots of the vine formed his favourite food, in a land in which there was neither brown paper, nor wall-plaster, nor salmon-tins, to nibble. And these sacrifices to the rosy god were “occasions” (as they say in the City) indeed! I have often wondered what the ancients did to cure a headache; and whether a man said to be “possessed of a devil” was in reality suffering from Alcohol, “the Devil in solution,” in the shape of delirium tremens in one of its many and objectionable forms.

In the time of Pliny, drunkenness and debauchery appear to have been the principal studies of the nations about whom he had information. A man was actually rewarded for getting drunk—tell it not in Vine Street, W.! The greatest drinker got the most prizes; and Pliny informs us that whilst the Parthians contended for the distinction of having the hardest heads and the longest swallows, they were simply “not in it” with the Milanese, who had a real champion in one Novellius Torquatus. This man, according to history, could have given a market-porter of the present day, a brewer’s drayman, or a stockbroker, any amount of start over the Alcohol course, and “lost” him.

This Novellius won the championship from all {7} pretenders, and “had gone through all honourable degrees of dignity in Rome, wherein the greatest repute he obtained was for drinking in the presence of Tiberius three gallons of wine at one draught, and before he drew his breath again; neither did he rest there, but he so far had acquired the art of drinking, that although he continued at it, yet was never known to falter in his tongue; and were it ne’er so late in the evening he followed this exercise, yet would be ready again for it in the morning. Those large draughts also he drank at one breath, without leaving in the cup so much as would dash against the pavement.”

Ah! We have nobody up to this form to talk about nowadays; and if men have improved in morality they must have deteriorated in capacity, or the occupation of gaolers and warders would be gone. And the poor old poet “Spring Onions,” with even a tenth part of the powers of endurance and swallow of Novellius Torquatus, might have escaped even one solitary conviction.

“If the antiquity of a custom,” writes the author of Ebrietatis Encomium, “makes it always good and laudable, certainly drunkenness can never deserve sufficient recommendation. Every one knows that Noah got drunk after he had planted the vine. There are some who pretend to excuse him, that he was not acquainted with the strength of wine. But to this it may very well be answered that it is not very probable so wise a man as Noah should plant a vine without knowing its nature and property. Besides it is one thing to know whether he got drunk at all: and another whether he had an intention to do so.” {8}

The amount of water previously experienced by Noah should surely be sufficient to purge him of the offence of making too free with the fruit of the vine!

“But,” continues the laudator of ebriety, “if we give any credit to several learned persons, Noah was not the first man who got fuddled. Father Frassen maintains ‘that people fed on flesh before the Flood, and drank wine.’ There is no likelihood, according to him, that men contented themselves with drinking water for fifteen or sixteen hundred years together. It is much more credible that they prepared a drink more nourishing and palatable. These first men of the world were endued with no less share of wit than their posterity, and consequently wanted no industry to invent everything that might contribute to make them pass their lives agreeably. Before the Flood men married, and gave their children in marriage. These people regaled each other, and made solemn entertainments. Now who can imagine that they drank at those festivals nothing but water, and fed only on fruits and herbs! Noah, therefore, was not the inventor of the use which we make of the grape; the most that he did was only to plant new vines.”

Procopius of Gaza, one of the most ancient and learned interpreters of Scripture, thinks it no less true that the vine was known in the world before Noah’s time; but he does not allow that the use of wine was known before the patriarch, whom he believes to be the inventor of it. As for the wine mentioned in the New Testament, we are now assured by modern commentators—total {9} abstainers every one—that it was unfermented, devoid of alcohol, and non-intoxicating. I had certainly always looked upon the wine which Timothy was enjoined to take for his “stomach’s sake,” as some form of brandy.

The Early Christians—like far too many of the late ditto—were terrible topers. Ecclesiastical history tells us that in the primitive church it was customary to appoint solemn feasts on the festivals of martyrs. This appears by the harangue of Constantine, and from the works of St. Gregory Nazianzen, and St. Chrysostom. Drunkenness was rife at those feasts; and this excess was looked upon as permissible. This is shewn by the pathetic complaints of St. Augustine and St. Cyprian, the former of which holy fathers thus delivered himself:—

“Drunken debauches pass as permitted amongst us, so that people turn them into solemn feasts, to honour the memory of the martyrs; and that not only on those days which are particularly consecrated to them (which would be a deplorable abuse to those who look at those things with other eyes than those of the flesh), but on every day of the year.”

St. Cyprian, in a treatise attributed to him, says much the same thing:—

“Drunkenness is so common with us in Africa that it scarce passes for a crime. And do we not see Christians forcing one another to get drunk, to celebrate the memory of the martyrs?”

Cardinal du Perron told his contemporaries “that the Manichæans said that the Catholicks were people much given to wine, but that they {10} never drank any,” which sounds paradoxical. Against this charge St. Augustine only defends them by recrimination. He answers, “that it was true, but that they (the Manichæans) drank the juice of apples, which was more delicious than all the wines and liquors in the world.” And so does Tertullian, who said the liquor press’d from apples was most strong and vinous. His words are: “Succum ex pomis vinosissimum.”

I trust that in quoting all those things I am not becoming wearisome, at the very commencement of my work; the main object being to show that all the drinking in the world is not done by the present generation of vipers.

But the Early Christians were excused for their habits of soaking, by Paulinus, on the grounds of the “excellence of their intentions”; which naturally reminds us of the celebrated excuse of the late Monsieur Thiers, on a much later occasion. The words of Paulinus are, when translated and adapted:—

But yet that mirth in little feasts enjoy’d

I think should ready absolution find;

Slight peccadillo of an erring mind,

Artless and rude, of all disguises void,

Their simple hearts too easy to believe

(Conscious of nothing ill) that saints in tombs

Enshrin’d should any happiness perceive

From quaffing cups, and wines’ ascending fumes,

Must be excus’d, since what they did they meant

With piety ill plac’d, yet good intent.

Similar pleas are occasionally urged by roysterers nowadays, yet they are but seldom credited in their own parishes.

CHAPTER II MORE FRIGHTFUL EXAMPLES

Eating and drinking the only work of the monks — Nunc est bibendum — An apology for Herodotus — A jovial pope — Good quarters in Provence — Intemperance of holy men — A tippling bishop — Alexander the Great — “Lovely Thais sits beside thee” — A big flare-up — Awful end of Alec — Cambyses always shot straight — Darius the strong-of-head — Philip drunk and Philip sober — Dionysius gets blind — Tiberius loved the bowl — So did Flavius Vobiscus, the diplomatist — Bluff King Hal — The Merry Monarch and the Lord Mayor — Dear old Pepys — A Mansion House wine-list — Minimum allowance of sack — A slump in brandy — A church-tavern — Dean Aldrich — The Romans at supper — “The tippling philosophers.”

Not even popes, saints, or bishops were exempt from accusations of loving the juice of the grape, or of the apple, too well. We read in the adages of Erasmus that it was a proverb amongst the Germans that the lives of the monks consisted in nothing but eating and drinking. One H. Stephens says on this subject, in his apology for Herodotus:—

“But to return to these proverbs, theological wine, and the abbot’s, or prelate’s, table. I say {12} that without these one could never rightly understand the beautiful passage of Horace:—

Nunc est bibendum, nunc pede libero

Pulsanda tellus; nunc Saliaribus

Ornare pulvinar Deorum

Tempus erat dapibus sodales,

nor this other:—

Absumet haeres Caecuba dignior

Servata centum clavibus: et mero

Tinget pavimentum superbo

Pontificum potiore coenis.”

Modern popes have always had a reputation for abstemiousness; but this same Mr. Stephens—who must have been somewhat of a slander-monger—in his same apology for Herodotus (what about the apology for Stephens?) mentions a popular little song of the day, which commenced:—

Le Pape qui est à Rome

Boit du vin comme un autre homme,

Et du l’Hypocras aussi.

And I can recall a cheery, albeit most likely libellous, song, which some of us used to sing at school, beginning:—

The Pope he leads a joyous life.

It appears to be a fact that many former popes drank hard; and if Petrarch is to be believed, the long stay made by the court of Rome at Avignon was on account of the excellence of the French wines; and that it was merely for that {13} reason that they stayed so long in Provence, and removed with so much reluctance.

Now for the saints. Although the fact of his drinking deep has been denied, St. Augustine appears to have confessed to “a day out” occasionally, in some such words as these: “Thy servant has been sometimes crop-sick through excess of wine. Have mercy on me, that it may be ever far from me.”

Amongst the bishops one instance must suffice. “Pontus de Thiard,” as appears from an old translation of the works of an eminent Frenchman, “after having repented of the sins of his youth, came to be bishop of Chalons-sur-Soane; but, however, he did not renounce the power of drinking heavily, which seemed then inseparable from the quality of a good poet. He had a stomach big enough to empty the largest cellar; and the best wines of Burgundy were too gross for the subtility of the fire which devoured him. Every night, at going to bed, besides the ordinary doses of the day, in which he would not suffer the least drop of water, he used to drink a bottle before he slept. He enjoyed a strong, robust, and vigorous health, to the age of fourscore.” Dear old Pontus!

Of all other mighty men, Alexander the Great serves to best point the moral of the evils of intemperance. Wearied of conquering, this hero gave himself up to debauchery in its worst and wildest forms. He killed his foster-brother in a fit of drunkenness, and sub­se­quent­ly, at the bidding of “lovely Thais,” queen of the {14} Athenian demi-monde, set fire to, and burnt to the ground, Persepolis, the wonder of the world. What an awakening Alec must have had! Not that he was the first, nor yet the last, man to make a fool, or rogue, of himself, at the bidding of the (alleged) gentler sex. Cleopatra corrupted a few heroes, and as for La Pompadour

but those be other stories. Alexander the Great, who had lost most of his greatness by that time, died from the effects of chronic alcoholism; although they didn’t tell me as much as this at school.

Cambyses was but little removed from a sot. This prince, having been told by one of his courtiers that the people thought Cambyses indulged in too many “drunks” for the good of the nation, reached for his best bow and his sharpest arrow, and, the courtier having retired out of range, shot the courtier’s son through the heart; after which the prince enquired of the courtier: “Is this the act of a drunkard?” which reminds me of a more modern anecdote, of a Piccadilly roysterer. But some men can shoot straighter, and ride better, and write more poetically, when under the influence of the rosy god; and had this courtier been a man of the world he would not have touched on the subject of ebriation to his prince. For ebriates are but seldom proud of their weaknesses.

Darius, the first King of Persia, commanded that this epitaph, which is here translated, should be placed on his tomb: “I could drink much wine and bear it well.” Philip of Macedon, father of Alexander the Great, took too much wine on {15} occasion; to corroborate which fact we have the exclamation of the good lady whose prayer for justice he had refused to hear — this is a quotation beloved of members of Parliament—“I appeal from Philip drunk to Philip sober.” Dionysius the younger, tyrant of Sicily, frequently had vine-leaves in his hair for a week at a time; he drank himself almost blind, and his courtiers, in order to flatter him, pretended to be blind too, and neither ate nor drank anything unless it were handed to them by Dionysius himself. Tiberius was called Biberius, because of his excessive attachment to the bowl; and, in derision, they changed his surname of Nero to Mero. Bonosus, according to his own historian, Flavius Vobiscus, was a terrible soaker, and used to make the ambassadors, who came from foreign parts, even more drunk than himself, in order that he might discover their secret instructions.

I cannot glean from the ancient records that any monarch who reigned over Great Britain was an habitual drunkard, an absolute and confirmed sot. But many of them were given to conviviality, notably Richard of the Lion Heart, Bluff King Hal — who had gout badly, and suffered also from obesity and other things—and the Merry Monarch. A story is told of the Second Charles, that when dining with the Lord Mayor, Sir Robert Viner, on one occasion—it was probably a 9th of November dinner at the Mansion House—the King noticed that most of the guests were uncomfortably uproarious, and, with his suite, rose to leave the banqueting chamber. Whereupon the Lord Mayor hastily {16} pursued him, caught hold of his robe, and exclaimed: “Sire, you shall take t’other bottle.” The King stopped, and with a graceful smile repeated a line of the old song, “He that is drunk is great as a king,” and with this compliment to his host, he returned, and took “t’other bottle.”

The immortal Pepys describes a Lord Mayor’s Feast which was given in 1663. It was served at one o’clock, and a bill of fare was placed, together with a salt-cellar, in front of every guest; whilst at the end of each table was a list of “persons proper” there to be seated. Pepys was placed at the merchant-strangers’ table, “where ten good dishes to a mess, with plenty of wine of all sorts.” Napkins and knives were, however, only supplied at the Lord Mayor’s table to him and the Lords of the Privy Council; and Pepys complains bitterly that he and those who were seated with him had no napkins nor change of trenchers, and had to drink out of earthen pitchers. He, however, took his spoon and fork away with him, as was customary in those days with all guests invited to entertainments. But as each guest brought his own tools, nobody was the worse for this custom. The dinner, says Pepys, was provided by the Mayor and two sheriffs for the time being, and the whole cost was between £700 and £800.

We are not told what was drunk at the Mansion House on that occasion, but I have a list before me of the potables served at the Lord Mayor’s banquet in 1782—more than a century later—which seems deserving of mention in this little work:— {17}

There be several remarkable features in the above list. I had imagined that a taste for claret had not been fully acquired by the British ratepayer until some years later than this; whilst the virtues of champagne could not have been fully recognized. Lisbon, I conceive to have been another sort of port, and this seems to have been neck-and-cork above all other vintages in popular favour. The taste for such mawkish stuff as malmsey must have been at vanishing point; whilst one is led to ask what, with only such a minute allowance of sack, did these feasters drink with their soup? Was the succulency of calipash and calipee known in those days; and if so, where was the harmless necessary milk-punch? But the most remarkable feature of all in the above catalogue is the meagre allowance of brandy for the crowd. The parable of the loaves and fishes would not appear more miraculous than that, in these later days, a multitude could be filled, after a big dinner, with four bottles of cognac! And this despite the fact of whisky having almost entirely usurped the place of the other strong-water. {18}

One hundred years ago, to be “drunk as a lord” was considered the height of human happiness. And at this period the Church had not severed its old connection with alcohol. In fact intemperance was encouraged by our pastors and masters; and in certain districts of England the churchwardens, at Whitsuntide, made collections of malt from the parishioners, and this was brewed into strong ale, and sold in the churches, the money so obtained being expended on the repairs of the sacred edifices; and it was a frequent and a saddening spectacle to see men who had drunk not wisely reeling about the aisles. Until as late as 1827—in which year the license was withdrawn—a church and a tavern were covered by the same roof, in the parish of Deepdale, a village between Derby and Nottingham; and a door which could be opened at will led from the altar to the tap-room.

A Romish priest wrote in praise of the bowl as follows:—

Si bene commemini, causae sunt quinque bibendi:

Hospitis adventus; praesens sitis; atque futura;

Aut vini bonitas; aut quaelibet altera causa.

Which comforting and jovial sentiments were thus adapted for the use of colleges and private bars, by Dean Aldrich, D.D., the great master of logic at Oxford:—

There are, if I do rightly think,

Five reasons why a man should drink:

Good wine, a friend, or being dry,

Or lest you should be by and by

Or any other reason why. {19}

But after all no nation ever did themselves so well, in the matter of wines, as the inhabitants of bad old ancient Rome.

“It was to excess of drinking,” wrote Whyte Melville, in The Gladiators, “that the gluttons of that period looked as the especial relief of every entertainment; since the hope of each seemed to be that when thoroughly flooded, and so to speak washed out with wine, he might begin eating again. The Roman was no drunkard, like the barbarian, for the sake of that wild excitement of the brain which is purchased by intoxication. No, he ate to repletion that he might drink in gratification. He drank to excess that he might eat again.”

Further on the same writer remarks: “Whilst marvelling at the quantity of wine consumed by the Romans in their entertainments, we must remember that it was the pure and unadulterated juice of the grape, that it was in general freely mixed with water, and that they imbibed but a very small portion of alcohol, which is the destructive quality of all stimulants.”

As to the Roman vintages being “in general freely mixed with water,” I have grave doubts. I have an idea that Maecenas would have made it particularly warm for that slave who might have dared to water his old Falernian; and, take them altogether, an amusement-loving, and playgoing public, for whom the legitimate drama took the form of certain brave men and fair women being torn and eaten by wild beasts, would hardly have been content with such drink for babes as “claret cold.” {20}

Ancient poets were not less backward than modern votaries of the muses; and it is related of the poet Philoxenus that he was frequently heard to express the wish that he had a neck as long as a crane’s, that he might the longer have the pleasure of swallowing wine, and of enjoying its delicious taste. I have heard the same wish expressed, during much more recent years.

One more old song, translated from a French chanson à boire, and I take my leave of the awful habits of the ancients (I trust) for ever. It is called

THE TIPPLING PHILOSOPHERS.

Diogenes, surly and proud,

Who snarl’d at the Macedon youth,

Delighted in wine that was good,

Because in good wine there is truth;

But growing as poor as a Job,

Unable to purchase a flask,

He chose for his mansion a tub,

And lived by the scent of the cask.

[Neither the air, nor the chorus, of this song is given in the old MS. But I would suggest the old air of “Wednesbury Cocking,” with a little “tol-de-rol” at the finish of each verse.]

Heraclitus ne’er could deny

To tipple and cherish his heart,

And when he was maudlin he’d cry,

Because he had empty’d his quart;

Tho’ some are so foolish to think

He wept at men’s folly and vice,

’Twas only his fashion to drink

Till the liquor flow’d out of his eyes. {21}

Democritus always was glad

Of a bumper to cheer up his soul,

And would laugh like a man that was mad

When over a good flowing bowl.

As long as his cellar was stor’d,

The liquor he’d merrily quaff,

And when he was drunk as a lord

At those who were sober he’d laugh.

Aristotle, the master of arts,

Had been but a dunce without wine,

And what we ascribe to his parts

Is due to the juice of the vine.

His belly most writers agree

Was as big as a watering trough,

He therefore leap’d into the sea,

Because he’d have liquor enough.

Old Plato, the learned divine,

He fondly to wisdom was prone,

But had it not been for good wine,

His merits had never been known;

By wine we are generous made,

It furnishes fancy with wings,

Without it we ne’er should have had

Philosophers, poets, or kings.

CHAPTER III DRINKS ANCIENT AND MODERN

The Whitaker of the period — France without wine — Babylonian boozers — Beer discovered by the Egyptians — A glass of bitter for Cleopatra — Brainless Persians — German sots — Turning the tables — Intemperance in the North — Chinese intoxicants — Nature of Sack — Mead and morat — Vinous metheglin — Favourite tipple of the Ancient Britons — Braggonet — Birch-wine — “The invariable” of Falstaff — A recipe by Sir Walter Raleigh — Saragossa wine — Usquebaugh — Clary — Apricock wine.

Pliny—whose works contain almost as much general information as Whitaker’s Almanack—tells us that the western nations got drunk with certain liquors made with fruits; and that those liquors have different names in Gaul and Spain, though they produce the same effect. Ammianus Marcellinus reports that “the Gauls having no wine in their country”—only fancy what a country France must have been to live in without champagne and claret, not to mention burgundy and cider—“though they are very fond of it, contrive a great many sorts of liquors which produce the same effect as wine.” The Scythians, too, had no wine, but got “for’ard” {23} just the same. One of their philosophers, upon being asked if they had nobody who played the flute in Scythia, replied that “they had not so much as any wine there.” Which seems to hint to flute-playing being a thirsty trade, even in those days.

The Babylonians were, according to Herodotus, habitual over-estimators of their swallowing capacity, and got merry after inhaling the fumes of certain herbs which they burned; which sounds like anything but a comfortable debauch, and must have choked some of them. Strabo tells all who care to read him that the Indians drank the juice of sugar-canes, which we now call rum; whilst according to Pliny and Athenaeus the Egyptians fuddled themselves with a drink made from barley; evidently undeveloped beer. And it is quite on the cards that Cleopatra occasionally drew, with her own fair hands, for her beloved Antony, a glass of “bitter,” with a head on it.

But the quaintest and most awe-inspiring of all drinks seems to have been that affected by the Persians—now decent, sober people enough; this was a liquor made from boiled poppy-seeds, and called

Kokemaar.

They drank it scalding hot, in the presence of many spectators, who may or may not have been charged for admission.

“Before it operates,” wrote a chronicler of the times, “they quarrel with one another, and give abusive language, without coming to blows; afterwards when the drug begins to have its {24} effect, then they also begin to make peace. One compliments in a very high degree, another tells stories, but all are extremely ridiculous both in their words and actions.” And after mentioning other liquors which they use, he adds, “It is difficult to find in Persia a man that is not addicted to one of these liquors, without which they think they cannot live but very unpleasantly.” Anything nastier than hot laudanum as a restorative I cannot imagine.

It sounds curious to read that France and Spain were censured by that universal provider of knowledge, Pliny, for their drunkenness with beer and ale, “wines not being in that age so frequent.” What was the world like before the invention of port wine, I wonder? For in Pliny’s time Italy exceeded all parts of the world for her luscious and curious vintages, being responsible for 195 different sorts of wines.

Their Names and Kinds innumerable are,

Nor for their Catalogue we need not care;

Which who would know as soon may count the Sands

The Western Winds raise on the Libyan Strands.

At a much later date, in the seventeenth century, Italy still held her own in the matter of the juice of the grape; and then, as now, their Chianti and Lachrymae Christi were justly celebrated. Strange to say at the same period the Germans, we read, “are much given to drunkenness, as one of their own countrymen writes of them; they drink so immodestly and immoderately at their Banquets that they cannot pour their beer {25} in fast enough with the ordinary Quaffing Cups, but drink in large Tankards whole draughts, none to be left under severe penalties; admiring him that will drink most, and hating him that will not pledge them.”

I once, in my salad days, assisted in the attempt to make a German “foxed.” There were some half a dozen of us, nice boys all, and we entertained this Teuton right royally. At the banquet table the champagne was decanted, and it was so arranged that our guest should imbibe at least twice as much as anybody else. Then we took him around the great city. At four the next morning the German sat facing me in the smoking-room of a little social club. Everybody else had gone home, more or less limp, or had come to anchor in some police-station. And I did not feel very well myself. And as the clock chimed four, and the grey dawn stole in through the venetians in streaks, that German uprose in all his majesty—he was six feet five inches and broad in proportion—smote me hard on the back, and enquired, in cheerful tones: “Now then! Vhere can ve go to haf some fun?” We never “took on” any more of the children of the Fatherland.

The Russians, Swedes, Danes, and other Northerners—also during the seventeenth century—we read, “exceed all the rest, having made the drinking of Brandy, Aqua Vitae, Hydromel, Beer, Mum, Meth, and other liquors in great quantities, so familiar to them that they usually drink our countrymen to death.”

“The Mahometans,” the same writer tells us, {26} “which possess a great part of the world, on a superstitious account forbear the drinking of much wine; because that a young and beautiful woman being accosted by two angels, that had intoxicated themselves with it”—an intoxicated angel surely takes the cake?—“taking the advantage of their ebriety, made her escape, and was for her beauty and wit prefer’d in Heaven, and the angels severely punished for their folly; for which reason they are commanded not to drink wine. Yet many of them, doubting of the divinity of that relation, do transgress that command, and liberally drink of the blood of the grape, which the Christians prepare out of their own vineyards; palliating their crime, in that they did not plant the tree, nor make the wine.” For the philosophy of the Mahomedan is like the ways of the Heathen Chinee, “peculiar.”

“The Chineses,” we are further told, “are the least addicted to ebriety, delighting themselves in Coffee, Tea, and such like drinks, free from those stupifying qualities; yet are they not without their carouses; and those of the intoxicating drinks prepared of Rice, Coco’s, Sugar, Dates, etc., equalling in strength and spirit any liquors in the world.”

With the “Chineses” must be of course included the gallant little Japaneses, with which nation English chroniclers had but a slight acquaintance three hundred years ago.

Without enquiring too closely into the nature of Red Falernian, Coan, Massic, or any of the Roman vintages at the time of dear old Horatius Flaccus, let us take a glance over the wine-lists {27} of our own country, from the Saxon period. And the first thing which will naturally strike the observer is the heavy, loaded nature of their dinner drinks. A little later on, Sack did duty for the “inferior sherry” of the Victorian era, although a Sack-and-Angostura was not a frequent demand amongst the young bloods of the period. On the festive boards of the Saxons appeared, besides ale of the strongest and cider of the roughest, home-made wines, mead, morat, metheglin, and more or less odoriferous pigments. In case any enterprising ratepayer should elect to give his guests

Mead,

at his next house-warming, here is the ancient recipe.

Take of spring-water what quantity you please, and make it more than blood-warm, and dissolve honey in it till ’tis strong enough to bear an egg, the breadth of a shilling; then boil it gently near an hour, taking of the scum as it rises; then put to about nine or ten gallons seven or eight large blades of mace, three nutmegs quartered, twenty cloves, three or four sticks of cinnamon, two or three roots of ginger, and a quarter of an ounce of Jamaica pepper; put these spices into the kettle to the honey and water, a whole lemon, with a sprig of sweet-briar and a sprig of rosemary; tie the briar and rosemary together, and when they have boiled a little while take them out and throw them away; but let your liquor stand on the spice in a clean earthen pot till the next day; then strain it into a vessel that is fit for it; put the spice in a bag, and hang it in the vessel, stop it, and at three months {28} draw it into bottles. Be sure that ’tis fine when ’tis bottled; after ’tis bottled six weeks ’tis fit to drink.

Fancy drinking Mead with your soup!

Morat was made of honey flavoured with mulberry juice; and Pigment—which might be drunk at the Royal Academy banquets—was a sweet and rich liquor evolved from highly-spiced wine flavoured with honey.

Metheglin

was also called Hydromel and Oinomel. “The best Receipt whereof,” writes an authority, “that I have observed to be made by them is thus:—

They take rasberries which grow in those parts (i.e. Swedeland, Muscovia, Russia, and as far as the Caspian Sea) and put them into fair water for two or three nights (I suppose they bruise them first) that the water may extract their taste and colour. Into this water they put of the purest honey, in proportion about one pound of honey to three or four of water. Then to give it a fermentation they put a tost into it dipp’d in the dregs or grounds of beer, which when it hath set the metheglin at work they take out again, to prevent any ill savour it may give; if they desire to ferment it long they set it in a warm place; which when they please to hinder or stop, they remove it into a cool place; after it hath done fermenting they draw it off the lee for present use; to add to its excellency they hang in it a little bagg, wherein is cinnamon, grains of paradise, and a few cloves. This may do very well for present drinking. But if you would make your metheglin of the same ingredients, and to be kept (time {29} meliorating any sort of drinks) you may preserve your juice of rasberries at the proper season. And when you make your metheglin, decoct your honey and water together, and when it is cold then add your juice of rasberries which was before prepared to keep, and purifie your metheglin by the means before prescrib’d, or ferment it, either by a tost dipp’d in yest, or by putting a spoonful of yest unto it, to which you may add the little bagg of spices before mention’d. Then let it stand about a month to be thorowly purified, and then bottle it, and preserve it for use, and it may in time become a curious drink.”

I should think so.

This is what Howell (Clerk to the Privy Council in 1640) wrote about metheglin:—

The juice of Bees, not Bacchus, here behold,

Which British Bards were wont to quaff of old;

The berries of the grape with Furies swell,

But in the honeycomb the Graces dwell.

“Neither Sir John Barleycorn or Bacchus had anything to do with it, but it is the pure juice of the bee, the laborious bee, and the king of insects; the Druids and old British Bards were wont to take a carouse hereof before they entered into their speculations. But this drink always carried a kind of state with it, for it must be attended with a brown toast; nor will it admit but of one good draught, and that in the morning; if more it will keep a humming in the head, and so speak too much of the house it comes from, I mean the hive.”

M’yes. I question the advisability of any sort {30} of carouse before entering into speculations; more especially if Tattersall’s Ring be the scene of your speculations, and you intend getting back your losses.

There is no doubt that metheglin was the favourite drink of the Ancient Britons.

Mead and Braggon, or Braggonet,

do not differ materially from metheglin. Here is the recipe:—

Mix the whites of six eggs with twelve gallons of spring-water; add twenty pounds of the best virgin honey and the peeling of three lemons; boil it an hour, and then put into it some rosemary, cloves, mace, and ginger; when quite cold add a spoonful or two of yeast, tun it, and when it has done working stop it up close. In a few months bottle it off, and deposit in a cool cellar.

If this liquor is properly kept, the taste of the honey will go off; and it will resemble Tokay both in strength and flavour. And the chief objection to this as to other ancient potations, appears to be the intolerable quantity of water, whether “spring” or “fair.”

We do not make Birch wine nowadays, although the Birch itself frequently makes small boys whine, after conviction of orchard-robbing, or train-wrecking. But it was a favourite tipple with our ancestors, who during the month of March were wont to cut the ends off the birch-boughs, and let the sap drip into bottles suspended from the boughs. For twopence or threepence a gallon the villagers would catch this sap for {31} their wealthier neighbours, regardless of the feelings, and the cartridges, of the owners of the trees. To every gallon of liquor was added a pound of refined sugar, the mixture being boiled for half an hour or so, then set to cool, with a little yeast added thereto, to make it ferment. The result was then put in barrels, together with a small proportion of powdered mace and cinnamon. A month afterwards it was bottled off, and when drunk was said to be “a most delicate, brisk wine, of a flavour like unto Rhenish.”

“The Vertues of the Liquor or Blood of the Birch-tree,” says the historian, “have not long been discovered, we being beholding to the Learned Van Helmont for it; who in his Treatise of the Disease of the Stone hath very much applauded its Vertues against the effects of the Disease, calling the natural Liquor that flows from the wounded Branches of the Tree, the meer Balsom of the Disease. Ale brewed therewith, as well as the Wine that is made of it, wonderfully operates on the Disease. It is also reputed to be a powerful Curer of the Ptisick.”

All the same you will hardly get the alumni of Eton and Harrow to love their birch.

“What was

Sack?”

is a question which has often been asked. It was a common name for a drink in the time of Shakespeare, and Falstaff had a terrible reputation as a sackster. The exact nature of the wine is uncertain, but the name is supposed to be derived {32} from the Spanish seco, and the French sec, “dry.” Canary (a sort of white Madeira) was often the wine meant; and in old churchwarden’s accounts the word sack frequently occurs, as used as a communion wine, i.e. Madeira and port mixed. That sack was imported from Spain is certain, and it was first of all sold, in England, in apothecaries’ shops, as a cordial medicine. The Excise authorities of the time, if there were any, were in all probability not quite as busy as at the present day.

The name Canary was formerly applied to dry, white wines, which were frequently seasoned with sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, roasted apples, and eggs.

Sack Posset

[Sir Walter Raleigh’s Recipe.]

Boil together half a pint of sherry and half a pint of ale, and add gradually a quart of boiling cream or milk. Sweeten the mixture well, and flavour with grated nutmeg. Put into a heated dish, cover, and stand by the fire for two or three hours.

And if you can see the double ox-fences in Northamp­ton­shire next morning, there is not much the mat­ter with your liver.

Here is the method of manufacturing

English Sack,

which must be a poor, ill-favoured sort of drink. It was also known as Saragossa wine.

To every quart of water put a sprig of rue, and to every gallon a handful of fennel-roots, boil these {33} half an hour, then strain it out, and to every gallon of this liquor—ugh—put three pounds of honey; boil it two hours, and scum it well, and when ’tis cold pour it off and tun it into a vessel, or such cask as is fit for it; keep it a year in the vessel, and then bottle it. ’Tis a very good sack.

And the butler who would place this on my table would get a good sack, too. Mustard-and-water is cheaper and swifter.

Canary and Rhenish were also drunk freely during the Elizabethan period—the English Sack recipe belongs to the Charles I. period—and long before that usquebaugh, or whisky in all its original sin, was in demand, although the Highlanders were no dabs at distillation until the sixteenth century. Usquebaugh, by the way, is derived from the old Gaelic Uisge-beatha, “Water of Life,” and under this name both Irish and Scotch whisky were originally known.

But this simple water of life was not tasty enough for some palates, therefore vile men invented a special blend for the benefit of the wealthy, and those who had not much work to do next morning.

To make Usquebaugh.

To three gallons of brandy put four ounces of aniseeds bruised; the next day distil it in a cold still pasted up; then scrape four ounces of licorice, and pound it in a mortar, dry it in an iron pan, do not burn it, put it in the bottle to your distill’d water, and let it stand ten days. Then take out the licorice, and to every six quarts of the spirits {34} put in cloves, mace, nutmeg, cinnamon and ginger, of each a quarter of an ounce, dates stoned and sliced four ounces; raisins stoned half a pound. Let these infuse ten days, then strain it out, and tincture it with saffron, and bottle it and cork it well.

It seems just the sort for Jubilee rejoicings and vestry meetings; but do not give it to the constable on fixed point duty.

In my pitiable ignorance, I once thought that Clary was the old English name for Claret. Not a bit of it. This is how the artistic used to make

Clary Wine.

Take twenty-four pounds of Malaga raisins, pick and chop them very small, put them in a tub, and to each pound a quart of water; let them steep ten or eleven days—this sounds like a school treat—stirring it twice every day; you must keep it covered close all the while; then strain it off, and put it into a vessel, and about half a peck of the tops of clary (what was clary?) when ’tis in blossom; stop it close for six weeks, and then bottle it off; in two or three months ’tis fit to drink.

Clary naturally leads to

Apricock Wine,

which we of the nineteenth century miscall apricot. The derivation of the word is Latin. Then the Arabs got hold of it, and it became Al-precoc. Then the thriving Spaniards got hold of the word, which became Alborcoque; and so to England. But to the wine. {35}

Take three pounds of sugar, and three quarts of water, let them boil together, and scum it well; then put in six pounds of apricocks, pared and stoned, and let them boil till they are tender; then take them up, and when the liquor is cold bottle it up. You may, if you please, after you have taken out the apricocks, let the liquor have one boil with a sprig of flower’d clary in it.

Also, you may if you please—and you probably will please—add a little old brandy to the decoction.

CHAPTER IV SOME OLD RECIPES

Indifference of the Chineses — A nasty potion — A nastier — White Bastard — Helping it to be eager — Improving Malmsey — Death of the Duke of Clarence — Mum is not the word — English champagne — Life without Ebulum a blank — Cock ale — How to dispose of surplus poultry — Painful fate of a pauper — Potage pauvre — Duties of the old English housewife — Election of wines, not golf — Muskadine — Lemon wine — Familiar recipe — King William’s posset — Pope’s ditto.

“The Chineses,” says a very old work on liquid nourish­ment, “make ex­cel­lent Drink of Rice, which is very pleasant of taste, and is pre­ferred by them before wine.”

But, like the Germans, the Chineses will eat and drink pretty nearly anything. And this is the cheering mixture which the Chineses sampled in the new German colony of Kiant-schan, according to the Frankfurter Zeitung:—

“Sitting under the poplars one can imagine oneself in the courtyard of an old German feudal castle. The hamper is opened, and the cold mountain stream flowing before the temple serves as an ice cellar. Once more the male population of the village puts in an appearance, standing {37} round the table in amazement at all the unheard-of things happening. The greatest success attends the uncorking of the Apollinaris bottles. The bottle is pointed at the onlookers, and the cork having been loosened it flies into their faces with a loud report. At first they are greatly alarmed, then they enjoy the joke hugely, and at last they all squat on the ground in a circle, and send a deputy to the table of the foreigners, bearing a teacup. The petition is granted, and in the teacup an exquisite brew is prepared. The drainings of all the beer bottles are collected, to which is added a little claret and a liberal proportion of Apollinaris, and then, in order to lend greater consistency to the beverage, some sausage skins are mixed with it. The teacup circulates amongst the Chinese, and each sips it with reverential awe. Some of them make fearful grimaces, but not one has the courage of his opinion, and it is evident that, on the whole, the drink is voted a good one, although, perhaps, its flavour is somewhat rare.”

Next, please. Oh, here is another, about some neighbours of the Chineses.

“In the Isle Formosa, not far from China, the Natives make a Drink as strong and intoxicative as Sack, out of Rice, which they soak in warm water, and then beat it to a paste in a Mortar; then they chew some Rice-meal in their mouths, which they spit to a pot till they have got about a quart of liquor, which they put to the paste instead of Leaven or Ferment. And after all be kneaded together till it be Dough, they put it into a great earthen pot, which they {38} fill up with water, and so let it remain for two months; by which means they make one of the most pleasant Liquors a man need drink; the older the better and sweeter, although you keep it five and twenty or thirty years.”

Weel—I hae ma doots.

Until reading “The English Housewife, containing the inward and outward Vertues which ought to be in a complete Woman, published by Nicholas Okes at the sign of the golden Unicorne, in 1631,” I had no skill in making

White Bastard

or “aparelling” Muskadine. They used a lot of eggs in the vintry in those days, and these were the instructions for making white bastard.

Draw out of a pipe of bastard ten gallans, and put to it five gallans of new milke, and skim it as before, and all to beat it with a parill of eight whites of egges, and a handfull of Baysalt and a pint of conduit-water, and it will be white and fine in the morning. But if you will make very fine bastard—which I, personally, have no ambition to do—take a white-wine hog’s-head, and put out the lees, and wash it cleane, and fill it halfe full and halfe a quarter, and put to it foure gallans of new milke, and beate it well with the whites of sixe egges, and fill it up with white-wine and sacke, and it will be white and fine.

Bastard had not much rest in the seventeenth century. The housewife who might wish “to helpe bastard being eager” had to follow these directions:—

Take two gallons of the best stoned honey, and {39} two gallons of white wine, and boyle them in a faire panne, skimme it cleane, and straine it through a faire cloth that there be no moats in it; then put to it one ounce of collianders (coriander seeds?) and one ounce of aniseeds, foure or five orange pils (pips?) dry and beaten to powder, let them lye three dayes; then draw your bastard into a cleane pipe, then put in your honey with the rest, and beate it well; then let it lye a weeke and touch it not, after draw it at pleasure.

In the present enlightened century such a recipe does not read like helping the possible consumer to be “eager.”

Nor does the following method of treating Malmsey sound promising, except for making its consumer particularly “for’ard”:—

If you have a good but of Malmsey, and a but or two of sacke that will not be drunke; for the sacke prepare some empty but or pipe, and draw it more than halfe full of sacke; then fill it up with Malmsey, and when your but is full within a little, put into it three gallons of Spanish cute, the best that you can get—where did they get it?—then beate it well; then take your taster, and see that it bee deepe coloured; then fill it up with sacke, and give it aparell, and beate it well. The aparell is thus: Take the yelkes of tenne egges and beate them in a cleane bason with a handful of Bay salt, and a quarte of conduit-water, and beate them together with a little peece of birch, and beate it till it be as short as mosse; then draw five or sixe gallons out of your but, then beate it againe, and then fill it up, and the next day it will be ready to be drawne. This aparell will serve both for muscadine, bastard, and for sacke. {40}

We are not told in history if the butt of Malmsey in which the Duke of Clarence shuffled off his mortal and sinful coil had been previously subjected to this “aparell” and castigation. In the interests of mercy, let us hope not.

The fluid once known as

Mum

never claimed any sort of relationship with sparkling wine, but was a species of unsophisticated ale, brewed from wheat, or oats, with a little bean-meal occasionally introduced; in fact, the sort of stuff we use in the present century to fatten bacon pigs upon. And “mum” has not been the word with British brewers for some time past.

Champagne has been made in England for a considerable period; but since the closing of the “night-houses” in Panton Street the trade therein has not been very brisk. During the present century champagne in this country—and I grieve to add in France as well—has been chiefly fabricated from apples, and other fruits; but here is a much older way of making

English Champagne.

Take to three gallons of water nine pounds of Lisbon sugar; boil the water and sugar half an hour, scum it clean, then have one gallon of currants pick’d, but not bruis’d, pour the liquor boiling hot over them, and when cold work it with half a pint of balm two days; then pour it through a flannel or sieve, then put it into a barrel fit for it with half an ounce of ising-glass well bruis’d. When it has done working stop it close for a month, then bottle {41} it, and in every bottle put a very small lump of double-refin’d sugar. This is excellent wine, and has a beautiful colour.

“Life without Ebulum,” writes a friend, an instructor of youth in the ingenuous arts, in forwarding me the recipe, “is a void to most people who have not cultivated the eringo root in their back gardens.” I have never tasted ebulum, preferring my ale neat and unadorned, but this is how to prepare

Ebulum.

To a hogshead of strong ale take a heap’d bushel of elderberries, and half a pound of juniper berries beaten; put in all the berries when you put in the hops, and let them boil together till the berries break in pieces; then work it up as you do ale. When it has done working, add to it half a pound of ginger, half an ounce of cloves, as much mace, an ounce of nutmegs, and as much cinnamon grosly beaten, half a pound of citron, as much eringo root, and likewise of candied orange-peel. Let the sweetmeats be cut in pieces very thin, and put with the spice into a bag, and hang it in the vessel when you stop it up. So let it stand till ’tis fine, then bottle it up, and drink it with lumps of double-refin’d sugar in the glass.

One of the quaintest beverages of which I ever heard, or read, is

Cock Ale.