Part 18

THE FOOD OF MANKIND. ITS USE AND ABUSE.

Destined by Providence to wander over the globe, and to live in various climes, man is essentially an omnivorous animal. According to the country he inhabits, its productions and the nature of his pursuits, his mode of living differs. The inhabitant of cold and sterile regions on the borders of the ocean becomes ichthyophagous; and fish, fresh, dried, smoked, or salted, is his principal nourishment. The bold huntsman lives upon the game he pursues; while the nomadian shepherd, who tends his herd over boundless steeps, supports himself on the milk of his flock. In warm countries fruits and vegetables constitute the chief support of life; and there the disciples of Pythagoras can luxuriate on the rich produce of a bountiful soil, solely debarring themselves from beans, which, like all flesh, they consider to have been created by putrefaction. What would these good people have done among the Scythians and the Getae, who, according to Sidonius Apollinaris, mingled blood and milk for food--

------------------Solitosque cruentum Lac potare Getas, ac pocula tingere venis;

or the stunted natives of the arctic regions, who feed upon whales and seals, drink deep potations of train-oil, and consider the warm blood of the seal an exquisite beverage, dried herrings moistened with blubber a dainty, and the flesh of the seal half frozen in snow during winter, or half corrupted in the earth in summer, the most delicious morsel. The semi-barbarous Russians, who during the late wars enjoyed the abundant bills of fare of France and Italy, accustom themselves easily to this disgusting diet on their return; and their troops, who live amongst the Samoiedes, thrive uncommonly well on raw flesh and rein-deer blood. It is in temperate regions that man displays his omnivorous propensities: there, animal food can be abundantly procured; and every description of grain, roots, and fruit, is easily cultivated. It is as we pass from these middle climes towards the poles, that animal substances are more exclusively consumed; and towards the equator that we enjoy refreshing fruits, and nourishing roots and vegetables. So scarce is food in some desolate tracts of the globe, that we find the wandering Indian satisfying his cravings with earth and clay: and Humboldt informs us that the Ottomaques, on the banks of the Mata and Oronoco, feed on a fat unctuous earth, in the choice of which they display great epicurean skill, and which they knead into balls of four or six inches in diameter, and bake slowly over the fire. When about to be used, these clods are soaked in water, and each individual consumes about a pound of them in the day; the only addition which they occasionally make to this strange fare consists in small fish, lizards, and fern-roots.

The art of cookery has improved, no doubt, with the progressive advance and development of our other institutions; and it seems to prove that the employment of all kinds of food is as natural to man, as a stationary uniformity and restriction of one species of aliment is to animals. A most erroneous idea has prevailed regarding the use of animal food, which has been considered as the best calculated to render mankind robust and courageous. This is disproved by observation. The miserable and timid inhabitants of Northern Europe and Asia are remarkable for their moral and physical debility, although they chiefly live on fish or raw flesh; whereas the athletic Scotch and Irish are certainly not weaker than their English neighbours, though consuming but little meat. The strength and agility of the negroes is well known, and the South Sea islanders can vie in bodily exercises with our stoutest seamen. We have reason to believe, that, at the most glorious periods of Grecian and Roman power, their armies were principally subsisted upon bread, vegetables, and fruits.

Man by his natural structure was created omnivorous, and there is no doubt but that a judicious mixed alimentation is the best calculated to ensure health and vigour, and enable the ambitious or the industrious wanderer to spend his winters near the poles, colonize beneath the equator, or inhabit regions where the hardiest of animals must starve and die. The teeth, the jaws, all the digestive organs fit him for this mode of existence. There is a curious passage in one of Dr. Franklin's letters in regard to wine: he pleasantly observes, that the only animals created to drink water are those who from their conformation are able to lap it on the surface of the earth, whereas all those who can carry their hands to their mouth were destined to enjoy the juice of the grape.

The diversity of substances which we find in the catalogue of articles of food is as great as the variety with which the art or the science of cookery prepares them: the notions of the ancients on this most important subject are worthy of remark. Their taste regarding meat was various. Beef they considered the most substantial food; hence it constituted the chief nourishment of their athletae. Camels' and dromedaries' flesh was much esteemed, their heels most especially. Donkey-flesh was in high repute; Maecenas, according to Pliny, delighted in it; and the wild ass, brought from Africa, was compared to venison. In more modern times we find Chancellor Dupret having asses fattened for his table. The hog and the wild boar appear to have been held in great estimation; and a hog was called "animal propter convivia natum;" but the classical portion of the sow was somewhat singular--"vulva nil dulcius ampla." Their mode of killing swine was as refined in barbarity as in epicurism. Plutarch tells us that the gravid sow was actually trampled to death, to form a delicious mass fit for the gods. At other times, pigs were slaughtered with red-hot spits, that the blood might not be lost; stuffing a pig with asafoetida and various small animals, was a luxury called "porcus Trojanus;" alluding, no doubt, to the warriors who were concealed in the Trojan horse. Young bears, dogs, and foxes, (the latter more esteemed when fed upon grapes,) were also much admired by the Romans; who were also so fond of various birds, that some consular families assumed the names of those they most esteemed. Catius tells us how to drown fowls in Falernian wine, to render them more luscious and tender. Pheasants were brought over from Colchis, and deemed at one time such a rarity, that one of the Ptolemies bitterly lamented his having never tasted any. Peacocks were carefully reared in the island of Samos, and sold at such a high price, that Varro informs us they fetched yearly upwards of 2000l. of our money. The guinea-fowl was considered delicious; but, wretched people! the Romans knew not the turkey, a gift which we moderns owe to the Jesuits. Who could vilify the disciples of Loyola after this information! The ostrich was much relished; Heliogabalus delighted in their brains, and Apicius especially commends them. But, of all birds, the flamingo was not only esteemed as a bonne-bouche, but was most valuable after dinner; for, when the gluttonous sensualists had eaten too much, they introduced one of its long scarlet feathers down their throats, to disgorge their dinner. The modern gastronome is perhaps not aware that it is to the ancients he owes his delicious fattened duck and goose livers,--the inestimable foies gras of France. Thus Horace:

Pinguibus et ficis pastum jecur anseris albi.

The swan was also fattened by the Romans, who first deprived it of sight; and cranes were by no means despised by people of taste. In later days the swan seems to have been in great estimation in our own country. We find in the Northumberland household book that in one year twenty of these birds were consumed at the earl's table.

While the feathered creation was doomed to form part of ancient delights, the waters yielded their share of enjoyments, and several fishes were immortalized. The muraena Helena was educated in their ponds, and rendered so tame that he came to be killed at the tinkling of his master's bell or the sound of his voice.

Natat ad magistrum delicta muraena,

says Martial. Hirtius ceded six thousand of these fish to Caesar as a great favour, and Vitellius delighted in their roe. The fame of the lamprey, mustela of Ausonius and Pliny, is generally known; and the sturgeon, the acipenser sturio, was brought to table with triumphant pomp: but the turbot, one of which was brought to Domitian from Ancona, was considered such a present from the gods, that this emperor assembled the senate to admire it. Soles were also so delectable that punning on the word solea, they were called the soles of the gods: the dorad, sparus auratus, was consecrated to Venus; the labrus scarus was called the brain of Jupiter, and Apuleius and Epicharmus maintain that its very entrails would be relished in Olympus.

To these dainties may be added the Alphestae, a fish always caught in pairs from their eagerness to be eaten. The Amia so very delicious that the Athenians defied the worst cook to spoil them. The Gnaphius that imparted to the water that had had the honour to boil them, the facility of taking out all stains. The Pompilus which sprang with Venus from the blood of the sky. The fish called fox by the Rhodians, and dog by the Boeotians, was considered such a dainty that Archestratus recommended epicures to steal them if they could not procure them by honest means; adding, that all calamities should be considered immaterial after a man had once feasted on such a luscious morsel, too divine to be gazed upon by vulgar eyes, and which ought to be procured by the wealthy, if they did not wish to incur the wrath of the gods, for not appreciating at its true value the flower of their nectar. Eels were also highly esteemed by the ancients. The preference being given to the Copaic, which the Boeotians offered to the gods crowned with flowers, giving them the same rank among fish that Helen held amongst women.

The garum, or celebrated fish-sauce of the Romans, was principally made out of the sciaena umbra, and the mackerel; the entrails and blood being macerated in brine until they became putrid.

Expirantis adhuc scombri, de sanguine primo Accipe fastosum munera cara garum:--

thus says Martial: and Galen affirms that this disgusting preparation was so precious, that a measure of about three or four pints fetched two thousand silver pieces. So delightful was the effluvium of the garum considered, that Martial informs us it was carried about in onyx smelling-bottles. But our luxurious civic chiefs are not aware that the red mullet--for such I believe was the mullus--was held in such a distinguished category among genteel fishes, that three of them, although of small size, were known to fetch upwards of 200l. They were more appreciated when brought alive, and gradually allowed to die, immersed in the delicious garum; when the Romans feasted their eyes in the anticipated delight of eating them, by gazing on the dying creature as he changed colour like an expiring dolphin. Seneca reproaches them with this refinement of cruelty--"Oculis quoque gulosi sunt;" and the most renowned of Apicius's culinary discoveries was the alec, a compound of their livers.

Snails were also a great dainty. Fulvius Herpinus was immortalized for the discovery of the art of fattening them on bran and other articles; and Horace informs us they were served up, broiled upon silver gridirons, to give a relish to wine. Oysters were brought from our coasts to Rome, and frozen oysters were much extolled. Grasshoppers, locusts, and various insects, were equally acceptable to our first gastronomic legislators. Acorns, similar to those now eaten in Spain, formed part of a Roman dessert; the best were brought from Naples and Tarentum. It does not appear that the ancients had a great variety in their vegetable diet; condiments to stimulate the sluggish appetite seemed to be their principal research: amongst these the asafoetida, which is to this day highly relished in the East, was an indispensable ingredient; this has been doubted by various naturalists, but it appears certain, since Pliny informs us that it was frequently adulterated by sagapenum, which bears the strongest resemblance to it. This substance was called laser, and by many tasteless persons, such as Aristophanes and Apuleius, considered offensive and disgusting; hence the latter, "lasere infectas carnes," and "laseratum porcellum." According to Theophrastus, asafoetida was collected and preserved, as it is at present, in skins; and, despite its estimation as a culinary ingredient, it was not unfrequently named stercus diaboli. In addition to this gum, they seasoned their food with various other strong articles, such as coriander and cummin seeds, sumac, saffron, cinnamon, thyme; with divers peppers, salt, and sal-ammoniac.

Instead of bread, which was only introduced in Rome 580, A. D. they used a heavy kind of unleavened paste, similar to the present polenta. This nourishment occasioned frequent indigestion, hence the use of warm water after meals, and the necessity of emetics. Warm water was sold about the streets in their thermopolia, and Seneca observed the paleness and debility that arose from its use and abuse; a practice recorded by Martial:

Et potet calidam, qui mihi livet, aquam.

While water was thus freely drunk, wine was not disregarded; but the various articles with which it was adulterated, must have rendered it any thing but a delectable potation according to our received ideas. Thus we see the Greeks putting salt and sea-water in theirs; at other times dissolving mastic and myrrha, or infusing wormwood, in their choicest Falernian. Like modern tasters, however, they knew the method of developing the bouquet by warmth; and, to appreciate the flavour, they frequently added hot water. That wines of a resinous taste were esteemed, appears from Martial:

Resinata bibis vina, Falerna fugis.

But we may conclude that, according to our modern taste, their boasted wines did not equal ours either in flavour or in delicacy.

The ancients however were very careful in the preparation of their bread, justly called the "staff of life," as constituting one of the most wholesome and nutritious parts of our food. The Athenian bakers bore the palm in the confection of this article. Archestratus recommended the wheaten bread of Athens and the barley meal of Lesbos, which their poets asserted was supplied to the gods. The Grecian millet bread was also in great repute, while delicious bread was also made with the Zea, the Triticum Spella of Linnaeus and the Far of the Romans. A species of wheat called Tiphe was also much esteemed. Brown bread was made of a grain called Olyra, and it was with loaves of this description that Homer's heroes fed their horses.

It appears that great attention was paid to the kneeding and the boulting: unboulted meal was called Syncomista, and when finely boulted in a woollen cloth, Semidalis. The most approved method of baking was in the Cribanus or Clibanus, an earthen or iron vessel, which they surrounded with charcoal. Bread according to its superior or inferior quality was consecrated to various divinities. Thus the goddesses used the Homoros, and Hecate was served with the Hemiantium, but we are unacquainted with the preparation of these varieties. The flour of barley was used by the Canephorae, or virgins that bore the sacred baskets in the festivals of Ceres, to sprinkle themselves. Bread according to its particular kind was served up in various ways; wheaten bread was brought to table upon fresh leaves; barley bread upon a layer of reeds. At the feasts of Ceres and Proserpine, a large loaf was kneeded and baked by the ladies of Delos, called Achainas which gave the name to the festival, instituted most probably in Achaia, to commemorate the invention of bread, which Ceres taught to Eumelus, a citizen of Patrae.

Barley for the preparation of bread was used long before wheat or any other sort of corn, and hence Artemidorus calls it Antiquissimum in cibis. It was also given to the athletae who were thence called Hordearii. In latter times it was chiefly given to cattle, although used by the poorer classes. Barley bread was also issued to soldiers as a punishment, the loss of wheaten bread being considered a great privation. Vegetius tells us that soldiers who had been guilty of any offence were thus punished--"hordeum pro frumentuo cogebantur accipere." In the second Punic war we find Marcellus sentencing the cohorts that had lost their standards to this infliction. Suetonius also informs us that Augustus only allowed barley to the troops that had misbehaved in action. Cohortes, si quae cepissent, loco, decimatas hordeo pavit. But there is reason to believe that under the head of bread were included various kinds of cakes, many of which were prepared with honey, some of them were called Placentae omnigenae, and were prepared by bakers who bore the name of pistores dulciarii. This honied bread or cake it appears, was frequently resorted to, as in the present day, to quiet troublesome children as well as to please the taste of fastidious patients. Thus Martial:

Leniat ut fauces medicus, quas aspera vexat Assidue tussis, Parthenopae tibi Mella dari, nucleosque jubet dulcesque placentas. Est quidquid pueros non sinit esse truces, At tu non cessas totis tussire diebus Non est haec tussis, Parthenopae gula est.

The bread made of spring wheat was called Collabus, and the Athenians considered a toasted Collabus eaten with a slice of a pig's belly, the very best cure for a surfeit occasioned by an excess in anchovies, especially the Phalerian ones, which were deemed fit for the gods.

Fragments of bread it appears were used instead of napkins to wipe the fingers on. These were called Apomygdaliae, with which Aristophanes fed his sausage-makers. These dainty bits were usually thrown to dogs.