ought to recollect at the same time, that it was perhaps in this case
as it was in regard to letters and the arts, and that we are under a
certain amount of obligation to the monks for modifying the barbarism
of the table, and encouraging a study of gastronomy.

There are more ways to fame than even Horace suspected. The road to
immortality is not one but manifold. A man can but do what he can. As
the poet writes and the painter fills with his inspiration the
mute and void canvas, so doth the Cook his part. There was formerly
apopular work in France entitled "Le Cuisinier Royal," by MM. Viard
and Fouret, who describe themselves as "Hommes de Bouche." The
twelfth edition lies before me, a thick octavo volume, dated 1805. The
title-page is succeeded by an anonymous address to the reader, at the
foot of which occurs a peremptory warning to pilferers of dishes or
parts thereof; in other words, to piratical invaders of the copyright
of Monsieur Barba. There is a preface equally unclaimed by signatures
or initials, but as it is in the singular number the two _hommes
de bouche_ can scarcely have written it; perchance it was M. Barba
aforesaid, lord-proprietor of these not-to-be-touched treasures; but
anyhow the writer had a very solemn feeling of the debt which he had
conferred on society by making the contents public for the twelfth
time, and he concludes with a mixture of sentiments, which it is very
difficult to define: "Dans la paix de ma conscience, non moins que
dans l'orgueil d'avoir si honorablement rempli cette importante
mission, je m'ecrierai avec le poete des gourmands et des amoureux:

"Exegi monumentum aere perennius
Non omnis moriar."