The distance between the healer and the cook has grown to be immense in
recent times. The College of Physicians and Mary Jane in the kitchen are
not on nodding terms--though one sees faint signs of an effort to bridge
the wide gap. But in the seventeenth century the gap can hardly be said to
have existed at all. At the back of the doctor is plainly seen the figure
of the herbalist and simpler, who appear again prominently in the
still-room and the kitchen, by the side of great ladies and great
gentlemen, bent on making the best and the most of the pleasures of the
table no doubt, but quite as much on the maintenance of health as of
hospitality. Simpler, herbalist, doctor, distiller, cook--Digby was all of
them, and all of them with the utmost seriousness; nor in this was he in
the least singular. The great Bacon was deeply concerned with such cares,
though in certain of his recommendations, such as: "To provide always an
apt break-fast," to take this every morning, not to forget to take that
twice a month, one may read more of the valetudinarian than in Digby. _The
Closet Opened_ is but one of an interesting series of books of the kind,
which have been too much neglected by students of seventeenth-century
manners and lore and language. Did not W.J. issue the Countess of Kent's
_Choice Manual of Physic and Chirurgey_, with directions for Preserving and
Candying? Patrick, Lord Ruthven's _Ladies' Cabinet Opened_ appeared in 1639
and 1655. Nor was it only the _cuisine_ of the nobles that roused interest.
One of the curiosities of the time is _The Court and Kitchen of Elizabeth,
commonly called Joan Cromwell, the Wife of the Late Usurper Truly Described
and Represented and now made Publick for general Satisfaction,_ 1644. The
preface is scurrilous beyond belief. Compiled from the gossip of servants,
it is meant to cast ridicule on the housekeeping of the Protector's
establishment. But the second part is a sober collection of by no means
very penurious recipes from Joan's own kitchen books.

Hartman, his steward, made an excellent thing out of Digby's