"Lord Denbigh's Almond Marchpane," and the 'current wine' of which it is
said "You may drink safely long draughts of it," will appeal perhaps only
to the schoolboy of our weaker generation. Yet there are receipts,
doubtless gathered in Sir Kenelm's later years, that have the cautious
invalid in view. Of these are the "Pleasant Cordial Tablets, which are
very comforting and strengthen nature much," and the liquor which is called
"smoothing." "In health you may dash the Potage with a little juyce of
Orange" is in the same low key. The gruels are so many that we must wish
Mr. Woodhouse had known of the book. If the admixture of "wood-sorrel and
currens" had seemed to him fraught with peril, he could have fallen back on
the "Oatmeal Pap of Sir John Colladon."

Where are all the old dishes vanished to? Who has ever known "A smoothening
Quiddany of Quinces?" Who can tell the composition of a Tansy? These are
tame days when we have forgotten how to make Cock-Ale. They drank 'Sack
with Clove-gilly-flowers' at the "Mermaid," I am sure. What is Bragot? What
is Stepony? And what Slipp-coat Cheese? Ask the baker for a Manchet. The
old names call for a _Ballade. Où sont les mets d'antan?_ And, cooks, with
all your exactness about pounds and ounces and minutes of the clock, can
you better directions like these? Watch for "a pale colour with an eye of
green." "Let it stand till you may see your shadow in it"; or "till it
begin to blink." Your liquid may boil "simpringly," or "in a great
ebullition, in great galloping waves." "Make a liaison a moment, about an
Ave Maria while." And all the significance of the times and seasons we have
lost in our neglect to kill male hogs "in the wane of the moon!" For there
is a lingering of astrology in all this kitchen lore. The irascible
Culpeper, Digby's contemporary, poured scorn on such doctors as knew not
the high science, "Physick without astronomy being like a lamp without
Oil."