What the condition of cookery may have been during the Middle Ages it is not easy to ascertain, just because there is no literature which might have recorded the practices even of the highest and ruling classes of society. Careme rather puts the cart before the horse, when he says of the Middle Ages : ‘ When there was no longer a kitchen in the world, there was also no literature, no longer any high and quick intelligence, no longer any inspiration, no longer any social idea.’ This is mere declamation, particularly the part about ‘ inspiration ’ and ‘ idea,’ and reminds of the * Oj. Hippocrat., ‘De Diiet.,’ ii. ; (talen, 'Do Aliment. Facult.,’ iii. ; Soyer, ‘ I’antroplieon,’ p. 150. 630 THE SI'IRIT OF COOKERY American Emerson and his claptrap about inspiration of daily thought. An inspiration must needs be a communica- tion from without by spiritual means, not by materials coming from the kitchen. But neither is there any proof that in the Middle Ages there was no ‘ kitchen,’ meaning that there existed no art and practice of cookery. And, indeed, when we study closely the system of Eoman cookery, we do not easily perceive that much could be lost that was superior to the practice of any nations that rose at all above the level of ‘ the age of innocence and acorns.’ Gastronomy was restored by the opulent cities Genoa, Venice, Florence, Milan. Autocratic rulers, who, like all tyrants, including spiritual ones, are deteriorated hy con- tact with their tools, did much less for culture and refine- ment than republican cities. Even the hierarchy did not much for the promotion of the culinary art, although they used it when it was achieved. But with art in general, that of cookery also rose in Italy, and much by the same kind of genius, beginning with Leonardo da Vinci ; from Italy it spread into France and Germany, together with the luxury so well represented in contemporaneous pictures, particu- larly by Paul of Verona in the ‘ Wedding of Cana.’ When the new science of cooking and dining had passed iuto France with Catherine of Medicis, it developed there under the reigns of Francis II., Charles IX., and Henry III., covering a period of thirty years — 1559 to 1589. Then returned again that most desirable of all table luxuries — the service of clean table linen — which had been practised at the time of Augustus, but had been discontinued in the retrogression of the Middle Ages. For a highly instructive and attractive descriptiou of cookery and dining as practised by the highest classes at the time of the Eenaissance, we may refer the reader to the article of the late bir A. II. Layard already quoted, p. 13. One of the principal results of this relation was that the RENAISSANCE COOKERY AND DINING 631 Italians knew little of the elements of savour as we under- stand them now, but dressed even naturally savoury dishes so as to make them sweet, or accompanied them with sweet entremets, as we do pork and goose with apple sauce, or mutton and venison with currant jelly.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

What the condition of cookery may have been during the Middle Ages it is not easy to ascertain, just because there is no literature which might have recorded the practices even of the highest and ruling classes of society. Careme rather puts the cart before the horse, when he says of the Middle Ages : ‘ When there was no longer a kitchen in the world, there was also no literature, no longer any high and quick intelligence, no longer any inspiration, no longer any social idea.’ This is mere declamation, particularly the part about ‘ inspiration ’ and ‘ idea,’ and reminds of the * Cf. Hippocrat., 'De Diæt.,' ii.; Galen, 'De Aliment. Facult.,' iii.; Soyer, 'Pantropheon,' p. 150. American Emerson and his claptrap about inspiration of daily thought. An inspiration must needs be a communication from without by spiritual means, not by materials coming from the kitchen. But neither is there any proof that in the Middle Ages there was no ‘ kitchen,’ meaning that there existed no art and practice of cookery. And, indeed, when we study closely the system of Roman cookery, we do not easily perceive that much could be lost that was superior to the practice of any nations that rose at all above the level of 'the age of innocence and acorns.' Gastronomy was restored by the opulent cities Genoa, Venice, Florence, Milan. Autocratic rulers, who, like all tyrants, including spiritual ones, are deteriorated hy contact with their tools, did much less for culture and refinement than republican cities. Even the hierarchy did not much for the promotion of the culinary art, although they used it when it was achieved. But with art in general, that of cookery also rose in Italy, and much by the same kind of genius, beginning with Leonardo da Vinci; from Italy it spread into France and Germany, together with the luxury so well represented in contemporaneous pictures, particularly by Paul of Verona in the 'Wedding of Cana.' When the new science of cooking and dining had passed into France with Catherine of Medicis, it developed there under the reigns of Francis II., Charles IX., and Henry III., covering a period of thirty years—1559 to 1589. Then returned again that most desirable of all table luxuries — the service of clean table linen — which had been practised at the time of Augustus, but had been discontinued in the retrogression of the Middle Ages. For a highly instructive and attractive descriptiou of cookery and dining as practised by the highest classes at the time of the Eenaissance, we may refer the reader to the article of the late bir A. II. Layard already quoted, p. 13. One of the principal results of this relation was that the RENAISSANCE COOKERY AND DINING Italians knew little of the elements of savour as we understand them now, but dressed even naturally savoury dishes so as to make them sweet, or accompanied them with sweet entremets, as we do pork and goose with apple sauce, or mutton and venison with currant jelly.

The spirit of cookery