' Pliny says that it is one of the most valuable plants to
man. Homer relates that it was to the virtues of the yellow
garlic that Ulysses owed his fortunate escape from being
turned into a pig by Circe as well as his companions, whom
he delivered from this disagreeable transformation.'
Although the Greeks cultivated several of the onion tribe
for culinary purposes, they are said to have regarded onion-
eaters in such abhorrence as to look upon them as profane
P
226 OUR VIANDS
persons. This we might readily infer from the straight
classical nose of the race, to which fastidious organ the rank
smell of raw onions would be peculiarly abhorrent. Even
to ourselve?, the smell of onions or garlic in a public con-
veyance or place of amusement, is intensely disagreeable,
and the strongly-flavoured dishes of the Spaniards and
Portuguese — the people of all Europe most given to the
eating of garlic — are most unpleasant to the palate of
Englishmen; and yet, if we attempted to give a list of
English dishes into which the onion in some form enters,
we should wellnigh exhaust the cookery book.
Formerly the onion and garlic played an important part
in pharmacopoeias, but at present the doctor has given them
over to the cook; nevertheless, their medicinal value is
known and acknowledged, and the old remedy for cold-
onion broth — is still prepared in many household?, whilst
the garlic has recently regained somewhat of its former
reputation as a remedy for bronchial coughs and shortness
of breath.
M'Intosh's ' Book of the Garden ' tells us that ' Palladius,
a Greek physician, recommends the onion to be sown with
savory, in which curious opinion Pliny agrees, observing
that onions prosper better when savory is sown with them.'
' It was,' says the writer, ' a current opinion in those days
that certain plants had an antipathy to, or sympathy with,
each other. However absurd such an idea may appear to
us, we should take into consideration, that the opinions of
the ancients may not have been faithfully handed down to
us, or that their works may admit of a somewhat different
construction. We find Phillips observes that all the plants
which they recommend to be sown or planted together are
ROOTS 227
of very opposite natures, and there may be more reason in
the system pursued by the ancients than is generally
allowed; for plants drawing the same juice from the earth
must naturally weaken each other, whereas those requiring
different nutriment may in some degree assist each other,
each feeding upon juices that are prejudicial to plants of
the other species. In this there is great truth.'
Our viands
1893Page 113
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AI-modernized reading of the original text
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' Pliny says that it is one of the most valuable plants to
man. Homer relates that it was to the virtues of the yellow
garlic that Ulysses owed his fortunate escape from being
turned into a pig by Circe as well as his companions, whom
he delivered from this disagreeable transformation.'
Although the Greeks cultivated several of the onion tribe
for culinary purposes, they are said to have regarded onion-
eaters in such abhorrence as to look upon them as profane
P
226 OUR VIANDS
persons. This we might readily infer from the straight
classical nose of the race, to which fastidious organ the rank
smell of raw onions would be peculiarly abhorrent. Even
to ourselve?, the smell of onions or garlic in a public con-
veyance or place of amusement, is intensely disagreeable,
and the strongly-flavoured dishes of the Spaniards and
Portuguese — the people of all Europe most given to the
eating of garlic — are most unpleasant to the palate of
Englishmen; and yet, if we attempted to give a list of
English dishes into which the onion in some form enters,
we should wellnigh exhaust the cookery book.
Formerly the onion and garlic played an important part
in pharmacopoeias, but at present the doctor has given them
over to the cook; nevertheless, their medicinal value is
known and acknowledged, and the old remedy for cold-
onion broth — is still prepared in many household?, whilst
the garlic has recently regained somewhat of its former
reputation as a remedy for bronchial coughs and shortness
of breath.
M'Intosh's ' Book of the Garden ' tells us that ' Palladius,
a Greek physician, recommends the onion to be sown with
savory, in which curious opinion Pliny agrees, observing
that onions prosper better when savory is sown with them.'
' It was,' says the writer, ' a current opinion in those days
that certain plants had an antipathy to, or sympathy with,
each other. However absurd such an idea may appear to
us, we should take into consideration, that the opinions of
the ancients may not have been faithfully handed down to
us, or that their works may admit of a somewhat different
construction. We find Phillips observes that all the plants
which they recommend to be sown or planted together are
ROOTS 227
of very opposite natures, and there may be more reason in
the system pursued by the ancients than is generally
allowed; for plants drawing the same juice from the earth
must naturally weaken each other, whereas those requiring
different nutriment may in some degree assist each other,
each feeding upon juices that are prejudicial to plants of
the other species. In this there is great truth.'