ragout; minced the sole; cut the wooden heel into very thin slices, fried them in batter, and placed them round the dish for garnish. The company, you may be sure, testified their affection for the lady by eating very heartily of this exquisite impromptu; and as this transaction happened just after the French king had taken a cobler's daughter for his mistress, Tom Pierce (who has the style as well as art of a French cook) in his bill politely called it, in honour of her name, de soulier a la Murphy. Taverns, Mr. Town, seem contrived for the promoting of luxury; while the humbler chop-houses are designed only to satisfy the ordinary cravings of nature. Yet at these you may meet with a variety of characters. At Dolly's and Horseman's you commonly see the hearty lovers of a beef-steak and gill ale, and at Betty's, and the chop-house about the inns of court, a pretty maid is as inviting as the provisions. In these common refectories you may always find the jemmy attorney's clerk, the prim curate, the walking physician, the captain upon half pay, the shabby valet de chambre upon board wages, and the foreign count or marquis in dishabille, who has refused to dine with a duke or an ambassador. At a lit-tle eating-house in a dark alley behind the 'Change, I once saw a grave citizen, worth a plumb, order a twopenny mess of broth with a boiled chop in it: and when it was brought him, he scooped the crumb out of an halfpenny roll, and soaked it in the porridge for his present meal; then carefully placing the chop between the upper and under crust, he wrapped it up in a checked handkerchief, and carried it off for the morrow's repast. I shall leave it to you, sir, to make farther reflections on this subject, and should be glad to dine with you at any tavern, dive with you into any cellar, take a beef-steak in Ivy lane, a mutton chop behind St. Clement's, or (if you chuse it) an extempore sausage or black-pudding over the farthing fries at Moor fields. Your humble servant, Pye-Corner Mr. Town! BY Jove it is a shame, a burning shame, to see the honour of England, the glory of our nation, the greatest pillar of life, Roast Beef, utterly banished from our tables. This evil, like many others has been growing upon us by degrees. It was begun by wickedly placing the beef upon a side-table, and screening it by a parcel of queue-tailed fellows in laced waistcoats. However, the odorous effluvia generally affected the smell of every true Briton in the room. The butler was fatigued with carving; the master of the house grew pale, and sickened at the sight of those juicy collops of fat and lean, that came swimming in gravy, smoking most deliciously under our nostrils. Other methods therefore were to be pursued. The Beef was still served up, but it was brought up cold, It was put upon a table in the darkest part of the room, and immured between four walls formed artificially by the servants with the hats of the compa ny. When the jellies and slip-slops were coming in, the beef was carried off in as secret a manner, as if it had gone through the ceremonies of concoction. But still, sir, under all these disadvantages we had a chance of getting a slice as it passed by. Now alas! it is not suffered to come up stairs. I dare say, it is generally banished from the steward's table; nor do I suppose, that the powdered footmen will touch it, for fear of daubing their ruffles. So that the dish that was served up to the royal tables, the dish that was the breakfast of queen Elizabeth and her maids of honour, the dish that received the dignity of knighthood from king James the First, is now become the food only of scullions and stable boys. In what words can I vent my resentment upon this occasion? especially when I reflect, that innovations seldom come alone. Toasted cheese is already buried in rammekins plumb-porridge has been long banished: I tremble for plumb-pudding. May we not live to see a leg of pork detested as carrion? and a shoulder of mutton avoided as if it were horse-flesh? Our only hopes are in the clergy, and in the beef-steak club. The former still preserve, and probably will preserve, the rectitude of their appetites; and will do justice to beef, wherever they find it. The latter, who are composed of the most ingenious artists in the kingdom, meet every Saturday in a noble room at the top of Covent-Garden theatre, and never suffer any dish except beef-steaks to appear. These, indeed, are most glorious examples: but what, alas! are the weak endeavours of a few to oppose the daily inroads of fricassees and soup maigres! This, Mr. Town, is a national concern, as it may prove more destructive to beef than the distemper among the horned cattle: and should the modish aversion against rumps and sirloins continue, it will be absolutely necessary to enforce the love of beef by act of parliament. Yours, GOLIAH ENGLISH. No. XX. THURSDAY, JUNE 13. Non umbræ altorum memorum, non mollia possunt No rural charms her joyless mind can move, VIRG. THE ladies of the present age are strangely altered from the unpolished females, who flourished in the days of Romance. What modern Parthenissa would not prefer a tall young fellow to the most beautiful dwarf in the universe, or a coach and six to a white palfry? The fair damsels of old were chiefly to be found in woods and forests; but our present heroines are distinguished by an utter aversion to the country, and would as soon be confined by a giant in an enchanted castle, as immured with old maiden aunts in the family mansion house, Nothing is more dreadful to our ladies of quality than the approach of summer: for what woman of spirit would chuse to leave the town to wander in solitudes and deserts; or what pleasure can the long days give to our fine ladies, when the pretty creatures are conscious, that they look best by candle-light? The general complaint against the country is want of amusement, or want of company; but these common inconveniences are trifles in comparison to the sufferings of the poor la dy, who wrote the following letter, which was communicated to me with leave to make it public, Dear Lady Charlotte, I HAVE been plagued, pestered, teized to death, and hurried out of my wits, ever since I have been in this odious country. O my dear, how I long to be in town again! Pope and the poets may talk what they will, of their purling streams, shady groves, and flowery meads: but I had rather live all my days among the cheese-mongers shops in Thames-street, than pass such another spring in this filthy country. Would you believe it? I have scarce touched a card since I have been here: and then there has been such ado with us about election matters, that I am ready to die with the vapours :such a rout with their hissing and hallowing, my head is ready to split into a thousand pieces! If my Sir John must be in parliament, why cannot he do as your lord does, and be content with a borough, where he might come in without all this trouble, and take his seat in the house, though he has never been within an hundred miles of the place. Our house, my dear, has been a perfect inn, ever since we came down; and I have been obliged to trudge about as much as a fat landlady. Our doors are open to every dirty fellow in the country, that is worth forty shillings a year; all my best floors are spoiled by the hobnails of farmers stumping about them; every room is a pig-stye, and the Chinese paper in the drawing-room stinks so abominably of punch and tobacco, that it would strike you down to come into it. If you knew what I have suffered, you would think I had the constitution of a washerwoman to go through it. We never sit down to table without a dozen or more of boisterous two-legged crea tures as rude as bears; and I have nothing to do but to heap up their plates, and drink to each of their healths. What is worse than all, one of the beasts got tipsy, and nothing would serve him but he must kiss me, which I was forced to submit to for fear of losing his vote and interest. Would you think it, dear Charlotte ?....do not laugh at me....I stood god. mother in person to a huge lubberly boy at a country farmer's and they almost poisoned me with their hodge-podge they called caudle, made of sour ale and brown sugar. All this and more I have been obliged to comply with, that the country fellows might not say, my lady is proud and above them. |