The fertile country inhabited by the Jewish people furnished them with a very great variety of excellent provisions. Those of which they made the greatest consumption, and which we find generally mentioned in the Scriptures, are bread, flour, barley, beans, lentils, wine, raisins, figs, honey, butter, oil, sheep, oxen, fatted calves, &c.[XXX_1]
The fat of animals offered in sacrifice was reserved for the Lord;[XXX_2] but, with this exception, the Hebrews could freely make use of it. They esteemed it much, and when they wished to speak of a rich banquet, they called it “a banquet of fat animals.”[XXX_3] “He that loveth wine and oil,”[R] says Solomon, “shall not be rich.”[XXX_4]
The extreme simplicity of the greater part of the Biblical repasts ought not to induce us to suppose that the Jews were entire strangers to the inspirations of good cheer. “Solomon’s provisions for one day were thirty measures of fine flour, and three score measures of meal, ten fat oxen, and twenty oxen out of the pastures, and an hundred sheep, besides harts, and roebucks, and fallow-deer, and fatted fowl.”[XXX_5]
That primitive nation also knew different kinds of banquets, which, conformably with their naïve manners, were associated with the celebration of a religious solemnity, a sad or a joyful event, a family festivity or mourning, a victory or a public calamity.[XXX_6]
The Greeks and Romans, skilful masters in the art of good living, were early on the alert to assure the collection of all things necessary for the support of life. “Take care,” said Aurelian to Flavius, “take care, above all things, that the markets of Rome be well supplied: nothing more gay or more peaceful than the people, when they are well fed.”[XXX_7] This remark is much more profound than it at first appears.
At Athens, special officers visited the markets, and only permitted each citizen to purchase and keep in his own house the quantity of provisions necessary for one year.[XXX_8]
The ediles of Rome performed nearly similar functions.[XXX_9] The prefect of the town was invested with the power of making regulations for the markets,[XXX_10] and the prefect of provisions had the inspection of the sale of bread, meat, wine, fish, and all other kinds of aliment required either for the table of the rich or poor plebeian.[XXX_11]
During a long time, in Greece and Italy, the only charm of repasts was, that they furnished an opportunity for the exercise of those duties of kind hospitality, which Apollodorus has described in the following ingenuous style: “As soon as a friend,” says he, “steps on the threshold of his host, the porter receives him with a smiling face; the dog of the house comes immediately to caress him, amicably wagging his tail; then some one runs and presents him a seat without being told.”[XXX_12] This last trait is charming.
But afterwards, they thought much more of honouring the god of good cheer than Jupiter Hospes, and joyous Comus became everywhere the fashionable divinity. One of the ancients describes him in the following manner: “He is seen at the door of an apartment communicating with the banqueting hall; his smiling face is fresh, plump, and ruddy; his head is crowned with roses, and he sleeps standing; his left hand rests on a thyrsus, but sleep makes him loose his hold; he staggers, and the torch will soon fall from his grasp.”[XXX_13]
The Greeks were fervent in their worship of this god, at an epoch when Rome still prided herself on her transcendant sobriety. Conon gave a banquet to all the Athenians after the battle of Cnidos, about four centuries before the Christian era; and his celebrated contemporary, the handsome Alcibiades, conqueror in the Olympic games, magnificently regaled the numerous spectators who had just applauded his triumph.[XXX_14]