It may have been some of Mrs. Glasse's compounds that prompted Johnson's remark, "Women can spin very well, but they cannot make a good book of cookery." Many other works during the eighteenth century succeeded "The Art of Cookery," though none achieved its marked popularity. Sufficient has been said of ancient English manuals, however, to present some idea of their quality and enable the reader to judge of the culinary science as it was understood by former generations. Far more slow to develop than in France, English cookery has still much to attain among both the middle and well-to-do classes, and even in the case of most of the restaurants and hotels; the era has not yet dawned in Great Britain when, on arising from the dinner-table, one may truly exclaim:
"Fate cannot harm me, I have dined to-day!"
L'ALMANACH DES GOURMANDS[19]
"Tout s'arrange en dinant dans le siècle où nous sommes,
Et c'est par des dîners qu'on gouverne les hommes."