Donaldson’s Beer Cup is of a more simple and lighter character. To a pint of ale is added the peel of half a lemon, half a liquor-glass of noyau, a bottle of seltzer-water, a little nutmeg and sugar, and some ice.
“Hungerford Park” is an excellent beverage, and is especially suitable for shooting parties in hot weather. To make it—cut into slices three good-flavoured apples, which put into a jug; add the peel and juice of one lemon, a very little grated nutmeg, three bottles of ginger-beer, half a pint of sherry, two and a quarter pints of good draught ale, sweeten to taste with sifted loaf sugar, stir a little to melt the sugar, and let the jug stand in ice. “The addition of half a bottle of champagne makes it awfully good,” wrote a certain Colonel B., in the Field, a few years ago.
Freemasons’ Cup, which may be drank either hot or cold, is of a very potent character, and consists of a pint of Scotch ale, a similar quantity of mild beer, half a pint of brandy, a pint of sherry, half a pound of loaf sugar, and plenty of grated nutmeg. Freemasons must have strong heads.
It will, no doubt, have been noted ere this that between mulled ale and the majority of hot beer-cups the distinction is rather in name than composition, and the various receipts for mulling ale so closely resemble the Wassail Bowl, Flip, &c., that it is quite unnecessary to quote any of {392} them. A word or two on cup making. Cups are easily made and easily marred. All the ingredients must be of good quality, and the vessels used sweet and clean. Everything required should be at hand before the mixing commences, and that important process should proceed as quickly as possible. Few servants can be trusted to brew cups, but if the matter is placed in their hands you cannot do better than caution them in terms similar to those addressed by Dr. King to his maid Margaret:—
O Peggy, Peggy, when thou go’st to brew, Consider well what you’re about to do; Be very wise—very sedately think That what you’re going to make is—drink; Consider who must drink that drink, and then What ’tis to have the praise of honest men; Then future ages shall of Peggy tell, The nymph who spiced the brewages so well.
Yet two more beverages compounded of ale or beer, and then this portion of the subject is completed. First, Shandy Gaff, the very writing of which word brings to us visions of a shining river, of shady backwaters, of sunny days, of two-handled tankards, and of deep cool draughts well earned. For the sake of the unfortunate few who are unacquainted with the beverage, the receipt is given: One pint of bitter beer, one bottle of the old-fashioned ginger-beer mixed together, and imbibed only on the hottest summer days, after rowing. Why, we cannot say; but Shandy Gaff always seems to us out of place anywhere but on the river.
Secondly and lastly—Mother-in-law, which, also, to some of us may bring visions—but of another kind. The drink of this name is composed of equal proportions of “old and bitter.”
If there is one season of the year more appropriate than another to hot beer-cups, be they Wassail Bowls, Lambswool, Flip or Mulled Ale, it is Christmas. Edward Moxon, a poet who flourished about the commencement of this century, presents in his Christmas a charming picture of the merry circle gathered round the crackling yule log, regaling themselves with mulled ale:—
Right merry now the hours they pass, Fleeting thro’ jocund pleasure’s glass, The yule-log too burns bright and clear, Auspicious of a happy year: {393} While some with joke and some with tale, But all with sweeter mullèd ale, Pass gaily life’s sweet stream along, With interlude of ancient song— And as each rosy cup they drain, Bounty replenishes again.
From the excellent beverages compounded of ale or beer, concerning which so much has been said in this chapter, let us turn to the cups, flagons, horns, bowls and other vessels used by ale drinkers, and in some of which these beverages were compounded.