Don Sebastian of Portugal, being no epicure himself, determined to train his people by issuing a sumptuary edict that none of his subjects might have more than two dishes, and those of the simplest character, for their meals; but he forgot that no decree could alter the daily life of his people.
Bianca of Milan, whom Maximilian the “Moneyless” married for her dowry, died of indigestion brought on by eating too freely of snails—“the large and lively sort,” reared for the market in the fierce heat below. Royal fatalities of this kind have been numerous. Thus in 1740 Charles, the brother and successor of Joseph I., not only went out hunting in the wet when he had the gout, but persisted in eating voraciously of mushrooms stewed in oil. Like Louis Philippe, he would not believe his medical advisers as they stood at his bedside “disputing as to whether mushrooms were a digestible diet or the contrary;” but, dismissing them from his presence, he ordered his favourite delicacy, the penalty for eating which was his death.
Among our early kings who in some measure patronised the culinary art may be mentioned Richard Cœur de Lion, who loved venison, “the stealers of which he punished by the most horrible of mutilations;” while his brother John, who was equally fond of venison, is reported to have given great offence to certain clerical gentlemen by a joke at dinner upon a fat haunch, which, he said, “had come from a noble hart that had never heard mass,” which was regarded as a reflection on their corpulency.
Edward III. paid every attention to good cheer; and as many as two thousand cooks are said to have been employed in the royal kitchen of Richard II., his chief cuisinier having been known by the initials C. S. S., under which he wrote a culinary work, “On the Forme of Cury,” in which Richard II. is spoken of as his royal master, “the best and royallest viander of all Christian kynges.”
A porpoise was a fashionable dish in the time of Henry V., who first had it at the royal table, and England, it is said, had never seen a king who gave dinners on so extravagantly profuse a scale as Edward IV.[31]
Henry VIII. was an epicure, and a liberal rewarder “of that sort of merit which ministered to the gratification” of his palate, on one occasion having been so well pleased with the flavour of a new pudding that he gave a manor to the inventor. It may be added that Cardinal Campeggio—one of the legates charged to treat with Henry VIII. concerning his divorce from Catherine—drew up a report on the state of the English cookery, as compared with that of Italy and France, for the special use of the Pope.
Anne Boleyn appears to have been very much of an epicure, and when staying, in the year 1527, at Windsor, Henry sent her by Heneage, who was the gentleman-in-waiting, a dish from his own table for supper; and yet even that did not content her, for all the time, it is said, she was hankering after Wolsey’s dainties, and expressing her wish “for some of his good meat, as carpes, shrimpes, and other delicacies.” And when in the year 1535 Viscountess Lisle, who was ambitious of obtaining appointments for two of her daughters in the royal household, sent her some dotterels, which were at that time esteemed a dainty dish, and calculated to tickle the palate of an epicure queen, she received from a friend the following note: “The Queen did appoint six of your dotterels for her supper, six for Monday dinner, and six for supper. My Lord of Rochford presented them himself, and showed her how they were killed new at twelve of the clock in Dover, of the which she was glad, and spake many good words towards your ladyship’s good report, as I was informed by them that stood by.”[32]
As for the royal table of Elizabeth, nothing could surpass the solemn order in which it was laid out, or the number of triple genuflections which accompanied every movement of the noble waiters; but all this was only for show, as the meat was finally taken off the table into an inner room, where the Queen herself dined in the utmost privacy and simplicity.[33] Her Sunday’s dinner on the 19th of November 1576 consisted of beef, mutton, veal, swan, goose, capons, conies, friants, custards, and fritters for the first course. For the second, lamb, kid, herons, pheasant, fowls, godwits, peacocks, larks, tarts, and fritters.
Her average dinner was varied with plovers, veal pies, custards, boiled partridges, boiled beef, snipes, pheasants, chicken pies, and tarts, and cost on an average £4 a dinner.
Her fish dinners were of great variety. The first course included long pike, salmon, haddock, whiting, gurnet, tench, and brill; the second, sturgeon, conger, carp, eels, lamperns, chine of salmon, perch, lobster, tarts, and creams; the side dishes were sturgeon, porpoise, fish collops and eggs, dories, soles and lampern pies, cod, boiled conger, bream, and red fish; the second course occasionally included warden pie, smelts, boiled veal, boiled mutton, pullets, partridges, and panado.