[2.] Guisnes: f. A kind of little, sweet, and long cherries; tearmed so because at first they came out of Guyenne; also any kind of Cherries. Cotgrave.
[3.] Corneille, a Cornill berrie; Cornillier, The long cherrie, wild cherrie, or Cornill tree. Cotgrave.
[From the Rev. Walter Sneyd’s copy of Mr Davenport Bromley’s MS.]
Mr Sneyd has just told me that Mr Arthur Davenport’s MS. How to serve a Lord, referred to in my Preface to Russell, p. lxxii., is in fact the one from Mr Sneyd’s copy of which his sister quoted in her edition of the ‘Italian Relation of England’ mentioned on pp. xiv. xv. of my Forewords. Mr Sneyd says: ‘I made my copy nearly forty years ago, during the lifetime of the late Mr A. Davenport’s grandfather, who was my uncle by marriage. I recollect that the MS. contains a miscellaneous collection of old writings on various subjects, old recipes, local and family memoranda, &c., all of the 15th century, and, bound up with them in the old vellum wrapper, is an imperfect copy of the first edition of the Book of St Alban’s. On Mr Arthur Davenport’s death, last September, the MS. (with the estates) came into the possession of Mr Davenport Bromley, M.P., but a long time must elapse before it can be brought to light, as the house you mention is still unfinished, and the boxes of books stowed away in confusion.’ On my asking Mr Sneyd for a sight of his copy, he at once sent it to me, and it proved so interesting—especially the Feast for a Bride, at the end—that I copied it out directly, put a few notes to it, and here it is.[1] For more notes and explanations the reader must look the words he wants them for, out in the Index at the end of Part II. The date of the Treatise seems to me quite the end of the 15th century, if not the beginning of the 16th. The introduction of the Chamber, p. 356, the confusion of the terms of a Carver, ‘unlose or tire or display,’ p. 357—enough to make a well-bred Carver faint: even Wynkyn de Worde in 1508 and 1513 doesn’t think of such a thing—the cheese shred with sugar and sage-leaves,
p. 355, the ‘Trenchours of tree or brede,’ l. 16, below, &c., as well as the language, all point to a late date. The treatise is one for a less grand household than Russell, de Worde, and the author of the Boke of Curtastye prescribed rules for. But it yields to none of the books in interest: so in the words of its pretty ‘scriptur’ let it welcome all its readers:
“Welcombe you bretheren godely in this hall!
Joy be unto you all
that en[2] this day it is now fall!