"Numerous passages in our old dramatic writers show that it was a fashion with the gallants of the time to do some extravagant feat, as a proof of their love, in honour of their mistresses; and among others, the swallowing some nauseous potion was one of the most frequent: but vinegar would hardly have been considered in this light; wormwood might. In Thomas's Italian Dictionary, 1562, we have 'Assentio, Eysell;' and Florio renders that word [Assentio] by Wormwood. What is meant, however is absinthites, or wormwood wine, a nauseously bitter medicament then much in use; and this being evidently the bitter potion of eysell in the poet's sonnet, was certainly the nauseous draught proposed to be taken by Hamlet, among the other extravagant feats as tokens of love."
The reader will judge with what justice the words "evidently" and "certainly" are used. MR. SINGER then cites Junius, but to little purpose; Hutton's Dictionary, to prove that absinthites meant "wormwood-wine;" and Stuckius's Antiquitates Convivales to show that absinthites was a propoma; but Stuckius, be it observed, mentions this propoma only as a stomachic, quod vim habet stomachum corroborandi et extenuandi.
It is not surprising, therefore, that LORD BRAYBROOKE (Vol. ii., p. 286.) should quote against MR. SINGER'S theory the following paragraph:
"If, as MR. SINGER supposes, 'Eisell was absinthites, or wormwood-wine, a nauseously bitter medicament then much in use,' Pepys's friends must have had a very singular taste, for he records on the 24th of November, 1660:
'Creed, and Shepley, and I, to the Rhenish wine-house, and there I did give them two quarts of wormwood wine.'
"Perhaps the beverage was doctored for the English market, and rendered more palatable than it had been in the days of Stuckius."
Two other correspondents of the "NOTES AND QUERIES" also, C. H. (Vol. iii., p. 508.) and GOMER (ibid.), assert that eysell, if it means any potion at all, must mean vinegar; C. H. referring to a MS. at Cambridge (Dd. i. fol. 7.), date about 1350, in which occurs,—
"Þe iewis herde þis word wet alle
And anon eysel þei mengid wiþ galle:"
and GOMER relying on the support of the Welsh word Aesell, which implies verjuice or vinegar. D. ROCK, too, adduces the 'Festival' in the sermon for St. Michael's day: