COOKERY.

It is probable that the Greeks derived something of their skill from the Eastern nations, and principally the Lydians, whose cooks were much celebrated in Athens,—and something from Egypt. A few hints on the subject of cookery are to be collected from Homer, and more from Aristophanes; but it appears that afterwards they had several native writers on the art, who are noticed in Athenæus ; and the cook was certainly considered among that polite people as a person of great consideration. As to the Romans, they of course borrowed much of their culinary skill, with the other fine arts, from the Greeks. In later times they also had many authors on the subject, and the practitioners were men of science; but their works are unfortunately all lost, except that which goes under the name of Apicius, written, as it is supposed, about the time of Heliogabalus, by one Cœlius.

The aboriginal Britons, little better than barbarians, without oil and perhaps butter, with little corn, and from superstition not eating hares, hens, geese, etc., nor fish, could have made little progress in the art of cookery; and Strabo asserts that they had no cheese. The Danes have always had the credit of importing hard drinking into this country, and also gormandizing; which word by some, (absurdly enough,) is derived from Gormund, a Danish king, who was persuaded by Alfred to be baptised. After the Conquest, the English, it is observed by Lord Lyttleton, generally accommodated themselves to the Norman manners, except in point of temperance: but in eating and drinking they communicated to the Normans their own habits of drunkenness and immoderate feasting.

Amongst many choice collections of "Compleat Cooks," etc., which we have examined in the hopes of discovering some choice morsel for the regale of our readers, we found the following curious account of " Triumphs and Trophies in Cookery, to be used at festival times." It is prefixed to the "Accomplished Cook of Robert May, 1664," a gentleman of great eminence in his time, who received his culinary education at the Court of France, as appears by a biographical memoir, which accompanies his book. After giving directions for a "preparation in paste of an artificial ship, and a

castle with battlements, portcullises, drawbridges, etc. with guns and a train of gunpowder to communicate with them; a paste stag is to be made, and placed on the table between them, all to be gilt and ornamented with flags, etc.; his body is to be filled with claret wine, and a broad arrow stuck in it; and on each side of the stag, two pies are to be served, the one filled carefully with live frogs, and the other with live birds; the whole to be garnished round with egg shells, deprived of their meat and filled with rose water. The trains are to be let off, and the ship and castle are daintily to fire at each other in mimic battle; but before this, it is to be so ordered that some of the ladies may pluck the arrow out of the stag, and then will the claret wine follow, as blood running out of a wound. This done, to sweeten the stench of the powder, let the ladies take the egg-sbells full of sweet waters, and throw at each other. All danger beeing seemingly over by this time, you may suppose they will desire to see what is in the pies; when, lifting first the lid off one pie, out slip some frogs! which makes the ladies to skip and shriek! next after, the other pie; whence come out the birds, which, by a natural instinct, flying at the light, will put out the candles; so that, what with the flying birds and skipping frogs, the one above, the other beneath, will cause much delight and pleasure to the whole company! At length the candles are lighted, and a banquet is brought in; the music sounds; and every one, with much delight and content, rehearses his actions in the former passages."

Such were formerly the delights of the nobility, before good housekeeping had entirely left old England! Our tastes, however, are so degenerate, that few, we fear, would now have courage to assist at one of these triumphs. The smoke of the gunpowder, the claret, like blood from a wound, running all over the table, the hopping about the room of a pie full of frogs, the natural instinct of the birds so amusingly putting out the candles, and the eggs and rose-water whizzing about, must have been an admirable whet to the appetites, particularly to those who had the fortune to be in the good graces of some fair lady, and to have four or five eggs full of rose-water flung in their faces.

Edinburgh Review.

The most venerable sticks now surviving, are the smooth ambercoloured canes in the possession of old ladies. They have sometimes a gold head, but oftener a crook of ivory. But they have latterly been much displaced by light umbrellas, the handles of which are imitations of them; and these are gradually retreating before the young parasol, especially about town. The old ladies take the wings of the stage-coaches, and are run away with by John Pullen in a style of infinite convenience. The other sticks in use are for the most part of cherry, oak, and crab, and seldom adorned with more than a leathern tassel-often with nothing. Bamboo and other canes do not abound as might be expected from our intercourse with India; but commerce, in this as in other respects, has overshot its mark. People cannot afford to use sticks, any more than bees could in their hives. There is a very sufficing little manual, equally light and lissom, yclept an ebony switch; but we have not seen it often.

The sticks however are not to be despised by the leisurely, any one who has known what it is to want words, or to slice off the head of a thistle, will allow. The utility of the stick seems divisible into three heads; first, to give a general consciousness of power; second, which may be called a part of the first, to help the demeanour; and third, which may be called a part of the second, to assist a man over the gaps of speech,—the little awkward intervals, called want of ideas.

Deprive a man of his stick, who is accustomed to carry one, and with what a diminished sense of vigour and gracefulness he issues out of his house! Wanting his stick, he wants himself. His self-possession, like Acres's on the duel-ground, has gone out of his fingers' ends. But restore it him, and how he resumes his energy! If a common walking-stick, he cherishes the top of it with his fingers, putting them out and back again with a fresh desire to feel it in his palm! How he twigs the luckless pieces of lilac or other shrubs, that peep out of a garden railing! And if a sneaking-looking dog is coming by, how he longs to exercise his despotism and his moral sense at once, by giving him an invígorating twinge!

Biographical Memoirs.

It is pleasant to have an opportunity to converse with persons, eminent for their ability, kind and benevolent in their dispositions. When the thread of life is broken and that pleasure can no longer be experienced, it is a source of enjoyment to read of their good deeds and useful discoveries, and thus guide our hearts unto wisdom. Such being the case, we feel no hesitation in laying before our readers the following brief Memoir of

JOHN ABERNETHY, Esq. F. R. S.

The eminent and eccentric surgeon, John Abernethy, one of the Court of Assistants of the Royal College of Surgeons, and one of the Curators of their Museum, died at Enfield on the 20th April, 1831, at the age of 66.

The celebrity which he obtained in his profession, is ascribed to the curious conduct that he manifested during his apprenticeship, which gave rise to the idea of his abilities being superior to those of others, although he had not yet displayed any attainments calculated to cause such an expectation. Very soon after the commencement of his medical career, he was appointed assistant surgeon at Saint Bartholemew's Hospital, and afterwards succeeded Mr. Potts, as Lecturer on Anatomy and Surgery. In no mean degree was he esteemed as a writer, and one of his publications, known by many under the title of Read-my-book, "On Local Diseases, Aneurisms, and Disorders of the Digestive Organs," is held in great repute. An improvement that he made in the art of Surgery, by a bold and praise-worthy operation, established his reputation, and added an increase of fame to the English School of Surgery, throughout Europe. By his ability and unceasing exertions, Saint Bartholemew's Hospital rapidly advanced in the scale of popular opinion, and became at last to be considered the first hospital in the metropolis.

Although coarse and uncourteous in his manners, his heart was warmed by the glow of benevolence, as the following anecdotes from one of the correspondents of a monthly journal amply demon

strate :

"In the year 1812, I lacerated my left tendon Achillis, and, after ineffectual attempts at cure by other professional men, consulted Abernethy. On quitting his house, I asked when my next visit should be paid? Your recovery will be slow,' said he, 'if you do not feel much pain, depend upon it you are gradually getting round; if you do feel much pain, then come again-but not else. I don't want your money.'

"In the year 1818, Lieut. D. fell from his horse on a paved street in London, and fractured his skull and arm, whilst his horse trod on his thigh, and greivously injured the limb. Abernethy was the surgeon nearest the young man's lodgings; he was sent for he came and attended daily. After the lapse of months, convalescence took place amidst great weakness, when Abernethy enjoined the adoption of shell-fish diet at Margate. His grateful patient requested information as to the amount of his pecuniary debt for professional aid and care? Abernethy smiled, and said, ́ who is that young woman?' She is my wife.' What is your rank in the army?' I am a half-pay Lieutenant.' 'Oh! very well; wait till you are a General, then come and see me, and we'll talk about it." "

Whenever Abernethy's name is mentioned then, whatever else may be said of him, let not his skill or benevolence be forgotten. Sittingbourne. L. L. E.

TIME.

The ancients divided time into years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and moments, as they divided numbers into units, tens, hundreds, thousands, and tens of thousands, and both with an object. If we commence at the bottom and employ well the moments, we turn the minutes into tens, the hours into hundreds, and the weeks and months into thousands-ay, and when there is a happy state of trade, into tens of thousands! Missing an hour, therefore, is somewhat like dropping an important figure in a complex calculation, and the whole labour may be as useless for want of punctuality in one, as for want of accuracy in the other.

COOPER.