Week of August 2 (Mini-Update)

August 5 - You: at the coffee shop, pretending to read W.B. Yeats. Brown knitted sweater, frizzy hair, worn jeans. Me: tall, soaking wet and my nose pressed against the window. Something passed between us when you noticed me. Please call mailbox #8675309 .

Ever see those ads searching for missed connections? Here's one from this day in 1758, originally published in the London Chronicle:

A young lady who was at Vauxhall on Tuesday night last, in company with two gentlemen, could not but observe a young gentleman in blue and a gold-laced hat, who, being near her by the orchestra during the performance, especially the last song, gazed upon her with the utmost attention. He earnestly hopes (if unmarried) she will favour him with a line directed to A.D. at the bar of the Temple Exchange Coffee-house, Temple-bar, to inform him whether fortune, family, and character, may not entitle him upon a further knowledge, to hope an interest in hear heart. He begs she will pardon the method he has taken to let her know the situation of his mind, as, being a stranger, he despaired of doing it any othe way, or even of seeing her more. As his views are founded upon the most honourable principles, he presumes to hope the occasion will justify it, if she generously breaks through this trifling formality of the sex, rather than, by a cruel silence, render unhappy one, who must ever expect to continue so if debarred from a nearer acquaintance with her, in whose power alone it is to complete his felicity.

Hone comments that "a description of the various afflictions and modes of relief peculiar to the progress of this disorder would fill many volumes."

There's no word on whether A.D. ever cured his heartache, but one wonders if contemporary approaches to the same illness are more successful than his. [EDBv1]

Mini-Update (Week of December 7)

December 11 - On this day, a letter about Saint Nicholas is published, concerning his yearly visit to the city of Leeuwarden, in the Netherlands:

"During a residence in the above town, some twenty years agone, in the brief days of happy boyhood, (that green spot in our existence,) it was my fortune to be present at one of these annual visitations. Imagine a group of happy youngsters sporting around the domestic hearth, in all the buoyancy of riotous health and spirits, brim-full of joyful expectation, but yet in an occasional pause, casting frequent glances towards the door, with a comical expression of impatience, mixed up with something like dread of the impending event. At last a loud knock is heard, in an instant the games are suspended, and the door slowly unfolding, reveals to sight the venerated saint himself, arrayed in his pontificals, with pastoral staff and jewelled mitre."

Sinterklaas, after praising the family's successes, then gave "his parting benediction, together with the promise (never known to fail,) of more substantial benefits, to be realized on the next auspicious morning."

"Before retiring to rest, each member of the family deposits a shoe on a table in a particular room, which is carefully locked, and the next morning is opened in the presence of the assembled household; when lo! by the mysterious agency (doubtless) of the munificent saint, the board is found covered with bons bons, toys and trinkets.

The writer, identified only as H.H., hopes that others appreciate the "relics of ancient observances, belonging to a more primitive state of manners," and offers the sentiment that "modern refinements, if they tend to render us wiser, hardly make us happier!"

H.H. could never have guessed that Sinterklaas' annual arrival to the Netherlands would be telecast and archived for all to see, but he might have relished the enduring joy in the spectacle. [EDBv1]

Image from Kenneth Verburg's Flickr page

Mini-Update (Week of October 26)

October 29 - For the young student, busy fashioning pumpkin faces over the past weeks, the very same skills that create a toothy grin may come in handy later on.

Consider the progression of the carving knife through the year-end seasons: from Halloween jack o'lanterns to Thanksgiving turkeys and Christmas hams. For this day, Hone publishes a letter that examines the importance of the carver in history and literature.



The friendly command "Come, make yourself at home!" was designed to end idleness more that it was meant to spur merriment. Originally, the idea was to jump into the fray and carve for yourself.

It wasn't always this way. During the time of royal and noble ranks, it was the custom for dinner guests to sit at the table, arranged in order of ranking. Carving started with the host, at the head of the table, and continued as it was passed down to the other end. If you were poor, hopefully you weren't too finicky by the time the roast was slid in front of you:

[T]he fastidious would be sorry to cut it, after it had been mangled by the aristocracy above, then to be washed by the tears of famishing plebians...

At first, the cook was often the carver as well. But the latter eventually carved out a niche for himself, even if the Roman philosopher Seneca didn't think much of it. "Unhappy he who lives but for this one purpose, that he may carve fat fowls with neatness!," he wrote in his Epistle the 47th.

About a century later, the Roman poet Juvenal described the occupation differently, in his Fifth Satire:

The carver, dancing round, each dish surveys
With flying knife; and, as his heart directs,
With proper gesture every fowl dissects.
A thing of so great moment to their taste
That one false slip--had surely marr'd the feast

In time, Chaucer and Shakespeare would make references and allusions to the meat-carver. Within Spanish culture, proficiency in carving was possibly just as important as bravery on the battlefield. For it could show ingenuity and acuteness, in adapting the parts and pieces to the tastes and tempers of the served:--a wing for the ponderous--seasoning for the inexperienced--a merry-thought for the melancholy!

How important is the carver? Observe her face, and listen--is she festive, or solemn? Then pay attention to the rest of the dinner guests and the mood at the table. [YB]

Image from Lex in the City's Flickr page

Mini-Update (Week of October 12)

October 14 - Have you heard the latest buzz? For today, it's bee-master Wildman, famous throughout the west of England for his command over the honeysmiths.



On this day in 1766, Wildman demonstrated his prowess in handling bees, without harm to himself or the bees. Once provided with three stocks of bees, at the Wimbledon home of Lord Spencer in Surrey, he proceeded to show them hanging on his hat, with an empty hive in his other hand.

This was to show that he could take honey and wax without destroying the bees. [...] Then he returned into the room, and came out again with them hanging on his chin, with a very venerable beard.

He could make them enter and exit their hives, swarm in the air, and even "took them up by the handfuls, and tossed them up and down like so many peas." For the finale, he covered himself in bees and rode a horse around the grounds.

During the entire demonstration, no one at the Wimbledon estate even thought to swat at the bees. [EDBv2]

Image from ScienceDaily.com

Mini-Update (Week of September 21)

September 23 - How did platonic kissing get stopped in its tracks? Will the swine flu give it the kiss of death? Once a common part of greetings, it's now relegated to scenes from the French cinema and high-fashion caricature. Along with other varieties, "la bise," or cheek-to-cheek kissing, survives for the moment, despite recent warnings. A correspondent to Hone muses on this "obsolete custom," as it was once practiced in England:

It appears that, under the Tudor reigns, 'the women of this country took great offence if they were not saluted in the form of kissing.' [...] The 'embrace' was not left off, even between men, in the days of James I.; for the Spanish ambassador, being indisposed, it appears 'James visited him, and gave him a hearty embrace in bed.'

The correspondent has it on good authority that, in France, a friend or relation of any gender would resent not being greeted with a friendly kiss. So why did the custom die out in England?

The change of religion, from catholic to protestant, no doubt produced a great change in our national manners and habits, which our neighbors, still adhering to the old religion, have retained.

Before the Reformation, he surmises, "a very striking resemblance" would have been found between French and English habits, spectacles and pastimes. [YB]

Image from Current.com

Mini-Update (Week of September 7)

September 7 - Pining for the fjords? Beware, writes a correspondent on this day in 1825, of the Viriginia Nightingale and other painted birds for sale.

To the Editor of the Times

Sir,--I consider it necessary to inform the public, through your paper, that there is a fellow going about the town, (dressed like a painter,) imposing upon the unwary, by selling them painted birds, for foreign ones.

The trick consisted of showing a paper bag, and saying that he'd been working for a gentleman about to leave England for a foreign country. The gentleman gave the painter his birds, who in turn, would tell a small audience,

but I'm as bad as himself, for I'm going down to Canterbury to-morrow morning myself, to work, and they being of no use to me, I shall take them down to Whitechapel and sell them for what I can get.

Taking a bird out of the bag, he described it as 'a Virginia nightingale, which sung four distinct notes or voices.' Beautiful plumage, too: 'its head and neck was a bright vermilion, the back betwixt the wings a blue, the lower part to the tail a bright yellow, the wings red and yellow...the belly a clear green.' Money changed hands, all the birds were sold, and the fellow quickly departed.

In the course of an hour, continues the correspondent, a barber, a knowing hand in the bird way, who lives in the neighbourhood, came in, and taking a little water, with his white apron he transferred the variegated colours of the nightingale to [his white apron]. The deception was visible--the swindler had fled--and the poor hedge-sparrow had his unfortunate head severed from his body, for being forced to personate a nightingale.

A Licensed Victualler

Upper Thames-street [EDBv1]

Mini-Update (Week of August 31)

September 1 - Dark, rich colors fill the month. Saffron - and its butterfly - appear this month, and its stamens are dried into flat square cakes. The clown in the Winter's Tale, reckoning up what he is to buy for the sheepshearing feast, mentions 'saffron to colour the warden-pies.'

Wardens, a type of long-keeping cooking pear, were found at Cistercian Abbey of Warden, in Bedfordshire. Cooked in wine and nestled in a pie with saffron and ginger, the pears became a sweet filling.



Warden Pie

Take the fairest and best wardens*, and pare them, and take out
the hard cores on the top, and cut the sharp ends at the bottom
flat; then boil them in white wine and sugar, until the syrup grow
thick; then take the wardens from the syrup into a clean dish,
and let them cool; then set them into the coffin, and prick cloves in
the tops, with whole sticks of cinnamon, and great store of sugar,
as for pippins; then cover it, and only reserve a vent hole, so set
it in the oven and bake it: when it is baked, draw it forth, and take
the first syrup in which the wardens were boiled, and taste it, and
if it be not sweet enough, then put in more sugar and some
rose-water, and boil it again a little, then pour it in at a the vent
hole, and shake the pie well; then take sweet butter and rose-water
melted, and with it anoint the pie lid all over, and strew upon it
store of sugar, and so set into the oven again a little space, and
then serve it up. And in this manner you may also bake quinces*.

from "The English Housewife", Gervase Markham, Edited by
Michael R. Best, McGill-Queen's University Press, Canada,
1986, p. 104, #130 [YB]

Recipe from http://www.florilegium.org/

Image from http://www.tastesofbedfordshire.co.uk/

September 4 - Tricks for harvest-time include 'how to keep apples' - for up to a year - and an alternative to produce stickers.

For keeping apples, try the following:

Gather them dry, and put them with clean straw, or clean chaff,
into casks; cover them up close, and put them into a cool dry
cellar. Fruit will keep perfectly good a twelvemonth in
this manner.


For the cultivator of choice fruit, this trick may be handy, as a way around modern identification labels:

Let [him] cut in paper the initial letters of his name, or any
other mark he likes; and just before his peaches, nectarines,
&c. begin to be coloured, stick such letters or mark with
gum-water on that side of the fruit which is next to the
sun. That part of the rind which is under the paper will
remain green, in the exact form of the mark, and so the
fruit be known wheresoever found, for the mark cannot
be obliterated. [EDBv2]

Image from LAT's Emerald City Blog